This is the second work by Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen as coauthors, after Hunger and Public Action. An Uncertain Glory explores India's miserable underperfor-mance on many indicators of human development relative to neighboring countries such as Bangladesh and Nepal, even while its economy has grown much faster. India's record in pioneering democratic governance in the non-Western world is a widely acknowledged accomplishment, as is its basic success in maintaining a secular state, despite the challenges arising from its thoroughly multi-religious population. When India became independent in 1947 after two centuries of colonial rule, it immediately adopted a firmly democratic political system, with multiple parties, freedom of speech, and extensive political rights. India's commitment to democracy has been a unique experiment in developing countries and has been an achievement in itself, and a means of avoiding the famines that have characterized autocracies, including China. The famines of the British era disappeared, and steady economic growth replaced the economic stagnation of the Raj. The growth of the Indian economy quickened further over the last three decades and became the second fastest among large economies. Despite a recent slowdown, it is still one of the highest in the world.
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