AIDS Sutra, ed. Negar Akhavi

The first reported HIV/Aids death in India occurred in 1986: a businessman in Bombay. Newspapers blamed contaminated blood supply. Within months, a story emerged of six affected sex workers in Tamil Nadu. An Indian magazine sent me to meet those women, and anyone else who might know anything else about HIV/Aids in India, to figure out the scale of the crisis. Many questioned if India should skew its priorities towards the new condition, given the rich harvest of diseases already prevalent.

Partly, this had to do with middle-class conservatism; partly the assumption that HIV/Aids could only occur in the "permissive West" or "developing Africa". Then the CIA shook Indians, saying 20 million could be affected by 2010. We now know that is closer to 2 to 3 million, but a reduced figure should not lead to a business-as-usual attitude.

That is why Aids Sutra is important. These "untold stories from India" humanise the tragedy, telling stories of sex workers, truck drivers, victims of contaminated blood, hijras (transvestites), devadasis (women who "serve" Hindu temples), and others bearing the brunt of stigma and discrimination. The book, supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, brings together 16 acclaimed writers who encounter those at the forefront of the battle.

Authors include Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, Kiran Desai and Amit Chaudhuri, and Indian-based bestsellers like Shobhaa De. The book succeeds because it is not sentimental: the writers respect the victims, admire their courage. With humility, expatriates make the arcane accessible. Those based in India have a refreshing candour.

Amartya Sen's thoughtful introduction shows the injustice committed not only through prejudice, but in the myopia of a law which continues to criminalise homosexuality. These writers give the lie to Stalin's dictum that many deaths are a mere statistic. The whole, as always, is but the sum of the parts.