The past and future of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands

A lavishly produced coffee-table book attempts to grapple with the past and present of the scenic archipelago

- Pankaj Sekhsaria

What is this book really about? This is perhaps a strange thing to ask at the beginning of a book review. It, however, is exactly the question I was left with after reading Keshav Chandra's When Turquoise Waters Turned Dark, which the cover describes as An Illustrated History of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

This is a large-format coffee-table book richly illustrated and lavishly produced, but little to no thought seems to have been given to the purpose of the book, who the readers could be, or even why certain photographs were chosen. The inside flap copy explains: "Crafted with stunning photography and presented with a meticulously researched narrative, this book is an immersive exploration of the islands' past."

Compare this with Chandra's own lines in the Author's Note: "I came here almost a year and a half ago. As anyone visiting these islands would be, I was deeply struck by their beauty. Gratefully, I decided to cobble up a few interesting anecdotes from its history and put them next to amazing landscapes of the island."

Interesting facts cobbled together quickly surely don't make for a meticulous historical account. This, in fact, is just the book you would give to a student as an exemplar of how a history should not be written—virtually no references or citations, incorrect dates, facts, and interpretations, mobilising concepts at a time they did not exist (e.g., Sanskritisation that was made popular in the 1950s by Indian sociologist M.N. Srinivas but the book mentions this in the context of convicts living in the island a century earlier), contradictory claims, and last but not the least, poorly written. The photographs are beautiful but are poorly credited or not credited at all.