SEEKING Sacred Ground

NAMITA DEVIDAYAL's new book captures her passage from worldly scepticism to spiritual clarity through the teachings of Vedanta

- Juhi Saklani

Tangerine begins as the story of a liberal, English-speaking journalist who stayed at a distance from organised religion. The very title of the book tells us this—the owning of the colour saffron under the alternative ‘tangerine’; the promise to people like her that this journey is not something weird and you don’t have to give up coffee or whatever you fear giving up! But Namita Devidayal is also someone nourished by her cultural roots—mythologies where plants and animals take centrestage, and the philosophical wisdom of mother figures and teachers. Later in the story, when she unapologetically makes a shrine for herself, she does so as a full “United Nations of benevol