Renaissance, Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution ushered in the modern era in Europe and ultimately to the entire globe, notably through the institutions of capitalism and colonialism. Colonial and capitalist induced transformations as well as the resistances offered against such changes initiated complex processes whereby many modern nations and nationalities were formed. India is but the result of such processes. Although there is a considerable volume of scholarship on the origin of the idea of India, the respective histories of its numerous divergent constituent nations are often washed out and obliterated in the process of creating a grand assimilative history. Also missed out are the subaltern perspectives of nationhood from lesser known ethnic societies. For Assam and the northeast in general, who have been purportedly over-marginalized in the popular and academic discourses of India, Jayeeta Sharma’s book, Empire’s Garden-Assam and the making of India, is a moment of reckoning. Through the rich and detailed analysis of archival and colonial documents as well as ‘local’ sources, Sharma traces the nascent origins of the ideas and notions leading to the formation of a modern Assamese identity and nation in the post Ahom-Kingdom period, through the colonial and nationalist assimilation of Assam within India.