Gilded cage is the third and final part of the trilogy on Sandeep Bamzai’s madre vatan, Kashmir. He has deep dived into history over these last four years to write two definitive and contrasting tales emerging out of the same fountainhead of India’s brutal partition,  a result of Britain’s decolonization. Join us as we showcase all three books in this trilogy and take you on a journey through the rich culture, history, and traditions of Kashmir.

Bonfire of Kashmiriyat

Weaving a defining story of Kashmir’s accession to India by Bamzai is a commendable effort. The plot is an insight into the interplay between the Central government and the State government as it tried to handle the post accession reality of a Muslim majority state’s integration with a Hindu dominated Dominion. As a sutradhar, he tells the story of Sheikh Abdullah, who wanted autonomy for Kashmir because he could not reconcile with Hindu Jammu, with Nehru and Jinnah playing out their respective roles on the canvas.

Princestan: How Nehru, Patel and Mountbatten Made India

In the run-up to independence, a vile plan was devised by a handful of powerful princes to not join either India or Pakistan. The plan was led by the Chancellor of the chamber of princes, Nawab of Bhopal, who was operating under the patronage of Mohd. Ali Jinnah, Lord wavell and British prime Minister Winston Churchill. The idea was to create a third dominion called princestan where the 565 princely states would stay outside the ambit of the two free states and retain paramountcy under the aegis of the departing British. The success of such a malevolent plan would have made the newly independent nation unstable and vulnerable. However, three persons stood in the way of the nefarious British plan to balkanize India. This is the hitherto untold story of how Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten and Sardar Patel battled the rulers of the princely states at every twist and turn to foil that cunning plan, even as the process of decolonization had begun.

Gilded Cage: Years that Made and Unmade Kashmir

In a powerful third part to his Kashmir trilogy, Sandeep Bamzai’s latest potboiler, The Gilded Cage, documents the contentious years that resulted in the making and unmaking of the ‘Kashmir issue’. From the emergence of Sheikh Abdullah in Kashmir’s politics up to his arrest to the disillusionment of the Kashmiri masses from their leadership, Kashmir turned into a caged match, a diabolical kill box where Pakistan’s attempts to mask the scent of the snare has and is creating consternation in the Valley. From Jinnah’s naked obsession for Kashmir to Sheikh Abdullah’s staunch hatred for Jinnah, from Jawaharlal Nehru’s comprehension of the Valley being a shop window for his brand of secular politics to Maharaja Hari Singh’s streak of remaining independent in the face of both India and Pakistan, this book covers the vital years that defined Kashmir’s accession to India.
Accessing letters, files and documents never produced earlier in the public domain, Bamzai travels the duplicitous and often-tortuous path of history to bring to light the equally treacherous history of Kashmir.