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HarperCollins is proud to announce the publication of ‘The Day I became a Runner’ A Women’s History of India through the Lens of Sport by Sohini Chattopadhyay

A Fourth Estate book



Hardback | 360 pp | INR 599



Releasing on 23rd October 2023



“One of the finest works of non-fiction I have read in years.”

Ramachandra Guha

NEW DELHI, Sept. 27, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — The Day I Became a Runner starts on a striking premise—that, since running is a solitary activity conducted in the public sphere, women who take up this sport pose a more direct challenge to patriarchy than those who play sports such as badminton, cricket, tennis and so on. To support this thesis, award-winning journalist Sohini Chattopadhyay presents the compelling stories of athletes spanning the entire history of independent India and involving women from a wide range of social and geographical backgrounds. Whether it is Ila Mitra, who could have been the first Indian-origin woman at the 1940 Olympics, or Mary D’Souza, who ran and played hockey for India through the 1950s, Kamaljit Sandhu, the first Indian woman to win an individual gold outside India in Bangkok in 1970, or P.T. Usha, who redefined the 1980s and the decades that followed for women in sport across the country, each of the women in this book is a remarkable figure of post-independence India.

Written with remarkable insight and poignancy, The Day I Became a Runner is an alternative account of the Indian republic chronicled through its women athletes. In that sense, it is a women’s history of India.

I wanted to attempt a story of India through the embodied experiences of women: what it is like to inhabit this nation as a woman citizen. From the start, my ambition was that this would be a history of the republic, a history told through the lens of sport and the lives of women. This is probably why it took me a while to write it—more than eight years, to be precise. I am truly thrilled that HarperCollins shared this vision with me—that this is a story of India, seen through what is hopefully a fresh lens—and enabled me to bring this book to you.

Sohini Chattopadhyay, Author

Written with stunning felicity, Sohini Chattopadhyay’s The Day I Became a Runner is a brilliant work of narrative non-fiction. This is a history of modern India, seen through the unusual but very insightful lens of women’s sports, and it reveals uncanny truths about our society and culture. A book like this comes along only once in a while. We at HarperCollins are hugely excited to be able to bring Sohini’s first book to readers under our prestigious Fourth Estate imprint.

Udayan Mitra, Executive Publisher

The Day I Became a Runner is a spectacular debut, not only because it is an extraordinary narrative, but because it brings so many diverse strands deftly together—history, gender, sports, reportage and personal experience. We publish this important work at a time when conversations around women and sport are becoming increasingly urgent and relevant.

Swati Chopra, Associate Publisher

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sohini Chattopadhyay is a journalist and National Award-winning film critic. Her work has been translated into German, Bengali, Tamil and Malayalam. She is a recipient of the New India Foundation fellowship, and has been bestowed the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award and the Human Rights Press Awards citation, among others. Her writing is archived on her website.

PRAISE FOR THE BOOK

Anjum Hasan says, “With curiosity, sensitivity and agility, Sohini Chattopadhyay creates a sisterhood of Indian runners.”

Jairam Ramesh says, “A hobby runner herself, the author weaves together the lives of nine notable Indian women runners to “trace the arc of citizenship in the Indian republic”. Each of them has left their imprint on not just our athletic but also our social history—one is now my colleague in Parliament. Their achievements could not have found a better chronicler and analyst. The book is delightfully written, and it has been an education to read it.”

Mukul Kesavan says, “The Day I Became a Runner isn’t just the best book ever written about Indian women in competitive sport, but it is the best book about India that you’re likely to read this year.”

Nida Kirmani says, “Sohini Chattopadhyay’s The Day I Became a Runner is a beautiful tribute to Indian women in sport. She skilfully interweaves her own relationship with running with stories of Indian women athletes from the 1940s to the present, demonstrating how women have creatively used professional sports as a way of creating space for themselves in the Indian republic. The Day I Became a Runner is a history of India told through the lives of these incredible, boundary-pushing women. It is also a touching personal story of a woman struggling to connect with her body despite the odds.”

