India, Oct. 11 -- In 2019, the Indian government revoked Aatish Taseer's Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card. After the initial shock and shame, Taseer felt, unexpectedly, relieved. "The burden of trying to fit into India, of forever apologizing for its shortcomings, apologizing for my own Westernization, was suddenly lifted from me. The West, in turn, was no longer some dirty secret that I could enjoy only at the detriment of the 'real' India. It was all I had. I was home," he writes in the introduction to his new book, a small collection of travel essays, A Return to Self: Excursions in Exile.

After returning from university in America, he had spent his time in India "trying to make up for the cultural and linguistic gaps of a colonia...