Half-Lion has also changed the national discourse on India’s most under-rated prime minister. The Tamil, Marathi, and Hindi translations will be released early next year, and the book is currently under review with Oxford University Press, USA. The Telugu translation has also proved a best-seller. It has been reviewed favorably in all major Indian media outlets, as well as international publications such as the BBC, Forbes, and The Economist. In its first three months, the book has sold more than 16,000 copies, is in its third print run, and was the #1 non-fiction book in India.

Narasimha Rao, Half-Lion, was published in June this year by Penguin India. Vinay Sitapati’s biography of the Indian prime minister P.V. Meticulously researched and honestly told, this landmark political biography is a must-read for anyone interested in the man responsible for transforming India. While tracing Rao’s life from a village in Telangana through his years in power and humiliation in retirement, the book never loses sight of the inner man, his difficult childhood, his corruptions and love affairs, his lingering loneliness. With exclusive access to Rao’s never-before-seen personal papers as well as over a hundred interviews, this definitive biography provides new revelations on the Indian economy, nuclear programme, foreign policy, and the Babri Masjid. Few world leaders have achieved so much with so little power. Despite being unloved by his people, mistrusted by his party, a minority in Parliament, and ruling under the shadow of 10 Janpath, Rao reinvented India, at home and abroad. Narasimha Rao became the unlikely prime minister of India in 1991, he inherited an economic crisis, violent insurgencies, and a nation adrift. Sitapati has written for publications as diverse as the Oxford Handbook of the Indian Constitution, Economic & Political Weekly, International New York Times, The Indian Express, Harvard BlackLetter Law Journal, The Hindu, Harvard Crimson, and Seminar. He studied at National Law School Bangalore and Harvard University, and will be graduating this year with a Ph.D. Vinay Sitapati is an Assistant Professor in Political Science and Legal Studies at Ashoka University, Delhi.

Vinay sitapati half lion