As the car rolls down the approach road to the famed ruins of Hampi in Karnataka, an involuntary gulp of expectation arises. Set in a forbidding backdrop of boulders precariously perched on one another, Hampi is the seat of the 15th century Vijaynagara...

Call me elitist if you will, but I believe respect for history in specific and people in general needs to be made a prerequisite for entry into historical monuments. There I was in the famed Wodeyar palace grounds in Mysore enjoying and overwhelmed by...