Keywords for Modern India provides a powerful introduction to modern India’s culture, politics and society, through an exploration of the English language vocabulary that is used in writing in and about a country that is becoming ever more in need of understanding as it becomes increasingly significant in world affairs. By two scholars who have lived and worked in different parts of India for many years, the book is modelled after the classic study of English culture and society by Raymond Williams. Like Williams’ Keywords, this book too is much more than a dictionary, aiming to illuminate debates and controversies over the meanings and uses of significant words, and to explore how their meanings have changed over time, as a window on processes of social and political change.