Aids Sutra

India is home to almost three million HIV cases. But AIDS is still a disease stigmatized and shrouded in denial. It is stigma that prevents people from openly discussing the facts around HIV, and keeps them from getting treatment. Stigma leads to discrimination against HIV positive people in hospitals, schools and even among families.

In this ground-breaking anthology, sixteen of India's well-known writers go on the road to tell the human story behind the epidemic. William Dalrymple meets the devadasis ('temple women'), many of whom have become victims of HIV; Kiran Desai travels to the coast of Andhra where the sex workers are considered the most desirable and Salman Rushdie spends a day with Mumbai's transgenders. These writers travel the country to talk to housewives, vigilantes, homosexuals, police and sex-workers and together they create a complex and gripping picture of AIDS in India: who it is affecting, how and why.

Eye-opening, hard-hitting and moving,AIDS Sutrawill show you a side to India rarely seen before.

This anthology was produced in collaboration with Avahan, the India AIDS Initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Proceeds will be used to support programs for children affected by HIV in India.

Kiran Desaiwas born in New Delhi and lived there till she was 14. She spent a year in England before moving to the US. Her novelThe Inheritance of Losswon the Man Booker Prize in 2006. She is the daughter of writer Anita Desai.

Salman Rushdieis the author of eight novels, one collection of short stories, and four works of non-fiction, and the co-editor ofThe Vintage Book of Indian Writing. In 1993Midnight's Childrenwas judged to be the 'Booker of Bookers', the best novel to have won the Booker Prize in its first 25 years. TheMoor's Last Sighwon the Whitbread Prize in 1995, and the European Union's Aristeion Prize for Literature in 1996. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres.

Vikram Sethwas born in Calcutta and grew up in India, and now lives in England. His acclaimed novels includeA Suitable Boyand AnEqual Music, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

Amit Chaudhuriwas born in Calcutta, attended UCL and now teaches at the University of East Anglia. Among his many acclaimed novels, poetry collections and critical essays, he edited theVintage Book of Modern Indian Literature. He is also a classical musician.

Siddhartha Debwas born in India in 1970 and moved to New York in 1998 on a fellowship. He has worked as a journalist in Delhi and Calcutta, and writes for theGuardian,New StatesmanandTLS.

Nikita Lalwaniwas born in Rajasthan, India, and raised in Cardiff, Wales. Her first novelGiftedwas longlisted for the 2007 Man Booker Prize, and will be followed by her second novelThe Villagein 2009. She lives in London.

Nalini Jones'scollection of short stories,What You Call Winterwas published in 2007. She was born in Rhode Island, received an M.F.A from Columbia University and now lives in Connecticut.

Shobhaa Deis an Indian journalist and novelist. She began her career as a model but became a journalist in the 1970s when she founded and edited three popular Indian magazines. She is now a freelance writer and lives in India with her husband and six children

Sunil Gangopadhyayis the author of over 200 books, including novels, poetry, children's fiction, short stories, travel writing and critical writing. He is an important literary and cultural figure in India.

Jaspreet Singhis the author of a novel,Chef, a play,Speak Oppenheimer, andSeventeen Tomatoes, a collection of stories awarded the McAuslan Best First Book Prize. He lives in Canada.

William Dalrympleis an internationally acclaimed historian and writer. He is a regular contributor toThe New York Review of Books,The Guardian, theNew StatesmanandThe New Yorker, and his bestselling books includeThe White MughalsandThe Last Mughal: The Fall of a Dynasty. He divides his time between New Delhi, Edinburgh and London.

Sonia Faleirois an award-winning journalist and author of a novel,The Girl. Contributing editor atVogueIndia and writer-at-large forTehelka, India's independent news magazine, she is working on a non-fiction book about the bar dancers of Bombay, where she currently lives.

Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi's debut novel,The Last Song of Dusk, won the Betty Trask Award and the Premio Grinzane Cavour Prize in Italy. He lives and works in Bombay.

Dr C.K Lakshmiwrites fiction under the pseudonym Ambai in Tamil, and is the author of two collections of stories,A Purple SeaandIn a Forest, A Deer. Currently a college lecturer in New Delhi, she is Director of SPARROW (Sound&Picture Archives for Research on Women).

Mukul Kesavana critically acclaimed, bestselling writer, essayist and journalist. He is also a cricket enthusiast, and his bookMen in Whitewas published by Penguin India in 2007.

Aman Sethiis a Delhi-based reporter with the fortnightly national Indian news magazine,Frontlinewhere he covers infrastructure, environment and urban ecologies. His first book is expected in 2009.

Amartya Sen (Foreword)is an Indian economist and philosopher. He won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1998 and the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian award, in 1999. A former honorary president of Oxfam and Master of Trinity College Cambridge, he now teaches at Harvard University in the USA. His many books includeChoice, Welfare and Measurement,Development as FreedomandIdentity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny.