Author: Kaninika Mishra
Pages: 210
Publisher: Bloomsbury
My Review: 🌟🌟🌟🌟/5India is a country rich in its cultural heritage. India has one of the world’s largest collections of songs, music, dance, theatre, folk traditions, performing arts, rites and rituals, languages, dialects, paintings and writings. Over the past decade Indians have started to explore this cultural reserve in their entrepreneurial ventures. In her book ‘The Indic Quotiesnt’, Kanika Mishra talks about various people who have brought back the forgotten heritage through various forms of business pursuits. Yoga is believed to have originated in India about 5,000 years ago which was brought back to common Indian’s life by Baba Ramdev. Numerous Yoga centers and health clubs have grown since then. It has spread across the world and now even western countries have inculcated yoga in their daily life. The origin of Ayurveda is deep rooted in Indian subcontinent which challenges the dominant narrative of global health industry and its demand is in rise. Kanika also speaks about the handloom industry, explores the mother of all language-Sanskrit, dives deep into Indian agriculture and talks how disappeared food grains are being brought back into our diet by Indian entrepreneurs. In the last chapter called ‘Temple Sentinels’ she talks about an organization on a mission to identify stolen religious artefacts from Indian temples and securing their return, which I was completely unaware of.
It is a very well researched book and deserves all the appreciation for portraying the diverse culture of India. Through this book we get to know about the history of various successful businesses like Forest Essentials, Just Herbs, CropConnect, SARVA, Patanjali and many others. It is beautiful to see Indian brands going global and how people are appreciating the usefulness of those products.
Here I can share a small example with you all, few days back while I was listening to a podcast hosted by two girls based in the United States I heard them talk about a brand which uses neem, turmeric and honey in their beauty products and how those girls loved the effect of it on their skin. So the point here is that Indian beauty rituals which we heard about growing up is making its place in the global market now and people are finally understanding their benefits. Indian businesses deserve the praise for exploring their own soil to come up with solutions to various problems and making it known globally.
I being a management student found the book extremely interesting. The way it talks about the history behind some successful ventures imparts important business lessons. I highly recommend this book if you want to know how India is undergoing transformation through cultural enterprise.
Bong Reader 