Shobhaa Dé says, “A searing comment on the harsh realities that women athletes face as they try to make their way in the sporting world. But The Day I Became a Runner is not only about sportswomen, it is about all of us who struggle against stereotypes and the world’s expectations of how women should live.”

Sonia Faleiro says, “A beautifully written and thoroughly captivating ode to the power of dreams and the pursuit of excellence.”

Srinath Raghavan says, :This remarkable and highly readable book braids together the lives of Indian women runners and the history of sport in a deeply gendered society. In so doing, Sohini Chattopadhyay also offers us a subtle and moving account of the meanings of freedom in India since its Independence.”

Sumana Roy says, “It is possible that many of us—particularly a generation of women— have willed this book into existence. Sohini Chattopadhyay gives us a history of Indian women in a manner never attempted before, without ever letting go of an opportunity to share a joke.”

Nilanjana Roy says, “This is what the ‘Big India Book’ used to be, only better and more fascinating. Through running, Chattopadhyay traces a map of the country’s dreams, fault lines and struggles, of gender, sport and nationhood. A work of incredible research, engrossing and powerful.”

Ramachandra Guha says, “I have had the great pleasure of having read, in manuscript form, Sohini Chattopadhyay’s wonderful book on women runners in India. Sohini is both a superb reporter and a beautiful writer. While the motif of struggle and sacrifice runs through the book, each story is moving in its own distinctive way. This is one of the finest works of non-fiction I have read in years.”

ABOUT HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS INDIA

HarperCollins is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, having begun publishing in India in 1992. HarperCollins India publishes some of the finest writers from the Indian subcontinent and around the world, publishing approximately 200 new books every year, with a print and digital catalogue of more than 2,000 titles across 10 imprints. Its authors have won almost every major literary award, including the Man Booker Prize, JCB Prize, DSC Prize, New India Foundation Award, Atta Galatta Prize, Shakti Bhatt Prize, Gourmand Cookbook Award, Publishing Next Award, Tata Literature Live! Award, Gaja Capital Business Book Prize, BICW Award, Sushila Devi Award, Sahitya Akademi Award and Crossword Book Award. HarperCollins India also represents some of the finest publishers in the world, including Harvard University Press, Gallup Press, Oneworld, Bonnier Zaffre, Usborne, Dover and Lonely Planet. HarperCollins India has won the Publisher of the Year Award four times at Tata Literature Live!, in 2022, 2021, 2018 and 2016, and at Publishing Next in 2021 and 2015. HarperCollins India is a subsidiary of HarperCollins Publishers.

PRE-ORDER NOW: https://amzn.to/4530tpL 

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Firstsource Partners with Typeface to Launch Agentic Marketing Services

New full-stack offering turns content operations into an agentic growth engine

NEW YORK and MUMBAI, India, April 30, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Firstsource Solutions Limited (NSE: FSL) (BSE: 532809), an RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group company, today announced the launch of a new offering — Agentic Marketing Services — in partnership with Typeface, the marketing orchestration engine for the world’s leading enterprises. The offering is designed to help enterprises move from marketing ambition to scale by transforming, implementing, and operating AI-native marketing systems. It transforms marketing operations into a scalable growth engine and delivers measurable top-line revenue growth beyond operational efficiency alone.

 

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Agentic AI is redefining how enterprises think about the customer lifecycle, and marketing content sits at the center of that transformation. Enterprises deploying AI-driven personalization are seeing up to 40% higher revenue compared to their peers. Content operations is both a growth lever and an efficiency play for CMOs: roughly 30% of CMO budgets go to content; approximately 55% of content work is manual — resizing, localization, brand compliance — while 90% of those manual workflows can be AI-enabled.

“At Firstsource, our approach has been about moving beyond traditional boundaries to build adaptive, intelligence-led ecosystems that deliver measurable outcomes. Content operations is now the most disrupted layer of the modern marketing stack, with Large Language Models reshaping the entire value chain — from ideation and production to governance and distribution — making it both the biggest near-term efficiency opportunity and the most exposed surface area in enterprise marketing,” said Ritesh Idnani, MD and Chief Executive Officer of Firstsource.

