this book revisits democracy from India， Srirupa Roy shows how the political outsider came to be a valorized figure of late-twentieth century Indian democracy。

Roy argues that the long 1970s were a crucial turning point in Indian politics。

the Indian republic is more than seventy-five years old. And yet， and asks what the Indian experience tells us about the trajectory of global democratic politics. ， when democracy was suspended by the declaration of a national emergency and then subsequently restored. By tracing the crooked line that connects the ideals of curative democracy and the political outsider to the populist antipolitics and strongman authoritarian rule in present times。

tasked with the urgent mission of curing a broken democratic system—what Roy terms "curative democracy." Drawing attention to an ambivalent political field that folds together authoritarian and democratic forms and ideas。

Defying the dire predictions that attended its birth as an independent nation-state in 1947，。

like the majoritarian regime of Narendra Modi. Tracking the shift from postcolonial nation-building to democracy-rebuilding，imToken下载， it is a place where criticisms of actually existing democracy are intense and strident. In recent years， the trope of victimized people suffering at the hands of a predatory elite and political dysfunction has reaped rewards. The populist language of redemptive outsiders pledging to combat a corrupt system has been harnessed in successful electoral campaigns。