Grand Tamasha

On the show this week, Ambassador Vijay Gokhale joins Milan to discuss the India-China relationship. His latest book examines how Beijing uses coercion, diplomacy, and military force to advance its interests—and what those patterns can tell us about China’s behavior today.

Vince Cable joins Milan on the show this week. The two discuss Vince’s first visit to India as a student in the mid-1960s, the contrasting reception to his writings on China and India, and the concept of “superstates.”

This week, Grand Tamasha is launching a new four-part series on energy and climate issues in collaboration with CASI—the Center for the Advanced Study of India—at the University of Pennsylvania. To discuss why toxic air has proven so politically challenging in India—and what it might take to change that—Milan is joined on the show this week by Vaishnavi Chandrashekhar and Tariq Thachil.

This week, host Milan Vaishnav is joined by Sarthak Pradhan and Pranay Kotasthane to discuss their new book, Fiscal Fables: A Citizen’s Guide to Public Finance. The book demystifies India’s public finances for a lay audience—and explains public finance concepts using relatable stories and examples.

New data collected by the Pew Research Center offer a revealing snapshot of how people across South Asia view their neighbors, major powers like the United States and China, and India’s growing global role. To unpack what these findings tell us about global public opinion, Milan is joined on the podcast this week by Jacob Poushter, the lead author of recent Pew report titled, “India and Pakistan: Rivals with Divergent Views of the Global Order.”

This week, Milan, Sadanand Dhume, and Tanvi Madan discuss the political fall-out of this summer’s Gen Z protests, the political future of the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), and the churn within the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Plus, the trio discuss Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the potential thaw in China-India relations, and whether ties between India and the United States can weather the current turbulence.

Josy Joseph joins Milan on the podcast this week to talk about his best-selling new book, The Birth of a Nation: Twenty-One Days That Changed India, which reconstructs the dramatic three weeks leading up to August 15, 1947.

Vidya Mahambare joins Milan on the Season 16 premiere of Grand Tamasha to discuss the economic drivers of the Gen Z protests, the link between unemployment and education, and the futility of the manufacturing versus services debate.

This week, Rahul Sagar join Milan to discuss his new book The Birth of Indian Liberalism: Mama Parmanand’s Letters to an Indian Raja, which uncovers an older tradition of Indian liberal thought through a remarkable work first published in 1891 and then largely forgotten for more than a century.

This week, Rohit De and Ornit Shani join Milan to discuss their new book Assembling India’s Constitution: A New Democratic History. Drawing on a remarkable range of archival material, the book shows that constitution-making was not confined to the halls of the Constituent Assembly alone. It also played out in provincial legislatures, princely states, government offices, civic associations, and communities across India. Ordinary citizens debated the constitution, petitioned its authors, organized around it, and creatively sought to shape its provisions.

Milan Vaishnav and Tanul Thakur discuss Tanul's new book "Wild Wild East: Exiled Americans, Enslaved Indians and the Systemic Abuse of the H-1B Visa Programme." The book follows the lives of Indian H-1B seekers, displaced American tech workers, and the firms that profit from a deeply broken system. It is at a story about immigration, labor exploitation, globalization, and the darker side of the U.S.-India tech corridor.

Discussing their new short book, Indian Public Opinion toward the Major Powers, Paul Staniland, and Aidan Milliff join Milan Vaishnav to discuss the treasure trove of data on Indian public opinion they stumbled upon, the characteristics of India’s “foreign policy public,” and the variation in Indian attitudes toward the United States, China, and Russia/the Soviet Union. Plus, the discuss why a respondent’s region emerges as a strong predictor of one’s foreign policy views.

Milan and Ambassador May-Elin Stener discuss the outcomes of the India-Nordic summit, the Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (TEPA), and the green technology partnership Norway envisions with India. Plus, the two discussed linkages between the Arctic and the Indo-Pacific and the controversy over a Norwegian journalist’s questioning of Indian officials in Oslo.

Milan Vaishnav, Sadanand Dhume, and Tanvi Madan discuss whether India is becoming a “one-party state,” the current state of the opposition, and the headwinds facing the Indian economy. Plus, the three discuss Pakistan’s diplomatic moment, Trump’s recent China trip, and Marco Rubio’s visit to India.

Abhishek Anand and Milan Vaishnav discuss the controversy over India’s GDP estimates, important reforms within India’s statistics ministry, and the debate over the Reserve Bank of India’s policies to defend the rupee. Plus, the two discuss Abhishek’s work on power sector reform and the embrace of non-tariff barriers that stymie the spirit of India’s new bilateral trade agreements.

