The Scroll.in ‘Empire’ review: The reviewer’s response to the author’s criticism

Writing about the exception and ignoring the norm does mis-service to history, argues the reviewer.

Ruchika Sharma

· Sep 29, 2017 · 08:30 pm

This work of historical fiction about the Chola dynasty is more fiction than history

The female protagonist of Devi Yesodharan’s ‘Empire’ has a position she would never have got in the 11th Century Chola kingdom.

Ruchika Sharma

· Sep 27, 2017 · 08:30 am

How Shiva was transformed from a meat-loving deity to a vegetarian god

And why banning the sale of meat along the Kanwariya route is specially ironic.

Ruchika Sharma

· Jul 29, 2017 · 08:00 am

In Taj Mahal’s shadow, the heritage of Jaunpur is rapidly decaying for want of state help

The Tughlaq city’s grand edifices inspired many Mughal monuments.

Ruchika Sharma

· Jul 20, 2017 · 05:30 pm

The ring: Making women adulterous and men faithful since the birth of patriarchy

Wendy Doniger’s ‘The Ring of Truth’ shows with humour and clarity how one form of oppression can be replaced with another.

Ruchika Sharma

· Jul 15, 2017 · 05:30 pm

Thinker, tailor, soldier, spy: The extraordinary women of Ghiyas-ud-din Khalji's harem

Only women with the keenest intellect were to join the king at his meals every day, in order to discuss matters of theology and philosophy.

Ruchika Sharma

· Mar 22, 2017 · 12:35 pm

The epic poem Padmavat is fiction. To claim it as history would be the real tampering of history

'I have made up the story and related it,' are the words with which Malik Muhammad Jayasi ends his Awadhi epic.

Ruchika Sharma

· Feb 05, 2017 · 06:30 pm

The Mahabharata: How an oral narrative of the bards became a text of the Brahmins

The epic was taken over by Brahmins who explained away abhorrent details like polyandry and parricide through imaginative additions.

Ruchika Sharma

· Jan 16, 2017 · 06:30 pm

'Parvati' in Mohenjo-daro: New claims for the statuette are part of the continuing Hindutva project

The recent paper in the ICHR journal is yet another attempt in the long history of Hindu-ising the remains of the Indus Valley Civilisation.

Ruchika Sharma

· Dec 27, 2016 · 08:00 am

Long before the Babri Masjid, architectural reuse was an intrinsic part of Indian history

Rulers destroyed shrines and built new ones over them, keeping some parts as war trophies. The British gave this a religious twist.

Ruchika Sharma

· Dec 25, 2016 · 12:30 pm

How Krishna was transformed from a tribal deity to a supreme god in the Puranic tradition

The story of the Hindu god evolved in reverse.

Ruchika Sharma

· Aug 24, 2016 · 06:30 am

From horses to headgear, everything the ‘Mohenjo Daro’ trailer has got wrong

A teaser of Ashutosh Gowariker’s period drama, starring Hrithik Roshan and Pooja Hegde, is riddled with inaccuracies about the Indus Valley Civilisation.

Ruchika Sharma

· Jun 22, 2016 · 09:30 am