“CEOs and CMOs are not looking for a consultancy that hands off a roadmap or an agency that operates in silos — they want a partner who can transform, implement, and operate marketing systems end-to-end. By combining micro-segmentation, personalization, and deep industry context, we help clients build acquisition, engagement, and retention engines that are intelligent, compliant, and scalable. Typeface brings the AI technology to generate personalized, on-brand, compliant content at scale, and Firstsource brings deep experience in customer operations, especially in regulated industries like banking, financial services, healthcare, and retail. Together, we enable enterprises to plan, build, and run modern marketing — turning content operations into a compounding growth engine and delivering outcomes, not just effort.”

The partnership extends the capabilities announced with Typeface’s recent Marketing Orchestration Engine launch — bringing governed AI systems into full-stack marketing operations for regulated enterprises.

“AI only transforms marketing when it’s embedded into the workflows that drive real customer outcomes,” said Abhay Parasnis, Founder & CEO of Typeface. “Firstsource brings deep industry expertise and operational rigor in highly regulated environments. Together, we’re helping enterprises turn AI ambition into operational reality, embedding governed intelligence into the systems that power durable growth.” 

While Typeface provides the orchestration layer that unifies brand intelligence, AI agents, and enterprise systems, Firstsource brings the operational expertise and insights to enable effective decision making and implement and run these systems in complex, regulated environments. Together, they redesign how growth is driven — focusing on the moments, segments, and mechanisms that truly move the needle — enabling enterprises to shift from fragmented activity to scalable, revenue-led execution.

Industry view

“In retail, seasonality and micro-segmentation are where revenue is won or lost. Every peak moment demands thousands of personalized variants across marketing, service, and customer operations — and the retailers who get this right see real movement on acquisition, conversion, and retention, not just efficiency. What makes the Firstsource–Typeface offering different is that it is not another tool — it is an operating capability. Pairing agentic AI with embedded marketing operations is exactly what retailers need to move from broad campaigns to true lifecycle-driven engagement. For the industry, this is a meaningful step-change in how growth gets engineered.”

– Dave Kimbell, Ex-CEO Ulta Beauty; Firstsource Advisory Board Member

“Healthcare payers sit on a real paradox: a huge share of member communication is locked inside PHI and claims workflows where the rules are clear and rightly strict — but the biggest lever on affordability lives outside that envelope, in how payers engage members on wellness, prevention, plan literacy, and proactive disease management. That is a white-space opportunity the industry has barely touched. This is where marketing AI services can genuinely move the needle. With micro-segmentation and agentic content, payers can reach the right member with the right nudge at the right moment — entirely within compliant, non-PHI pathways — and shift the engagement model from acquisition and retention to lifelong wellness. That is how you make healthcare more affordable, improve member experience, and strengthen the economics of the plan at the same time. The Firstsource–Typeface offering is one of the few capabilities purpose-built to operate at that intersection of compliance, personalization, and outcomes.”

– Paul Sanford, Ex-EVP Operations, Cigna Group; Firstsource Advisory Board Member

About Firstsource

Firstsource Solutions Limited, an RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group company (NSE: FSL) (BSE: 532809), is a global intelligence partner to enterprises across healthcare, banking and financial services, communications, media, technology, retail, and utilities. Its inch-wide, mile-deep practitioners work collaboratively to reimagine business process management.

