Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- List of illustrations -- Notes on contributors -- Preface -- Introduction: steering democratisation and negotiating identity in the Himalayas -- PART I Shifting selves and competing identities -- 1 Seeking identities on the margins of democracy: Jad Bhotiyas of Uttarkashi -- 2 The politics of census: fear of numbers and competing claims for representation in Naga society -- 3 The making of the subaltern Lepcha and the Kalimpong stimulus -- PART II Negotiating democracy -- 4 Monks, elections, and foreign travels: democracy and the monastic order in western Arunachal Pradesh, North-East India -- 5 'Pure democracy' in 'new Nepal': conceptions, practices, and anxieties -- PART III Territorial conflict and after -- 6 Demand for Kukiland and Kuki ethnic nationalism -- 7 Displacement from Kashmir: gendered responses -- Index