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Vasudha Dalmia is Professor of Hindi and Chair of the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of California at Berkeley. She has researched and published widely on Hinduism, colonial and post-colonial Hindi literature, medieval Indian religiosity, and modern Indian theatre. Her book, The Nationalization of Hindu Traditions: Bharatendu Harischandra and Nineteenth Century Banaras, examines the life and writings of a major Hindi writer of the nineteenth century as the focal point for an examination of the intricate links between politics, language, culture, religion and nationality.

Heinrich von Stietencron is Professor Emeritus of Indology and Comparative History of Religion (1973-98) at the University of Tuebingen.  He has done extensive work on the religious traditions of Orissa.  He is chief editor of the annotated Epic and Puranic Bibliography (1992) and the author of numerous works, most recently of Hindu Myth, Hindu History: Religion, Art, and Politics (2005).  He was awarded the Padma Shree in 2004.