The Second World War was not fought by Britain alone. India produced the largest volunteer army in world history: over 2 million men. But, until now, there has never been a comprehensive account of India's turbulent home front and the nexus between warfare and India’s society. In The Raj at War we hear the myriad voices of ordinary Indian people, from the first Indian to win the Victoria Cross to the three soldiers imprisoned as ‘traitors to the Raj’ who returned to a hero’s welcome, from the nurses in Indian General Hospitals to labourers and their families in remote villages.

Yasmin Khan presents the overlooked history of India at war, and shows how mobilisation for the war unleashed seismic processes of economic, cultural and social change – decisively shaping the international war effort, the unravelling of the empire and India’s own political trajectory.

Yasmin Khan is a British historian and writer, and University Lecturer in British History (18th to early 20th century) based in the Department for Continuing Education and a member of the History Faculty at Oxford University. Her research focuses on the history of the British in India, the British Empire, South Asian decolonization, refugees and the aftermath of empire. She has also written about the Second World War and the imperial dimensions of the conflict.

She was educated at Oxford (St. Peter’s and St. Antony’s colleges) and was previously a Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh and a Senior Lecturer at Royal Holloway, University of London. She has held research grants from the British Academy (Postdoctoral Fellowship) the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Leverhulme Trust.

Publications include The Great Partition: the Making of India and Pakistan (Yale University Press/Penguin India, 2007) which won the Gladstone Prize from the Royal Historical Society. She has also published in journals including History Workshop Journal, Modern Asian Studies and the Roundtable: the Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs.

Yasmin has given public lectures and talks in the UK, Nepal, India, Pakistan and the USA. She is a trustee of the Charles Wallace India Trust which welcomes applications from Indian research students. She is an editor of History Workshop Journal, a journal committed to debating the role of history in public life, and exploring the dialogue between past and present. She has contributed to media including the Guardian, BBC Radio and Channel 4 News.