The Sickle & the Scalpel, translated from Gamaname Gamyam, is a novel based on the extraordinary life and times of Dr Komarraju Acchamamba (1906–1964)—one of the first doctors in the country, member of the Communist Party of India, and a pioneer for women’s emancipation in Andhra. Capturing the period of social reform in pre-independence Andhra, through the freedom struggle, it foregrounds the rise of the modern Indian woman and her struggle for rights and recognition, alongside the rise of communism and the Left in the newly formed nation.

Sharadamba, the protagonist, born into a wealthy brahmin family, Annapurna, a farmer’s daughter, and Vishalakshi, a devadasi’s daughter, are childhood friends, who grow up to perceive modernity and tradition differently. Their divergent paths crisscross and conflict as their lives are propelled and shaped by cataracts of change—social, political, historical—as the nation struggles to free itself, and each of these women strives to negotiate these changes for herself and others, and, despite everything, remain friends.

In a fast-paced narrative, punctuated by upheavals like the Satyagraha, two World Wars, the Bengal famine, Gandhi’s assassination and the Telangana people’s struggle, it is the quest for freedom, the dream of an equal and just world for all, and the end of domination across caste, class and gender that animate the real-life characters who march through history.

Vasanth Kannabiran, a loved teacher, writer, and a lifelong human rights and women’s rights activist herself, brings us Volga’s unputdownable tour de force compellingly and effortlessly, making it available to English readers for the first time.