Besieged Voices from Delhi 1857

Description

A historian and professional raconteur, Mr. Farooqi takes on the role of an archeologist here, excavating and laboriously translating Urdu documents in the National Archives from the time of the Mutiny of 1857, now known as India’s First War of Independence. His focus is the “rebel” government of the heir to the Mughal throne, Bahadur Shah Zafar, around whom rebel soldiers who had marched against the British in Shahjahanabad rallied. The documents provide both an account of the resistance, and a sense of what life was like in Delhi during these five, harrowing months. “Besieged” isn’t in narrative form — so it’s a book to dip in and out of rather than read straight through.