BREAKING THROUGH (HB)

This is the life story of
Isher Judge Ahluwalia, one of the leading Indian policy economists of her
generation. Born into a family with eleven children and limited means, where
she was one of the first to attend university, she takes us through her journey
to Presidency College, Delhi School of Economics and Massachusetts Institute
of Technology.She chronicles her career as a young policy economist fighting
against the Indian economic orthodoxy that underpinned the
license-permit-quota Raj, as an institution builder leading the Indian
Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), one of
India’s leading economic think tanks for over a decade, and also her most
recent role in focusing attention on the challenges of urbanization in India.Narrated
with candor and from the heart, this is also a story of a woman balancing
career and family, and trying to stay close to her roots as her life path
takes her through the power corridors of New Delhi, both through her own
career, and through a 50-year-marriage to Montek Singh Ahluwalia. An outsider
to Delhi, who ultimately became the consummate insider, Breaking Through is
an account of a remarkable life that was witness to remarkable times.