Mapping India

Manosi Lahiri, Mapping India, New Delhi: Niyogi Books / Kaveri Books, 2011–12

320 pages, richly illustrated throughout with reproductions of historic maps and cartographic material, many in full colour; bibliographic references; index; original hardcover (cloth boards with dust jacket)
11.50 x 11.50 in (29.2 × 29.2 cm)

A Landmark Cartographic Chronicle of the Subcontinent: Mapping India, an Exceptional Compendium of India’s Historical Maps

A monumental illustrated survey of India’s cartographic record, Mapping India is both a visual and intellectual exploration of how the subcontinent has been depicted, interpreted, and instrumentalised on maps over half a millennium. Written by geographer Dr Manosi Lahiri, the work assembles a curated sequence of early maps that trace the evolution of European and indigenous geographical knowledge—from the first modern charts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries through colonial mapping projects and into the modern nation-state era.

Throughout its 300+ pages, the book sets these maps in their historical, political, and socio-economic contexts, illustrating how cartography was bound to trade imperatives, military campaigns, diplomatic treaties, and the shifting power dynamics of empire. Maps featured range from early Portuguese and Dutch depictions of India’s coastline, through seminal British East India Company surveys, to more comprehensive surveys of the nineteenth century that reflect both colonial administrative imperatives and indigenous geographical scholarship.

Since the Age of Discovery, cartography has played a critical role in shaping geopolitical understanding and imperial power. Mapping India invites the reader to reconsider the history of the Indian subcontinent through this prism of geographic representation. Rather than offering merely a catalogue of facsimiles, Dr Manosi Lahiri’s book contextualises each map within the broader narratives of exploration, conquest, colonisation, commerce and nation-building.

A professional geographer with a PhD from the University of Delhi and a career spanning academia and applied GIS consultancy, Lahiri brings both scholarly rigour and narrative clarity to the subject. Mapping India’s earliest sections delves into the first attempts by European powers to chart India’s vast coastline and internal regions, illuminating how inaccuracies and omissions reflected not only technical limitations but also strategic priorities. Later chapters examine the critical role played by the British East India Company’s trigonometrical surveys, which underpinned colonial administration and resource extraction strategies.

Throughout, the text underscores the interdependence of mapping and power — how territorial boundaries, trade routes, river courses and population centres were inscribed, contested and re-inscribed in map form. The book’s conclusion situates these historical cartographies within post-independence developments, asserting the continuing relevance of maps to understanding India’s political geographies and cultural identities.

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