With operations across the US, UK, India, Philippines, Mexico, Romania, Trinidad & Tobago, South Africa, and Australia, Firstsource combines over twenty-five years of domain expertise with an agent-first delivery model to design, build, and operate intelligent enterprise operations. Through its Intelligence That Operates promise—powered by Kairos, the operating system that makes it real—the company unifies consulting, implementation, and operations into a single full-stack engagement and underwrites outcomes, not effort, turning deep domain intelligence into a compounding operational advantage for firms in the world’s most regulated industries. (www.firstsource.com)

About Typeface

Typeface is a marketing orchestration engine for the world’s leading enterprises, coordinating brand intelligence, AI agents, and enterprise systems across cross-channel marketing operations. Built for large organizations, Typeface combines shared brand intelligence, governed agent workflows, and deep enterprise integration at scale — connecting seamlessly with platforms like Salesforce, Microsoft, and Google — to help teams scale what works without sacrificing quality or control. Trusted by Fortune 500 companies, Typeface enables organizations to operationalize AI inside real marketing workflows, turning brand standards, approvals, and performance signals into coordinated systems that improve over time. Typeface is backed by Lightspeed, GV, Salesforce Ventures, Madrona, Menlo, and M12, and has been recognized by Fast Company, Gartner, TIME, LinkedIn, and Adweek as a leader in AI for marketing. Learn more at www.typeface.ai.

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Shaping Future-Ready School Leaders: Woxsen University Leads Design Thinking Initiative for Principals

HYDERABAD, India, April 30, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The School of Arts and Design at Woxsen University, in collaboration with the Public-School Principals’ Association (PSPA), conducted a Principal Leadership Programme on April 27, bringing together 30 principals from leading schools across Hyderabad for an immersive, design-led learning experience focused on rethinking leadership in contemporary education.

Participating institutions included Delhi Public School, Sloka International School (Tukkuguda), Jain Heritage Cambridge School, AVN Vida International School, CMR School (Medchal), and Gitanjali High School, among others. Designed as a hands-on, studio-based workshop, the programme moved beyond traditional formats, enabling participants to engage in collaborative problem-solving, systems thinking, and real-world leadership challenges.

The programme was delivered by Woxsen’s Centre for Learning Design (CLD) and the David Dunne Design Thinking Lab, and was guided by the university’s ERS (Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability) framework, reflecting an integrated and purpose-driven approach to leadership development.

Through guided design thinking exercises, principals explored new approaches to decision-making, innovation in school ecosystems, and building student-centric learning environments. The interactive format encouraged peer exchange and practical application, making the experience directly relevant to institutional leadership.

Rajendra Prasad, President of the PSPA, said, “The School Principals’ Leadership Workshop at Woxsen University was well organized and delivered with great impact. The sessions were highly engaging and insightful, and the programme received overwhelming positive feedback from participants for both its content and overall experience.”

Dr. Ashok Pandey, Member of the PSPA Leadership Team, shared, “An inspiring day at the picturesque Woxsen University campus, engaging with exceptional school leaders committed to designing the schools of tomorrow.” 

Dr. Adity Saxena, Dean, School of Arts & Design, said, “This programme is aligned with Woxsen’s core pillar of Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability, reinforcing our commitment to purpose-driven education. We see our role as bridging ideas, institutions, and impact in education, and we are grateful to PSPA and Rajendra Prasad for this meaningful collaboration.”

The initiative reflects Woxsen University’s commitment to strengthening the school education ecosystem in Telangana by building leadership capacity and fostering future-ready thinking among educators. Following the workshop, the PSPA leadership team engaged in a strategic discussion with Dr. Adity Saxena to explore future collaboration opportunities.

Building on the momentum of the programme, Woxsen University and PSPA are exploring the launch of a structured Principal Leadership Certificate Programme. The proposed initiative aims to institutionalize leadership development for school heads and further strengthen the region’s education ecosystem through sustained, practice-oriented engagement.

About Woxsen University, Hyderabad

Woxsen University, located in Hyderabad, is one of the first private universities in the state of Telangana, India. Renowned for its 200-acre state-of-the-art campus and infrastructure, Woxsen University offers new-age, disruptive programs in the fields of Business, Technology, Arts & Design, Architecture, Law, and Liberal Arts & Humanities. Woxsen also houses Asia’s largest Sports Infrastructure, spread over 60 acres. With 175 Global Partner Universities and a strong industry connect, Woxsen is recognized as one of the top universities for Academic Excellence and Global Edge. Woxsen has also secured the QS Business Masters World Ranking 2025, Rank #9 All India, Top 100 B-Schools by Times B-School Ranking 2025, Rank #6, Asia Pacific, Bloomberg Best B-School, and features in India’s Best B-Schools beyond IIMs by Dalal Street Investment Journal 2025, in 4th consecutive year. Woxsen is ranked as one of the Top Professional Colleges in India by Outlook I-CARE for its undergraduate programs, securing All India Rank 12 among the Top 130 BBA Private Institutes, All India Rank 20 among the Top 160 B.Tech Private Institutes, All India Rank 3 among the Top 25 Design Private Institutes, and All India Rank 3 among the Top 30 B. Arch Private Institutes.

