Proactive Humanism

Tikekar pens a narrative laced with academic research, often bringing personal experiences to bear on the writing. Across the Wagah is neither a travelogue nor an academic treatise, and is more readable for it. You travel with her and discover two things: that we must differentiate between people, nation and State, and that territorial boundaries and cultural frontiers do not necessarily coincide. And Kashmir? The place, people, culture, references come into her narrative often but she rightly skirts the geopolitical debate. There’s no place for it here, this is a book about the people beyond the boundary, a picture we almost never get to see.