1st Edition
In Search of Delhi A Translation of Brij Kishan Chandiwala's Dilli ki Khoj
Dilli ki Khoj is an anecdotal history of Delhi and its monuments by Shri Brij Kishan Chandiwala, an eminent Gandhian. The volume was published in Hindi by the Publications Division of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, in 1964 and has been out of print for many years. This English translation of Dilli ki Khoj revives an out-of-print classic and makes it more accessible to a global audience. The book covers Delhi’s long history, details on monuments built from the ancient times till the early 1960s and a detailed recording of all of Gandhiji’s visits to Delhi. It also traces significant epochs in Indian history and the rise of a national identity.
The volume spans the genres of journalism, architecture, history, mythology and area studies and will be of special interest to historiographers, especially in the contemporary context.
Indira Gandhi’s Foreword to Dilli ki Khoj. The Original Preface to Dilli Ki Khoj. Acknowledgements. Translators’ Introduction. 1. Delhi of the Hindu Period 2. Delhi of the Islamic Period (Pathan Era 1193–1546) 3. Delhi during the Muslim Era (Mughals 1526–1857 AD) 4. British Delhi (1857–1947) 5. Post-Independence Delhi 6. Perambulating the Eighteen Delhis Afterword by Narayani Gupta
Biography
Jitender Gill is Associate Professor in the Department of English, Janki Devi Memorial College (JDMC), University of Delhi, India. She was awarded a doctoral degree in English literature by the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA. She is a recipient of a Fulbright-Nehru Visiting Lecturer Fellowship in 2010‒11. Her primary areas of research are nineteenth-century British literature and culture. She has written articles and presented papers at various conferences on nineteenth-century British literature as well as popular culture. She has also edited Rediscovering the City in Times of Covid (2021) and has co-edited Rediscovering Delhi (2020). As the Director of JDMC Research Centre, she has conceptualised and mentored a series of projects about Delhi, in which a large number of students and faculty of the college are also involved.
Namita Sethi is Associate Professor in the Department of English, Janki Devi Memorial College, University of Delhi, India. She received her PhD and MPhil degrees from the University of Delhi, India. She has been an Associate at the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla, and the recipient of the UGC international travel grant and Charles Wallace and British Council grants for presenting papers in the UK. She has taught, researched and published in the areas of the British long eighteenth century, detective fiction, Adivasi literature, Women’s Studies, Indian Classical and European Classical literatures. She has edited the Worldview edition of Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (2023) and co-edited Rediscovering Delhi (2020). Her article on Santhal literature has been published as a chapter in the book Representing the Exotic and the Familiar: Politics and Perception in Literature (2019). Some of her poems and translations in English and Hindi have been published as well. She is a member of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (BSECS) and its Indian branch, India International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (IISECS).
