The book as the title suggests describes the history of the devadasis of India who were regarded for centuries as servants of the Hindu deities. But for one century between 1857 to 1947 they came to be regarded as profane prostitutes by the emerging Indian westernized elite and the British officials. The book reviews court cases, executive correspondence, and legislations that led to the shift in the official attitude towards the devadasis.   The book in its introduction defines devadasis as female ritual specialists who were ever auspicious since they were never widowed. The Hindu scriptures did not regard them as prostitutes; although forbidden to marry they were not expected to be chaste. Their customary laws included absolute ownership of property by women, adoption of daughters, and matrilineal inheritance customs favouring relatives dedicated to temple service. In the introduction the author reviews some important works of anthropologists Frederique Marglin, Amrit Srinivasan and Saskia Kersenboom Story. Studies that reviewed legal and judicial efforts that disenfranchized the devadasis as ritual specialists and rescinded recognition of their customary law included those of Janaki Nair , Kunal Parker, and M. Sundra Raj’s works.   The author clearly lays out three themes of the book in the introduction. First, the relation of change in the status of devadasis with the process of modernization and secularization of India; second, the spirit of post-colonial criticism, reconstruction of the Indian past to justify the legal status of the devadasis, and lastly, the paradoxical impact of the devadasis reform legislation that in some cases it deprived the devadasis of religious status and in other cases prevented the exploitation of women.   The second chapter describes the relation between the Hindu kings and devadasis that lays the background for dramatic shift in perception of the devadasis from sacred to profane prostitutes. Traditionally both the kings and the devadasis derived their social and cultural importance from their relation to the sacred. Kings and devadasis interacted within a cultural environment infused by a sense of reality and meaningfulness of the sacred. The traditional worldview was very much alive when the British conquered India.   The third chapter explores the tension between the traditional worldview where political, economic, and religious power were intertwined and between the modern world-view where the political and economic power and well-being of society was distinct from the sacred realm. The contrast between the rule of the Hindu kings, and that of the British regime ...