Of Freedom and Friendship

T.C.A. RAGHAVAN'S CIRCLES OF FREEDOM FOLLOWS THREE YOUNG MUSLIMS DRAWN INTO THE FREEDOM STRUGGLE

- Sunil Sethi

Diplomat turned historian T.C.A. Raghavan has turned his hand at various aspects of the past. He has a talent for rescuing figures from the footnotes of history. Circles of Freedom, his latest, follows the trajectory of three young Muslims, studying law in London in the first decade of the 20th century, who are drawn into the nationalist struggle. Asaf Ali is from Old Delhi; Syud Hossain grew up in Calcutta, while Syed Mahmud comes from a landowning family of Uttar Pradesh. The catalyst in their lives is Sarojini Naidu, a poet with a network of friendships that include Gandhi and Jinnah. Passionate about Hindu-Muslim unity, she casts a spell-Mahmud's letters to her, she sighs, are "like the cry of a wounded animal in agony".