Even before Yann Martel, The Babu knew there was a reason why he loved the free spirits who run Canongate. Join their campaign–support The War Against Terrorism (TWAT for short).

Every war produces its blue-eyed intellectuals, and the name that’s on everyone’s lips is Fareed Zakaria. Here’s a somewhat gushy profile of the man.

The End of India has received unmerciful reviews (Karan Thapar injects a nice note of regret as he administers the lethal injection in his review for Outlook), but hey, the reading public loves the grand old man anyway. Book’s doing just fine on what passes for the local bestseller lists.

Abraham Verghese, Atul Gawande and now Raj Persaud. Seems to the Babu that the Indian medical establishment turns out better work than the rest of the IWE school…

Wondering what Indian writers have been doing about TWAT? (The Babu dislikes acronyms as a rule, but will make an exception for The War Against Terrorism. Shortened, it has a singularly mellifluous ring to it.) Amitav Ghosh wrote a typically incisive essay; Arundhati Roy wrote A Very Impassioned Piece (in the colourful aviary of Indian writers, she is affectionately referred to as The Greater Common Shrill).

The burning of the library of Korans in Baghdad received coverage across the world. The Independent has an update. Indian newspapers did their bit with impassioned editorials as well–see these stories from the Hindustan Times and the Business Standard.