The Origin Story of India's States

I love looking at maps of India. Road maps allow me to dream abour great cross-country adventures. Topographic maps highlight the textures of the land through the mountains' wrinkles and the rivers meanderings. Satellite maps trace the coastline's undulations that give the country its distinctive shape. Maps show me the beauty of India.

When I was a child at school, my absolute favourite map of India was the political map that clearly demarcated its states. India's states fascinated me with their various shapes and sizes. My favourite activity was colouring in the states neatly and meticulously with sketch pens.

The stories of the states of India are also the story of India. The states of India are all-encompassing-they cover every inch of land and hold every single person that makes up India. Every person in India belongs to a state, lives and works in a state, has family and childhood memories in a state. States give every Indian a home and an identity. Every time a new state is created or an old one altered. India and Indians are remade, recreated, reborn. Every single Indian deserves to know the story of their state, their home, their identity.

That's how this book was born. We know the origin story of India, but what are the origin stories of each of its states.

**Contents and Sample Pages**