Why release a book on the deadly bubonic plague that hit Mumbai nearly 120 years ago?
Mumbai in 2015 is very like the Bombay of 1896: overburdened and overdeveloped, unsanitary and undernourished. Like it did in 1896, ‘development’ means the destruction of natural habitats. New diseases always emerge whenever this happens. When bubonic plague emerged in 1896, it was as strange and unknown as Ebola and H1N1 are to us today. Yet we continue to make the same mistakes. Recalling what happened in 1896 might, just might, get us to look more critically at today’s strategies.

Authors-surgeon duo Ishrat Syed and Kalpana Swaminathan (better known as Kalpish Ratna)