From a small village in South India to the august offices of South Block in New Delhi this is the incredible journey made by three generations of a Tamil Brahmin family during the last century: a herbal healer a doctor practicing against the backdrop of Gandhi and the Freedom movement and a senior bureaucrat representing the aspirations of a young newly-independent India. Chronicling a tumultuous era The Family from Padma Vilas is a memoir which recaptures a past that is fast receding from our memories yet a past which must be cherished.