Raised in the turbulent Bihar of the 1970s ? a crucible of idealism and democratic awakening in an era of gang wars and caste militias ?Yashovardhan Azad, son of Bhagwat Jha Azad, freedom fighter, union minister and former Bihar chief minister, spent four decades inside India's law enforcement and intelligence establishment, from the dusty thanas of the mofussil to the corridors of real power. Policing the Republic is Azad's hard-hitting account of the criminalisation of politics, the machinery of corruption, the long war against terrorism and insurgency, and the slow erosion of the rights the country promised its citizens. It covers difficult ground that few insiders have been willing to write about. Clear-eyed and analytical, it maps the fault lines beneath the surface of the world's largest democracy. It goes beyond critique to offer hard-headed, practical solutions to the structural failures that hold India back. For anyone working to change this country, from within the system or outside it, this is an essential handbook ? authoritative, candid and long overdue. For anyone seeking to understand how the system works, there is no better place to start