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HarperCollins is proud to announce the publication of The Book of Daily Brilliance: 111 Days to Transformation by Pamela Puja Kirpalani

Published by HarperCollins

Hardback | Non-Fiction/Self-Help | 140 pp | INR 399

Available wherever books are sold | Releasing on 24 April 2026

NEW DELHI, April 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — HarperCollins Publishers India is thrilled to announce the publication of The Book of Daily Brilliance: 111 Days to Transformation by Pamela Puja Kirpalani, a practical guide towards a spiritual and psychological transformation.

ORDER HERE

ABOUT THE BOOK

Everyone in the world has good days and bad days. But what if there was a way to unleash one’s radiant self every day? Something simple yet profound—something the reader could reach for every day to centre themselves and remember what really matters.

The Book of Daily Brilliance is designed to speak to the heart and the highest self. Meant to be read over 111 days and covering topics that resonate with all—relationships, self-worth, love, pain, abundance, manifestation, surrender and much more—this daily reader will guide the one through a gentle yet powerful spiritual and psychological journey.

There is no fixed start date. No pressure to be perfect. If a day is skipped or there is a pause for a while, that is okay. All that’s needed to do is come back when it feels right. For those who choose to commit to the 111-day journey, the experience reveals the unfolding of a deeper truth within. 

So, take a deep breath. Open the page to Day 1 and let this be an invitation to return to oneself —one day, one page, one insight at a time.

Pamela Puja Kirpalani says, “One page can really just change the way you show up for your life. I wrote The Book of Daily Brilliance to be something you return to, not just read once — a daily pause that brings clarity, perspective and healing. In a fast-paced world, I believe even a single mindful page a day can create powerful inner psychological shifts. This 111 Daily Reader is my way of helping people reconnect with themselves— and if it helps someone feel more present, more grounded, and more like themselves, then it has done exactly what I hoped it would.”

Sachin Sharma, Publisher, HarperCollins India, says, The Book of Daily Brilliance offers a perfect pause amidst the busyness of life. Readers will appreciate how the book gently guides them through a journey of transformation—without any pressure—one step, one day at a time.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Pamela Puja Kirpalani is the Founder of Inner High Living and a distinguished thought leader in the world of behavioural psychology and neuro-behaviour. Her vision materialized as she started coaching individuals, couples and parents on achieving their goals initially using Neuro-linguistic Programming (NLP) as a modality. She is certified by ABNlp (Australian Board of Neuro-Linguistic Programming), IEMT (Integrated Eye Movement Technique) Practitioner, member of the APSS Singapore and the NLP Association of Singapore.

ABOUT HARPERCOLLINS INDIA

At HarperCollins Publishers India, we believe in telling the best stories and ensuring they reach the widest readership. We publish around 250 new books every year across 10 imprints, adding to a diverse catalogue of more than 2,000 titles across print and digital formats. Our authors include APJ Abdul Kalam, Agatha Christie, Amish Tripathi, Amitav Ghosh (Erasmus Prize 2024), Jhumpa Lahiri, Paulo Coelho, Raghuram Rajan, Sudha Murty, Ruskin Bond and many more.

HarperCollins India has been honoured with seven Publisher of the Year awards and proudly represents global publishers such as Harvard University Press, Lonely Planet, Oneworld, Nosy Crow, Usborne and National Geographic Children.

We have also been certified as a Great Place to Work for two consecutive years, a testament to our culture, creativity and people.

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