For more than a decade, India has steadily deepened its ties with the Gulf while trying to balance competing interests across the region. How is India being impacted by the Iran crisis? And what do these geopolitical shifts mean for India’s West Asia policy? To discuss these and other questions, Milan is joined on the show this week by Kabir Taneja, the Executive Director of the Observer Research Foundation’s Middle East office.

It’s safe to say that India’s 2026 state assembly elections have scrambled many of the assumptions that have long shaped our understanding of Indian politics. To make sense of these results, Milan is joined today by Neelanjan Sircar and Yamini Aiyar—two of the sharpest observers of Indian politics and political economy.

India hasn’t updated how political power is distributed across its states in five decades—and the consequences are mounting. Recently, Milan sat down with Shruti Rajagopalan of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University for a wide-ranging webinar on delimitation, representation, and the reshaping of Indian democracy.

For more than three decades, India’s growth story has rested on the promise of a large and youthful workforce. But a new report published by the Centre for Sustainable Employment at Azim Premji University takes a comprehensive look at how young Indians move from education into the labor market—and asks whether India is successfully converting its demographic dividend into an economic one. This week on the show Milan speaks with the report’s lead author Rosa Abraham, who heads theCentre for Sustainable Employment at Azim Premji University.

Kanwal Rekhi was the first Indian-American founder & CEO to take a venture-backed company public on the NASDAQ. He also co-founded and built The Indus Entrepreneurs—or TiE—into the largest global network of Indian entrepreneurs. He writes about his life in his new memoir, which traces his remarkable journey from a modest upbringing in India to becoming one of the most influential figures in the Indian diaspora in the United States. Kanwal joins Milan to discuss his lifelong passion for entrepreneurship, his modest upbringing and challenging early family life, and his role in building the modern Internet.

For decades, India’s growth story has rested on the spectacular rise of its middle class. But a new book argues that this very group—roughly 40 million income-tax–paying households—is now under acute strain. Facing a convergence of job disruption, wage stagnation, and rising debt, the middle class may no longer be the engine of growth it once was. This is the argument made in a new book titled, Breakpoint: The Crisis of the Middle Class and the Future of Work. It is authored by Saurabh Mukherjea, along with Nandita Rajhansa and Sapana Bhavsar.

On this week’s show, Milan sits down with the novelist Karan Mahajan, author of a much-anticipated new novel, The Complex. Karan and Milan discussed the book at our first ever live Grand Tamasha event at Carnegie headquarters in Washington, DC on March 16. Karan is an associate professor in Literary Arts at Brown University and the author of the books Family Planning and The Association of Small Bombs.

Donald Trump’s return to the White House has once again altered the contours of international politics. For India, this evolving context raises several important questions about the viability of its foreign policy approach. This week on the podcast, Milan sits down with three of the contributors to a new compilation published by the Carnegie Endowment—Shoumitro Chatterjee, Sameer Lalwani, and Tanvi Madan—to discuss the uncertain trajectory of Indian foreign policy.

Over the past two decades, Washington and New Delhi have drawn steadily closer—driven by shared concerns about China, expanding economic ties, and a growing Indian diaspora in the United States. To help us unpack all of this, this week Milan spoke with Congressman Ami Bera in his office on Capitol Hill.

In 2024, mass protests brought an abrupt end to Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s long tenure in power, opening the door to Bangladesh’s most consequential election in more than a decade. To talk about this new political era, Milan is joined on the show this week by Global Research Professor Naomi Hossain, with the Department of Development Studies at SOAS University of London.

Just weeks ago, India hosted the 2026 AI Impact Summit, the latest chapter in a global process that began in 2023 in the UK. For the Modi government, the summit was part diplomatic showcase, part investment pitch, and part declaration of ambition. To talk more about the summit and its key takeaways, Milan is joined on the show this week by Anirudh Suri, a nonresident scholar with Carnegie India.

We tend to think of populist leaders around the world as disruptive—skeptical of international institutions, impatient for change, and prone to upending foreign policy norms. But a new book by scholars Sandra Destradi and Johannes Plagemann argues that—while populists can have dramatic impacts on foreign policy—the extent of change depends on key factors. Milan and Sandra discuss the definitional debates around populism, the conditional effects of populism on foreign policy, and the reasons for the Modi government’s differential approach to Pakistan and China.

Over the past year, Europe–India relations have entered a markedly upbeat phase. What was once a diffuse partnership—long on rhetoric, short on strategy—now looks far more purposeful. To unpack what’s driving this convergence—and where its limits lie—Milan is joined on the show this week by German Marshall Fund senior fellow Garima Mohan to discuss the geopolitical drivers that are bringing the EU and India closer together, Europe’s views on the limits to India’s potential, and the key takeaways from the EU-India FTA.

