'So, three cheers for a new book by one of the world's most distinguished environmental historians … deserves a place on the shelves of secondary schools, colleges and universities throughout the English speaking Commonwealth, of which India is such an important member … Cambridge University Press should be congratulated for including so many excellent maps, diagrams and illustrations which make even more compelling the text of this well-written, beautifully presented but at times most chilling of books.' Trevor Grundy, Asian Affairs
1. Introduction; 2. Locating and shaping India's physical environment and living populations; 3. Indus and Vedic relationships with Indian environments (c.3500 BCE–c.600 BCE); 4. The environment and forest-dweller, late Vedic, Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, and Dravidian cultures, societies, and states (c.600 BCE–c.800 CE); 5. Insiders, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim immigrants, and the environment (c.700–c.1600); 6. Mughal empire (1526–1707); 7. Mughal imperial fragmentation, regional state rise, popular environmental movements, and early British colonial policies and institutions (c.1700–1857); 8. The British Raj, 'Mahatma' Gandhi, and other anti-colonial movements (1857–1947); 9. West and East Pakistan and India following independence (1947–71); 10. India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh from Stockholm to Rio (1971–92); 11. India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh into the twenty-first century; 12. National, subcontinental, and global issues in South Asia; Bibliographic essay.