The book is a Narrative of the Rescue of an Empire – pertaining to the times of Madhav rao Peshwa. Set in a non fiction format, the book opens after the third battle of Panipat. What was left in its aftermath was a fragmented Hindustan. When the Marathas were hurtling down an abyss with many potentates rising against them and a raging power struggle at Pune, there came on the scene a sixteen-year-old youth who took over the reins of an unruly realm. In this book, the journey that Indian history took over the next twelve years has been meticulously constructed from original contemporary sources, creating a coherent narrative of a turbulent time when the nation threatened to fall apart. Richly illustrated and copiously annotated, the hardcover book can justifiably claim to be the authentic chronicle of the decade after 1761. The book runs into 576 pages (plus 32 preliminary pages), that include ten appendices, an introduction to principal characters, nearly twenty four maps, over seventy colour pictures of persons, forts and unpublished original documents, over 1300 references, a bibliography, and an index. Covering the story of India, from the north to the south, ‘The Mastery of Hindustan’ takes the story of the eighteenth century a step further. This is Dr Uday S. Kulkarni's seventh non-fiction book that deals with 17th and 18th century Indian History. It is an unveiling of an unknown part of our rich History.