Sham, an aspiring youth from a prosperous rural family, narrates the conflict between ancient cultural values and the emerging modern lifestyle. He realises that in the process of receiving good education to tap new opportunities and lead a lavish life, the new generation has been chasing materialistic acquisition at the cost of social inequality and environmental destruction, ending up in stress and frustration. Realising the erosion of traditional values, the enlightened villagers, with the advice of their spiritual leader, try to strike a balance between moral obligations, cultural values and emerging opportunities of the new world to live happily and in harmony with nature. The Shami tree in Hindu mythology is a symbol of strength and endurance which sacrifices its own life to save other lives while inspiring human beings to search for self-realisation. It also demonstrates its importance in the food chain and in the conservation of biodiversity. This self-help fiction motivates young parents to understand their moral obligations and promote spiritual and cultural values among their growing children.

Plants personify the divine— The Rig Veda (X.97) Trees and plants have long been held sacred to communities the world over. In India, we have a whole variety of flora that feature in our myths, our epics, our rituals, our worship and our daily life. There is the pipal, under which the Buddha meditated on the path to enlightenment; the banyan, in whose branches hide spirits; the ashoka, in a grove of which Sita sheltered when she was Ravana’s prisoner; the tulsi, without which no Hindu house is considered complete; the bilva, with whose leaves it is possible to inadvertently worship Shiva. Before temples were constructed, trees were open-air shrines sheltering the deity, and many were symbolic of the Buddha himself. Sacred Plants of India systematically lays out the sociocultural roots of the various plants found in the Indian subcontinent, while also asserting their ecological importance to our survival. Informative, thought-provoking and meticulously researched, this book draws on mythology and botany and the ancient religious traditions of India to assemble a detailed and fascinating account of India’s flora.

A TO Z INDIA - OCTOBER 2023 Monthly Magazine

The intellectual and cultural efflorescence in Goa reached its apogee in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Antonio Bernardo de Bragana Pereira was a product of this time, and Ethnography of Goa, Daman and Diu is an expression of the author passionate interest in scholarship and research into various dimensions of Goan life. His intellectual curiosity and critical spirit led him to delve deep to understand the lan vital of the society of his ancestors and to catalogue the many dimensions of Goan life. In the book he describes the rituals, customs and manners of various castes and religions, their habitat, their artisanship, their environment and all aspects of Goa and Goan society. Ethnography of Goa, Daman and Diu was published as a two-volume edition in 1940 in Portuguese. In making the second volume available to a larger readership, the publishers perform a dual role of bringing this scholarly work to a new generation of readers and in a language that will be accessible. Its publication is a tribute to A.B. de Bragan.a Pereiras passionate attachment to Goa and his pride in being a Goan.