Sonia Gandhi is set to publish a deeply personal memoir examining the extraordinary journey that took her from a small village in Italy to becoming one of the most prominent political figures in India. Belonging: A Journey of Love, due to go on sale on November 10, 2026, combines personal memories with an account of a life shaped by love, family and the political upheavals of modern India.
The memoir begins in Cambridge, England, in 1965, where Sonia Maino, then a 19-year-old student, falls in love with Rajiv Gandhi, the grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru, independent India’s first Prime Minister. Their relationship would ultimately take her from Italy to India and into one of the country’s most influential political families.
The book follows her childhood in post-war Veneto and her transition to life in India, including her introduction to Rajiv’s mother, Indira Gandhi, India’s first female Prime Minister. Sonia describes adjusting to an unfamiliar country and culture, learning Hindi, wearing saris and embracing Indian cuisine as she built a life alongside Rajiv.
Rajiv Gandhi initially worked as a commercial airline pilot, and the couple raised their two children in the Prime Minister’s house in Delhi. Their family life was transformed by a succession of devastating events. Rajiv’s brother, Sanjay, also a pilot, was killed in a crash, followed in 1984 by the assassination of Indira Gandhi by her security guards in the garden of her home.
Despite Sonia’s fears, Rajiv subsequently assumed the office of Prime Minister. The couple travelled across India and abroad, but seven years later their lives were shattered again when Rajiv was assassinated by a suicide bomber while campaigning.
The memoir recounts Sonia’s decision to remain in India despite advice from her Italian family to return home. She was subsequently drawn into politics and became the longest-serving president of the Indian National Congress. Once regarded as a foreign-born outsider, she eventually came to earn the trust and affection of millions, according to the book’s description.
One of the most consequential moments in her political career came after a key election, when the Congress Party selected her to become Prime Minister. Sonia declined the country’s highest political office, instead choosing to lead her party in an alliance that would govern India for a decade.
Belonging presents this journey as both a personal and political account of India, offering Sonia’s perspective on the country’s tumultuous post-independence history and its political, economic and social changes over five decades. It also promises an intimate account of a renowned political family and of the experiences that shaped Sonia herself.
The memoir places particular emphasis on identity, duty and the meaning of home. At its centre is the story of a woman who left her Italian beginnings behind, endured profound personal losses and ultimately chose to remain in India, presenting the country not simply as the place where her political life unfolded, but as the home to which she came to belong.
