Aparajith Ramnath is the winner of the 2025 Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay NIF Book Prize for Engineering a Nation: The Life and Career of M Visvesvaraya (Penguin Random House India).

The award – comprising a cash prize of Rs 15 lakhs, a trophy, and a citation – will be presented to him on December 6 at the Bangalore Literature Festival.

Ramnath is an Associate Professor in the School of Arts and Sciences at Ahmedabad University. His interests lie in the history of science and technology, the history of engineers, business history, and South Asian history. M Visvesvaraya (1861–1962) was one of India’s most celebrated engineers and technocrats, whose work helped shape modern India’s industrial and economic landscape. The jury praised Ramnath for capturing not only the life of a remarkable individual, but also the spirit of a nation in transformation.

The 2025 jury comprised N Chandrasekaran (Chairman, Tata Sons and Tata Group), Manish Sabharwal (entrepreneur), Niraja Gopal Jayal (political scientist), Srinath Raghavan (historian), Rahul Matthan (Partner, Trilegal), Jawed Ashraf (Former Ambassador of India to France), and Yamini Aiyar (public policy scholar)

The other books on the shortlist were

• Savarkar and the Making of Hindutva, Janaki Bakhle, Princeton University Press

• India’s Forgotten Country: A View From the Margins, Bela Bhatia, Penguin Random House India

• India’s Near East: A New History, Avinash Paliwal, Penguin Random House India

• Gods, Guns, and Missionaries: The Making Of The Modern Hindu Identity, Manu S Pillai, Penguin Random House India

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