It takes some daring to choose opium as your historical protagonist. The milky sap of the poppy flower has taken so many forms across so many centuries that its allure feels like a trap, a chasing of ...

After the mid-18th century, when the British East India Co. was importing tea from China, few could have guessed that the industry would be revolutionized by a different plant: the opium poppy. Over ...

So much for provision opium, sold for export. Let us now consider the other form, manufactured at the government factory at Ghazipur, known as excise opium, destined for consumption in India and other ...

Shehnab Sahin’s short story collection, ‘Colour My Grave Purple and Other Stories’, seeks to expand Assam’s narrative beyond ...

CYNTHIA D. BERTELSEN of Blacksburg writes a blog, "Gherkins & Tomatoes: Writing Journeys into the World." Opium, scourge of China, coin of the realm for Britain, financed the British Raj in India ...

For close to a century, the British colonial regime in India ran a narcotic empire which became its second largest source of income after land revenue. Beneath the lucrative British narco trade hides ...