{
"authors": [
"Milan Vaishnav",
"Karan Mahajan"
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"Carnegie Endowment for International Peace"
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"primaryCenter": "Carnegie Endowment for International Peace",
"programAffiliation": "SAP",
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"topics": [
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Grand Tamasha Live: Exploring 'The Complex' World of Post-Independence India
Tue, March 17th, 2026
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM (EDT)
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
In the nearly 75 years since independence, India has undergone profound political, economic, social, and cultural transformation. In The Complex, a new novel by Karan Mahajan, readers are introduced to the fictional Chopra family as they navigate the personal and political turmoil of late 1970s India.
As each member of the family struggles to forge an identity in the shadow of patriarch SP Chopra’s legacy, buried tensions surface and rival visions of power, belonging, and ambition collide. Set against a nation in upheaval, The Complex traces the roots of many forces that continue to shape contemporary India—from political radicalization and shifting class structures to the pull of the global diaspora and the evolving meaning of family itself.
Join Milan Vaishnav, senior fellow and director of the South Asia Program and the host of Carnegie’s flagship Indian politics and policy podcast Grand Tamasha, for the show’s first-ever live event. He will sit down author Karan Mahajan to delve into the world of the Chopra family—and what its story reveals about India then and now.
A reception and book signing will follow, with copies available for purchase.
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
Event Speakers
Milan Vaishnav
Director and Senior Fellow, South Asia Program
Milan Vaishnav is a senior fellow and director of the South Asia Program and the host of the Grand Tamasha podcast at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. His primary research focus is the political economy of India, and he examines issues such as corruption and governance, state capacity, distributive politics, and electoral behavior. He also conducts research on the Indian diaspora.
Karan Mahajan
Author, The Complex
Karan Mahajan is the author of The Association of Small Bombs, which was a finalist for the National Book Award, won the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, and was named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by The New York Times Book Review. His debut novel, Family Planning, was a finalist for the Dylan Thomas Prize. He has been selected as one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists, and his writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The New York Review of Books, and other venues. He is an associate professor of Literary Arts at Brown University.