I have written chapter-length essays for several academically-oriented volumes, as well as two full books of my own.
The first book, published in 2008, Izzat: Historical records and iconography of Indian cavalry regiments, 1750-2007, was commissioned by Asia’s oldest research organisation related to the military – the United Service Institution of India (USI). That is a think tank rather than a full-fledged publishing house, although it does commission and publish books as well as a journal and research papers. So, what do I mean by saying that it is “not a full-fledged publishing house”? I mean that they lacked the means to publicise and market Izzat. I ended up purchasing 250 copies of my own book to be shipped to the United Kingdom, where a specialist military history bookseller agreed to store and despatch them. All copies of Izzat have now been sold out – though a reprint, or possibly an expanded edition, is being discussed.
My second book, Sowars and Sepoys in the Great War 1914-1918, Indian cavalry and infantry regiments, was entirely self-published in 2014 to commemorate the centenary year of the First World War – as a response to my feeling that India’s contribution to it had been, for too long, ignored or forgotten.
In the case of both books, the print run was limited: respectively, 500 copies and 300 copies.
Both the books have been well received and have been recognised as the definitive work on each specific area.
No doubt the reviews (mostly in UK publications) helped. About 180 copies of each book were sold within the UK, some to libraries and institutions, but mainly to individuals interested in the regimental and overall military history of the undivided Indian sub-continent.
After the Partition of the Indian sub-continent, the elites in each of the resulting countries have continued to flourish and have been joined by large numbers of people who have been successful in different fields of business. These individuals and families are. wealthy, educated, and claim to be patriotic and even nationalist.
However, in my experience so far, there is a greater market in United Kingdom and in the United States than in the countries of the Indian sub-continent – particularly in the case of proportionally costly, well-researched, weighty, and well-produced works of reference such as mine.