What happens when history, imagination, and storytelling come together?

Bestselling author Amish Tripathi returns with his new book, The Chola Tigers, and will explore it in conversation with Manish Sabharwal. The session will also open out into the broader terrain of historical fiction and its power to engage with memory, identity, and culture.

Set in 1025 CE, in the aftermath of Mahmud of Ghazni’s raid on Somnath, The Chola Tigers follows five characters, a Tamil warrior, a Gujarati merchant, a devotee of Lord Ayyappa, a scholar-emperor from Malwa, and Emperor Rajendra Chola, who unite to undertake a journey of retribution. Moving between the grandeur of the Chola Empire and the court of Ghazni, the book explores themes of resilience, honour, and duty.

The discussion will reflect on the narrative of the novel as well as the role of historical fiction in reimagining the past and engaging with questions of identity, culture, and collective memory. In conversation with Amish is Manish Sabharwal, entrepreneur and public intellectual, whose wide-ranging interests in nation-building, institutions, and India’s place in the world bring a complementary lens to the themes explored in the book.