Manu S Pillai is the author of the award-winning The Ivory Throne; Rebel Sultans, The Courtesan, the Mahatma & the Italian Brahmin, and most recently, False Allies. Formerly Chief of Staff to Dr Shashi Tharoor (MP), he has in the past worked at the House of Lords in Britain, and with the BBC on their Incarnations history series. A winner of the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar, he has been a columnist at Mint Lounge. Manu is currently studying for a PhD at King’s College London.