Category: Narratives
-
Kamla Balan Bridge in Bihar – it’s a disaster waiting to happen
First published in Mint: https://www.livemint.com/Politics/hXg4cJufdI5JSr5YbU0DoK/Kamla-Balan-bridge-it8217s-a-disaster-waiting-to-happen.html
-
The business of caste in India
Priyanka P. Narain and Pallavi SIngh Mumbai/New Delhi: Images of adventure reside in their collective memory—journeys into the cobbled streets of Antwerp to compete with powerful Hasidic Jew merchants for grubby stones, which, when polished and cut, would sparkle and dazzle. The journey that transformed the Palanpuri Jains from cloth and perfume traders into moguls…
-
Bihar’s IIT dream
Patna: Along the busy Rajendra Nagar flyover in Patna, the skyline is dotted with huge, irregularly placed hoardings. More than a hundred in number, they congregate with a purpose: to help every child in the city enter the Indian Institute of Technology (IITs), the country’s premier technical institutes. This dream caught Navneet Rajan’s fancy when…
-
Patna’s Brave New Nights
Pallavi SinghPatna That hot June afternoon in 1992 left an indelible imprint on Shanker Dutt’s memory. “June 5, in fact, let me tell you,” he says matter-of-factly. The professor of English was at Patna University’s Darbhanga House, the heritage precinct where postgraduate classes for literature students are held, attending a farewell function for one of…
-
Rise of India’s caste warrior
Pallavi SinghDuhai, Ghaziabad: Caste is most often seen through the prism of conflict—the heated national debates about reservations, the political polarization on the census and the attacks on young couples that have been blessed by caste panchayats. But far away from the spotlight, there is the more benign world of organizations and activists who continue…
-
Islamic students body on a mission for peace
Pallavi SinghNew Delhi: Hashmatullah Khan says the combination invites scrutiny: students, computers and Islam. In his case, it gets worse. He is general secretary of the Students Islamic Organisation (SIO). No, not the Students Islamic Movement of India, better known as SIMI, and effectively banned for alleged extremist activities. But Khan can’t avoid the connotation.…
-
Government’s madrasa reform plan hits theological hurdle
New Delhi: The impasse over a government proposal to modernize madrasas, or traditional Islamic schools, illustrates how a “minority mindset” imposed by the ulema, or clergy, and politicians could draw Muslims deeper into the morass of conservatism, poverty and unemployment. Fostering education: (from left) Shafiqur Rahman, Abdul Khan, Afaque Rahmani and Salim Akhtar Bellali at…
-
In the job market, Caste role reversal
I am absolutely thrilled to share another story on caste. This one again has gone missing from Mint’s website. I found this story’s draft on my drive and googled with the first four lines. Guess what, this blog had shared the story with the Mint link that does not work anymore. Thanks to the blog,…
-
Dalit Capitalism
I covered Dalit capitalism for Mint in its early days when DICCI as a chamber of commerce for the Dalit community had just come up. My boss at Mint, who is an economist, always felt proud of my work, especially on Dalit capitalism. Today, I spoke to Milind Kamble, founder and chairman of DICCI, in…
-
Perfection
Truth is, perfection is a feeling – a feeling that there is nothing wrong, no treatment ever shoddy, no care ever incomplete, no expectation ever unmet.
-
Grandma’s romance
Last December, in a winter that froze tears, she passed away, gasping heavily in her mulmul quilt.
-
Changing approach to dealing with rape
The young girl, visibly bruised and shaken, was brought for questioning amid blaring sirens and numerous cops stirred by her sudden appearance. She was reporting rape on a summer day in 2001 in a police station in central Delhi, where the policemen struggled to make sense of her distress. In an instant, they went hurling…
-
People Who Ate Delhi’s Smoke
We are the cursed boat people They said we have snatched their jobs And then, we were killed in a factory before we could call them murderers. ~~ They outraged over jobs, onions, freedom They said we were dying, with anger in their hearts, fire in their voices … We applauded, eyes moist, “They stand…
-
‘Good research is vital’
This very interesting interview with Alpa Shah is a must-read for anyone aspiring to write narrative non-fiction. Shah, a professor of anthropology at my alma mater London School of Economics, speaks beautifully and honestly about her writing process while working on ‘Nightmarch’ and has great messages for both academics as well as writers of the…
-
Protected: Living Light Has its Roots in Love & Mortality
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
-
Free-Fall
Technology and solitude are allies of the present. When my dreams have stopped regressing into nightmares, I close my eyes and plug my iPod in my ears. In this musical solitude, I become my best dance show.
-
Narendra Modi, The Best Marketed Leader Of India
Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, is not just a product of the world’s largest democracy; he is also a product of incredible marketing. The crux of this marketing hinges on a personality cult, carefully woven around a frequent and unabashed show of masculinity created through the means of propaganda. We are aware of the campaigns…
-
Rape Victims Are Being Silenced. Will We Just Watch?
Often, I shut myself down when I hear of heinous crime against a woman. Like when Nirbhaya was raped. And now when his girl in Unnao has been raped and seeking justice. But her story is almost like the dirty, scary Bollywood movie you watched and hated: Girl is raped and in no particular coincidence,…
-
Education Is A Great Leveller And IITs Do It Best
I have always felt that IITs have been the subject of unfair criticism over the years. I think IITs flowed with the liberalization wave of India. Indian economy opened and offered IITians a chance to go all over the world. Brain drain happened and media reportage on big salaries for IITians became the sensational stories…
-
The Girl With The Peacock Tattoo
It was always the tattoo that stood out. Peacock tattoo on the waist. It hurt to get it done but then, is there ever any gain without pain? Neetu Singh Solanki knew it only too well. She was a girl from Matiala, the congested suburb in West Delhi that we hear of only during elections,…
econhistorienne.com 