The People Next Door
The Curious History of India’s Relations with Pakistan
T C A Raghavan
HarperCollins
360 pages; Rs 699
It is never easy to decode the many paradoxes that lie embedded in the India-Pakistan relationship that have never quite escaped from the perpetual oscillation between euphoria and despair. It is, therefore, a pleasure to read T C A Raghavan’s tightly structured narrative, The People Next Door, tracing the endless twists and turns in India-Pakistan relations, avoiding monotony even as it clinically and cogently uncovers the inextricably bundled layers of intimacy and hostility. For this very reason one