You know how you always miss what is right in front of you? That has been the classic case with me and this little village called Mattur. Let me first tell you why it is famous. Long, long back
I have seen the future, and there are no motorcycles. No bicycles either, nor buses. There are few pedestrians, and all of them seem to be white. Lots of cars, though. And shiny Metro trains. And airplanes and helicopters and
How does a secular intellectual feminist perspective emerge when one is raised in a highly patriarchal religious community? What specific features is this perspective likely to have, depending on the extent of oppression one experienced at the hands of the
“Puzzled, I stare at the skein not knowing which end I should pull so that one strand comes out untangled, and with its help I could fly beyond the horizon, reaching out like a kite.” —Ismat Chughtai, ‘Chhoti Aapa’
Ismat Chughtai, the most provocative and rebellious among women writers in Urdu, wrote voluminously until she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 1988. Her formidable body of work comprises several collections of short stories, novels, sketches, plays, reportage, radio plays as
Woman…woman…woman… Very good, disloyal, loyal, this and that, and god knows what else. In every country and in every age, great thinkers have put forward some opinion or the other about woman. If one gentleman emphasizes her beauty, another insists
We the undersigned express our profound dismay and disquiet at the continued official harassment by the central government of leading human rights defenders Teesta Setalvad and Jawed Anand. Since the installation of the BJP led government in Delhi in May
When Greece adopted the euro in 2001, it was far from meeting the Maastricht convergence criteria, a five-point “entrance test” that takes into account a country’s inflation, budget deficit, debt, exchange rate stability and long-term interest rates. This made it one of the weakest
World Environment Day has come and gone, and I say good riddance. For those concerned with the ecological health of the planet, the day brought little reason to cheer. The theme of this year’s celebration, organised by the UN, was
The Lalitgate scandal badly embroiled the BJP government in a political controversy and rattled its legendary “56-inch chest”, which did not seem strong enough to handle the heat of the controversy. The ghost of Lalit Modi now haunts Vasundhara Raje, the