Fire on the Ganges Life among the Dead in Banaras by Radhika Iyengar

Radhika Iyengar is the author of the book ‘Fire on the Ganges: Life Among the Dead in Banaras,’ released by HarperCollins. The book explores the city of Banaras (also known as Varanasi) in India, particularly its relationship with death and the afterlife. Fire on the Ganges is the first attempt to chronicle the everyday realities of the Doms in Banaras. Through their tales of struggle and survival, betrayal and love, it tells the at-times-heartbreaking, at-times-exhilarating story of a community struggling to find a place beyond that accorded to it by ancient tradition.

About the book

Fire on the Ganges is the first attempt to chronicle the everyday realities of the Doms in Banaras. It plunges into Banaras’s historical past, while narrowing its lens on a few spirited characters from the Dom community. Through their tales of struggle and survival, loss and ambition, betrayal and love, it tells the at-times-heartbreaking, at-times-exhilarating story of a community struggling to find a place beyond that accorded to it by ancient tradition.

Radhika Iyengar

Radhika Iyengar is an award-winning journalist with a Master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, New York. She won the Red Ink award for Excellence in Indian Journalism (2018). In 2020, she was awarded the Charles Wallace India Trust fellowship at University of Kent, UK. She received the Bianca Pancoat Patton Fellowship in 2019 and was a recipient of the Sanskriti-Prabha Dutt Fellowship (2016–17).

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