Sonia Gandhi's memoir Belonging: A Journey of Love is set to reach Indian readers through a different publisher than originally planned, after Penguin Random House India stepped back from the project following a disagreement over the manuscript. HarperCollins India has since stepped in and confirmed the book will be released on November 10, giving the long awaited memoir a firm publication date despite the earlier upheaval.
Penguin Random House India said the decision followed discussions with the author's team over editorial changes and deletions it had sought in parts of the manuscript. The publisher said some of its suggestions were accepted while it in turn accepted the author's position on other points, but the two sides ultimately could not find common ground on what it described only as a particular issue, without disclosing further detail.
The publisher was equally direct in stating what did not drive the decision, saying explicitly that no external pressure had influenced its choice to walk away, an attempt to head off speculation that political considerations rather than editorial ones were behind the split. Even so, reports around the dispute have pointed to passages touching on Prime Minister Modi, the RSS and communal divisions as the likely source of the disagreement, though neither side has confirmed specifics.