During his seventeen years as prime minister, Jawaharlal
Nehru led India through one of its most difficult and potentially explosive
periods in international affairs. As the leader of a new state created amidst
the bloodiest partition in history, saddled with new and outstanding problems,
Nehru was confronted with a range of disputes which threatened to boil over.

Srinath Raghavan draws on a rich vein of untapped documents
to illuminate Nehru’s approach to war and his efforts for peace. Vividly recreating
the intellectual and political milieu of the Indian foreign policy
establishment, he explains the response of Nehru and his top advisors to the
tensions with Junagadh, Hyderabad, Pakistan, and China. He gives individual
attention to every conflict and shows how strategic decisions for each crisis
came to be defined in the light of the preceding ones. The book follows Nehru
as he wrestles with a string of major conflicts—assessing the utility of force,
weighing risks of war, exploring diplomatic options for peace, and forming
strategic judgements that would define his reputation, both within his lifetime
and after.

War and Peace in Modern India challenges and revises
our received understanding of Nehru’s handling of international affairs. General
readers as well as students of Indian history and politics will find its
balanced consideration of Nehru’s foreign policy essential to gauge his
achievements, his failures, and his enduring legacy.