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NAMIT ARORA is a writer and travel photographer based near Delhi. He was raised in Gwalior, famous for its historic fort, its epigraphic evidence of zero, and Tansen. After IIT Kharagpur and a masters in computer engineering from Louisiana, he worked in Silicon Valley for two decades, at both failed startups and big corporations. Whether or not this made him wiser, it did allow him to take social science courses of dubious practical value at Stanford and to live, work, or travel in scores of countries, with yearlong stints in London and Amsterdam. He quit this profession in 2013 for a life of reading and writing and returned to India. For two years, he volunteered with the Delhi govt. to tackle civic problems; he led the drafting of Delhi's solar energy policy and a task force on air pollution. Namit's writing has appeared in 3 Quarks Daily, The Caravan, The Baffler, The Humanist, Philosophy Now, The TLS, The Philosopher, Scroll, Himal, The Wire, and many anthologies (see his article archive and favorite books). He won the 3QD Arts & Literature Prize in 2011. From 2004 to 2006, he traveled across India and kept a photojournal. His photos have been licensed by over 15 museums, 40 academies, and 60 publishers. He also made River of Faith, a film on the Kumbh Mela. Namit's three books include: (1) Indians: A Brief History of a Civilization, (2) The Lottery of Birth: On Inherited Social Inequalities, and (3) the novel A California Story (US) / Love and Loathing in Silicon Valley (India). In 2024, Namit wrote and anchored Indians, a history web series in ten episodes. He then began a host of candid and wide-ranging conversations about Indian history with Prof. Romila Thapar, soon to be published as a book. He is on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Email. |
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Photo Licensing and Copyright (Selected Licensee Organizations) |
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Namit's photos have been licensed by museums, academia, media, publishers, governments, individuals, NGOs, etc. If you too desire any from this archive of 30K+ copyrighted photos (~half from India), please email to negotiate a license fee, file format, and resolution. The fee depends on your means and ends—progressive non-profits and causes can get their licenses for free. Please always inquire before copying (fair use exception). To make your online payment, click on the Buy Now button on the right. |
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SHUNYA, a labor of love and folly, went 
"Shunya" means "zero" as well as a metaphysical "void". Zero and our decimal system arose in India some 1500 years ago, reaching the West via the Arabs and so came to be called Arabic Numerals. The city of Gwalior, in its Bhojadeva inscriptions, has perhaps the earliest known epigraphic evidence of zero in India. So for all practical purposes, Gwalior may be regarded as the birthplace of zero. It also happens to be the city where Namit was raised and he surely stands to gain a measure of pride from this association. :-)