Where to buy
Carried by Amazon in every market, Barnes & Noble, Walmart, Waterstones, Booktopia, Kinokuniya, Flipkart, Google Books, Apple Books and Kobo. Printed on demand close to wherever it is ordered.
Listed with the worldwide trade network, so any bookstore or library can order it. Ask for it by ISBN: 979-8950206054 (paperback) or 979-8950206061 (hardcover).
What is inside
Pushkar by Chandra Ganjoo explores this question through a deeply personal account of her father’s life, his enduring influence, and the memories that preserve his legacy.
Set against the cultural richness and turbulent history of Kashmir, the memoir traces a journey shaped by family, belonging, displacement, resilience, and love. It portrays a man whose intellectual clarity, quiet discipline, and profound humanity influenced those around him, not through grand declarations, but through the choices he made and the principles he lived by.
Through intimate family memories and reflections on changing circumstances, Chandra Ganjoo brings together the ordinary moments and defining experiences that shaped her understanding of her father. His relationships, sense of dignity, commitment to family, and ability to face adversity become part of a larger exploration of what gives a life meaning. The narrative also reflects on the experience of displacement and the importance of preserving cultural identity. Against this backdrop, memory becomes more than remembrance. It becomes a way of maintaining a connection to family, heritage, and the values that endure across generations.
At its heart, Pushkar is a daughter’s tribute to a father whose presence continues to influence her life. It considers how parents shape their children through everyday actions, how loss changes the meaning of familiar memories, and how personal values can become an inheritance that outlasts material possessions.
This book is for readers who appreciate reflective memoirs, family histories, and stories of love, loss, and resilience. It will particularly resonate with those interested in Kashmiri heritage, the experience of displacement, and the enduring bonds between parents and children.
Pushkar invites readers to reflect on the people who have shaped their own lives and consider what truly remains when a lifetime becomes a legacy.
Excerpt
From “Where Our Story Began”
I have always believed in hard work. In fact, I have long felt that the true measure of success in life is directly proportional to the effort we put into it. It felt simple, logical. and almost reassuring. But as I have grown older, I’ve also come to believe in destiny. There are so many moments in life that defy logic, times when things unfold as if someone, somewhere, is scripting the story, changing the plot until it reaches a point of their satisfaction.
There is a quiet orchestration in life that we do not always understand. And perhaps, we are not meant to. I often wonder whether life would have unfolded differently if my family had not belonged to Kashmir. Because Kashmir is not just a place on a map, it is an inheritance. An inheritance of identity, memory, struggle, and breathtaking beauty woven into every generation born of its soil.
It is a land where snow-capped mountains guard valleys of indescribable grace, where chinars blaze like flames in autumn, and rivers move with a quiet poetry that seems almost sacred. It is a place where beauty has always walked alongside turbulence, where serenity and sorrow live as neighbors, never separate, never distant. For us, Kashmir has never been merely geography. It has been history, culture and soul.
Ours was a lineage rooted in a civilization of learning, spirituality, dignity, and discipline. Kashmiri Pandits have, for centuries, been known as a community of thinkers, teachers, scholars, doctors, administrators, and artists, people who deeply believe in education, values, and quiet strength.
Temples, shrines, ancient manuscripts, rituals, music, and language formed the delicate threads of our belonging. We inherited not wealth, but resilience. Not privilege, but pride in who we were. That pride was quiet but unshakeable. But Kashmir has also been a story of endurance.
Our community has lived through uncertainty and repeated upheavals long before the world began to speak about it. History reminds us that displacement did not begin in 1989–1990 alone. There were waves of migration even before the Partition times, when circumstances, intolerance, and political realities forced Kashmiri Pandit families to leave the homeland they loved.
Trailer
About the author
Group CEO, Trivitron Healthcare · Delhi, India
Chandra Ganjoo is a Kashmiri Pandit writer whose debut memoir explores memory, identity & resilience. Inspired by her father’s enduring values, her writing reflects on love, loss, dignity & the lasting power of legacy.
Published by Stardom Books — written from the author’s own words, in the author’s name. Browse the catalogue
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