Blogs

As the free trade negotiations between India and the European Union are entering into a crucial stage, both sides reaffirmed their goal to conclude negotiations by the end of this year. The present negotiation was relaunched in 2022. Earlier, the negotiations for an India–EU Free Trade Agreement (FTA) started in 2007 but encountered delays because of…

Few months ago I found my right thumb not leading the right hand team of fingers very well. As in it would feel jammed. Even regular tasks like holding a pen or a cup gave discomfort to the thumb and to an extent to the wrist. It took me a while to figure out what…

In the rugged mountains of the Trikuta range, where faith has flowed for centuries and millions undertake an arduous pilgrimage seeking spiritual solace, the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine Board (SMVDSB) has, over the years, emerged as much more than an administrative body. It has become an emblem of how a sacred institution when guided…

…If I&B ministry lets film festival preview committees be sole arbiters of what can or cannot be screened On Oct 19, 1980, you could have walked into Delhi’s Vigyan Bhawan at 3pm, and watched a screening of Sergei Eisenstein’s silent film, Battleship Potemkin, for all of ₹2, which was the price of a bread loaf…

…if the government lets film festivals decide what movies they can show Long ago, on October 19, 1980, people in Delhi could walk into a big hall called Vigyan Bhawan and watch an old, famous movie called The Battleship Potemkin. The ticket cost just ₹2, about the price of a loaf of bread back then….

Narayani Ganesh A 15-year-old Carlo Acutis, who died of leukaemia in 2006 – popularly known as ‘God’s influencer’ and the ‘Patron Saint of the Internet’ – used digital media to promote Catholicism. A website he created documented Eucharistic miracles recognised by the church. With its finger on the pulse of the digital world, the Vatican,…

How to secure rights for gig workers – with no single employer, fixed hours of work, or common workplace? Karnataka gets a new law whose foundation was laid over 50 years ago by a young doctor Karnataka’s legislation for gig workers kicked in in November, mere weeks before the man who built the timeless foundation…

Stakes are high, but Mumbai’s civic polls are touch-and-go for both coalitions. Allies’ hyperlocal networks and organisational depth may decide the battle Ahead of BMC polls, cousins Uddhav and Raj Thackeray have united on the platform of Marathi asmita (pride) – at stake is the Thackeray political legacy. The two face NDA, the BJP-Shinde Sena…

We work, we stay up late having fun, then we work again. We push our bodies hard. But our bodies are not machines that can adjust forever. On school or work days, you wake up to a loud alarm. On weekends, you sleep very late. It feels great. But your body may not agree. On…

Parts of speech are dumbfounded  A visitor tells a boy who answers the door that he’s come to meet his mother, and gets the sullen reply, ‘She was in, she is  out!’ The aghast man says, ‘Young man, where’s your grammar?!’ To which the lad points upstairs and says, ‘She’s takin’ a nap.’ This old…