After years of trade skepticism, India appears to be back in the deal-making business—signing new agreements, reviving stalled talks, and announcing ambitious frameworks with key bilateral partners. To help make sense of what’s changed—and what hasn’t—Milan is joined by Mark Linscott, a nonresident senior fellow on India at the Atlantic Council who previously served as the assistant US trade representative for South and Central Asian Affairs from 2016 to 2018.

Over the past few years, South Asia has witnessed a striking wave of mass protests toppling governments and upending long-standing political arrangements in countries ranging from Bangladesh to Nepal and Sri Lanka. These upheavals are often explained in terms of domestic factors—such as corruption, economic mismanagement, and democratic backsliding. Muhib Rahman - a Perry World House Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania and expert in intersection of international security, emerging technologies, and the politics of the Global South - and Milan discuss India’s illiberal hegemony in its neighborhood, the downturn in Bangladesh-India ties, and the enabling role of the United States.

U.S.-India relations were once described as one of Washington’s MOST important strategic bets in the twenty-first century. But over the past year, that partnership has come under serious strain—buffeted by trade disputes, sharp rhetoric, and deep disagreements over Pakistan and Kashmir. To talk more about this new piece, Lisa Curtis joins Milan on the show this week. Lisa is Director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security.

Milan and Sunetra discuss the prevailing political winds in Delhi, the BJP’s surprising new president, and the long shadow of the 2025 Bihar assembly elections. Plus, the two discuss the upcoming state elections, the inner turmoil within the Congress Party, and the ECI’s controversial “special intensive review.”

To mark the end of 2025 and Grand Tamasha's 14th season, Milan reflects on some of hist most impactful conversations with authors and researchers this year, and their books.

What is the state of the U.S.-India defense relationship? Sameer Lalwani joins Milan to analyze the success of these two countries' defense ties, even in spite of turmoil in their overarching relationship.

CEO of Educate Girls, a leading non-profit in India working to expand girls' education, joins Milan this week to discuss her organization's impactful work and the launch of the first Development Impact Bond.

Are India-UK relations entering a new era? Their recent signing of a landmark trade agreement may signal a new chapter in the two countries' post-colonial relationship. Avinash Paliwal returns to the show to discuss the evolving India-UK relationship with Milan.

Data and political economy editor Roshan Kishore joins Milan on this week's episode to analyze the outcomes of Bihar's assembly elections results, including changing voter behavior and attitudes toward the BJP.

Political scientist Kolby Hanson joins Milan Vaishnav on the show this week to discuss the behaviors and recruitment strategies of non-state armed groups, drawing on his research findings in "Ordinary Rebels: Rank-and-File Militants between War and Peace."

Journalist Ruhi Tewari joins Milan to explore Indian women's changing place in politics and the narrowing gender gap in voter turnout, drawing on her latest book "What Women Want: Understanding the Female Voter in Modern India."

Author Sam Dalrymple sits down with Milan to explore the unknown story of how the Indian Empire was unmade, the focus of his new book "Shattered Lands: Five Partitions and the Making of Modern Asia."

Scholars Devesh Kapur and Arvind Subramanian return to the podcast to discuss their new book "A Sixth of Humanity: Independent India's Development Odyssey ," an in-depth look at how India undertook a series of pivotal transformations within its economy, society, and political landscape.

Former Chief Justice of India's Supreme Court Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud joins Milan on this week's episode to assess the role of the court in India's political environment today.

Britta Glennon, an assistant professor of management at the Wharton School, joins Milan to discuss the Trump administration's announcement of a $100,000 fee on new H-1B visas and its impact on India.

What's behind the Trump administration's new approach to U.S.-Pakistan relations? Uzair Younus sits down with Milan to discuss the strategy behind Washington's newfound interest in Islamabad.

Ashley J. Tellis joins Milan for a special episode on the latest developments in U.S.-India relations and what they mean for the future of this pivotal bilateral relationship.

Journalist and analyst James Crabtree joins Milan for an episode on Europe-India relations and whether the strengthening of these relations is possible in the wake of deteriorating U.S.-India relations.

Narayani Basu joins Milan on this week's episode of Grand Tamasha to discuss the incredible life of K.M. Panikkar, from his founding of the Hindustan Times to his career as India's ambassador to China and Egypt.

Author Abhishek Choudhary joins Milan on the premiere of Grand Tamasha's 14th season to explore the career of former BJP prime minister Bihari Vajpayee.

Will U.S.-India relations survive U.S. President Donald Trump's trade wars? On this special episode of Grand Tamasha, Milan welcomes back Tanvi Madan and Sadanand Dhume to discuss the United States' historic tariffs on India and their impact on this fragile bilateral relationship.

On the season finale of Grand Tamasha, Milan welcomes back Ashley J. Tellis to discuss his latest essay in Foreign Affairs and the broader future of India's great power status.