It's the season finale, y'all! So it's time to investigate the history of the Desi diaspora's favorite symbol. Warning, it's not a warm, cozy story. 

VISUALS

• The BBC investigation of an Assam plantation that you hear at the very end of the episode
• A map of Assam

GLOSSARY

• Pashmina: a Kashmiri shawl made of spun cashmere from the Changthangi goat
• Canton: known today as Guangzhou, Canton is a huge port city in China on the eastern bank of the Pearl River.
• Sharbat: a sweet cordial made from fruits or flowers, served cold.

MUSIC CREDITS

Wasn’t this episode a bop!? Check out the incredible artists:

• Charanjit Singh | Raga Bhairav
• Brain Drop I Brain Drop vs. Silent Horror
• FINGERGAP I 恭喜你
• Codec I Trap Bach
• Jamblu I Hypocrite Pt 1
• Aloo Gobi I Spicy
• Lifeform I Inert AI

DIG DEEPER

This episode covers 300 years, 3 commodities and 3 countries, so very understandable you wanna learn more. Here’s where to start:

• Andy Liu’s new book Tea War and Rolf Bauer’s new(ish) publication were in many ways the backbone of our research
• This NPR excerpt from Sarah Rose’s book on Robert Fortune’s tea theft is wild, captivating, and delicious
• Jayeeta Sharma provided a stunning analysis of how and why the British built a migrant workforce on the tea plantations of Assam in her paper “Lazy Natives”

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

• See the annotated transcript with citations and timestamps.
• Visit www.kahaani.io/misrepresented for free curriculum to help you use this podcast in your classroom.

SUPPORT THE PODCAST

• Give $15 on our website or via Venmo (@kahaani)
• Follow us on INSTAGRAM or TWITTER !
• Sign up for our newsletter 

MISREPRESENTED is produced by Kahaani, a media organization that tells stories to widen the historical narrative.

A conversation with writer Manu Pillai about Episode 3, The Last* Hindu Empire. Topics covered include the similarities between Ukraine, Russia, and the Deccan Sultanates. 

ABOUT MANU PILLAI

Manu S Pillai is the author of The Ivory Throne: Chronicles of the House of Travancore, for which he won the 2016 Tata Lit Live Prize for best first work of non-fiction and the 2017 Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar.

He has written three other books since: Rebel Sultans: The Deccan from Khilji to Shivaji, The Courtesan, the Mahatma & the Italian Brahmin: Tales from Indian History, and most recently, False Allies: India’s Maharajahs in the Age of Ravi Varma.

Formerly Chief of Staff to Dr Shashi Tharoor MP, Manu has also worked at the House of Lords in Britain, with Lord Karan Bilimoria CBE DL, and with the BBC on their Incarnations history series.

Manu is an alumnus of Fergusson College, Pune, and is currently enrolled as a PhD candidate at King’s College London. 

Follow him on Twitter @UnamPillai and on Instagram @WaatCoconut

VISUALS

• The painting Manu references
• A map showing the four states in discussion: Vijayanagara, Deccan Sultanates, Mughal Empire, and Persian (Safavid) Empire

ANNOTATED TRANSCRIPT

Visit www.kahaani.io/hampi-footnotes for a transcript with timestamps. 

TEACHER’S GUIDE

Visit www.kahaani.io/misrepresented for free curriculum to help you use the MISREPRESENTED podcast in your classroom.

MUSIC CREDITS

• Arun Ramamurthy | Conception
• Drum ani Bass | King of Good Times
• pelle | Lizard Lunch 
• Subh Saran | Slip
• Dolorblind | QQ

ABOUT THE PODCAST

MISREPRESENTED is produced by Kahaani, a media organization that tells stories to widen the historical narrative. 

FOLLOW US ON INSTAGRAM AND TWITTER

How did a wealthy, cosmopolitan empire go from thriving to collapsing in a matter of days? This episode explores the many histories of the fall of the last Hindu Empire in South India. 

VISUALS

• The Hampi bazaar that blew Niki’s mind
• A painting depicting the very moment that Rama Raya is beheaded!
• A map of the Vijayanagara and Deccan Sultanate territories

GLOSSARY

Deccan

The Deccan plateau is one of the most fertile regions in South Asia and has produced many major empires including the Pallavas, Chalukyas, and, later, the Nizam of Hyderabad. 

Sultanate

An Islamic state or kingdom governed by a sultan, i.e., a king

Paan 

A treat made out of areca nut and betel leaf

ANNOTATED TRANSCRIPT

Visit www.kahaani.io/hampi to get an annotated transcript with citations and timestamps. 

TEACHER’S GUIDE

Visit www.kahaani.io/misrepresented for free curriculum to help you use this podcast in your classroom.

DIG DEEPER

This episode goes all into the micro. Read these sources to get a better understanding of the macro forces behind the fall of Hampi and the Vijayanagara Empire:

• Manu Pillai’s new book False Allies has a juicy chapter called Rebel Sultans that is a very quick, but very excellent read
• Richard Eaton’s India in the Persianate Age provides a thorough exploration of the social and political history of the Deccan
• Kathleen D Morrison and Mark T Lycett’s paper The Fall of Vijayanagara Reconsidered does exactly what you’d expect from its title.

MUSIC CREDITS

• Arun Ramamurthy | Conception
• Drum ani Bass | King of Good Times
• Sanjay Subrahmanyan | Carnatic Vocalizing
• pelle | Lizard Lunch
• Jayanthi Kumaresh | Carnatic Raga
• Subh Saran | Slip
• Dolorblind | QQ

SPECIAL THANKS

Thank you to Pradeep Aggarwal and Sarbajit Mitra for script review.

SUPPORT THE PODCAST

MISREPRESENTED is produced by Kahaani, a media organization that tells stories to widen the historical narrative. 

FOLLOW US ON INSTAGRAM AND TWITTER