Conversion: many versions

Political parties are the forever switcheroos. Try anti-converting them It’s the season of anti-conversion – a very strict Uttarakhand law is the latest. Anyone found converting, or trying to convert, someone to a religion other...

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Aurangabad, Ajanta Caves & Ellora Caves – Part 1

The Ellora Caves   Two lamas — Rinpoche, a monk, and Kandola, a lady monk — from His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s monastery had come to stay with us in Mumbai. I had known them earlier,...

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Clinical perspectives on supporting children in distress: The power of presence

Having worked as a clinical psychologist, I have encountered numerous instances of families struggling to cope with their child’s emotional challenges. Parents are naturally inclined to take action, rectify the situation, and provide solutions when...

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Atrophy astrology

Part 2 Just by saying that the astrologers are failing us will not suffice. We need to look at the nitty gritty to say how and why. Therefore, lets investigate some hardcore astrology. Initially, let...

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Razia Sultan and Noor Jahan: What girls lose when queens are erased

The great French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir once wrote that girls were not born into a pre-ordained state of ‘womanhood’ but instead learnt how to become women by absorbing societal cues as they grew up....

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The Vance Dance

Sometimes wanting to move up and staying loyal to your boss can clash. JD Vance is a US politician with really big dreams. At first, he didn’t like Donald Trump at all. But later, he...

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Mountain Dues

A brief reminder of India’s civilisational debt to Himalayas & the need to once again show gratitude The West named India after Indus, but Himalayas would have been a better geographical descriptor. Around 50mn years...

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Time To EVolve

India can become a global e-vehicle hub with right incentives & mastery over batteries With Trump’s 50% tariff kicking in, India must devise both short- and long-term strategies to counter the impact. As the above...

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Talk, don’t walk away

Some opposition parties have decided not to join a special group (called JPC) that will study a very important new law. This law says that if the Prime Minister, Chief Ministers or state ministers are...

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The inward turn: Humanity’s quiet revolution

For over a century, humanity sought happiness, freedom, and security through the promises of modernity—industrial advancement, scientific discovery, material wealth, and digital connectivity. These milestones improved life expectancy, reduced poverty, and transformed human possibility. Yet,...

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Rethinking stray dogs: From crisis to opportunity

On this International Dog Day (26 August), let us shift the lens through which we view India’s dogs, replacing fear and pity with imagination and purpose. With an estimated 62 million strays, India hosts the...

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Each soul has potential for liberation

(By Muni Pranamyasagar) Chaos, unrest, suffering, and misuse of power arise when the human mind disconnects from real nature of the soul. The connotation of Dashlalshan Dharm, ten virtues, is not religious; it is to...

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Evergrande’s Big Fall: A Lesson for India

Sometimes when people build too much without thinking, things go wrong. That’s what happened in China with a company called Evergrande. It borrowed a huge amount of money (about $300 billion!) and quickly became the...

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They shouldn’t get away with it

A young woman in Greater Noida was set on fire by her husband in front of their 6-year-old child. She had been married into this family in 2016 and was tortured for dowry – money,...

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Trimbakeshwar: A sacred journey of light, love, and power – The Trinity of God

The moment I realised that 15th August, the Independence Day, fell on a Friday, giving us a long weekend, I decided to set out for Trimbakeshwar Jyotirlinga. A Jyotirlinga is a shrine dedicated to Lord...

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Quick trials a better way to tackle corruption than 30-day shortcut

India’s reputation as a democracy —Sweden’s V-Dem institution classifies it as an ‘elected autocracy’ much to the ire of many Indians — will sag further if three proposed bills become law. These bills seek a...

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Chill gives way to thaw but India, China must go beyond piecemeal fixes

The signals from Beijing and Delhi are unmistakable. The India-China relationship is being stabilised and rebuilt after it literally fell off the Himalayan cliffs in 2020. While the impetus is a predatory US, Modi and...

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Mosquito tennis, pigeon politics and other great Indian games

8am Last weekend, along with India, the contents of my stomach also celebrated Independence Day for a good 24 hours. Like all freedom struggles, there was a steep price to pay, but this morning the...

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Well Judged

What officials must & mustn’t do after SC order on strays Calling the 2-judge bench order on stray dogs “too harsh”, SC’s 3-judge review bench has restored status quo ante – strays are to be...

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Stray dogs and Supreme Court: What’s decided

The Supreme Court (SC) recently gave an important order about stray dogs. A smaller bench of judges had earlier suggested rules that many thought were too harsh. But now, a bigger bench has said: stick...

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Down the drain

Don’t celebrate Mumbai’s ‘resilience’. Fix its capacity to cope with rains. That stranded monorail said it all An engineer proposing to increase Mumbai’s stormwater drainage capacity to 14 inches or 356mm of rainwater per day,...

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So many choris

‘ O EC, EC, / O EC, EC, Mere polls churaya na karo!’ ‘O Rahul, Rahul/ O Rahul Rahul Roz, roz lies na bo-la-ya karo!!’ ‘ Vote Chori ’ is the latest RaGa Atana ....

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Paryushan Mahaparv: Festival of awakening

Lalit Garg In Jainism, Paryushan Mahaparv holds a unique significance. It is not merely a religious ritual but a celebration of deep introspection, self-purification, and turning inwards. Jain culture, for centuries, has regarded this sacred...

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Why substandard steel is threat to public safety

In a country where infrastructure is expanding at breakneck speed from high-rise buildings and metro lines to cranes, elevators, and bridges—the quality of steel used in these projects is not just a technical detail. It’s...

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Noble Donald

To set the record straight as to the real reason that President Trump has declared a tariff war against India, the White House gave a special interview to Second Opinion. Second Opinion: Why are you so...

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Get it right

Vital that GST reform is designed in a way that spurs spending. Economy needs it India’s proposed GST overhaul can spur demand in the festive season that starts in about a month. It can also...

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Good, bad and sick

As AI companies delete the health disclaimers, the chatbots are running amok playing doctor, doctor Doctors may be wishing they could return to the good old days of Dr Google. Because Dr AI is much...

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Ahmedabad: A spiritual sojourn of divine encounters and cultural heritage

In 2010, during the sacred Kumbh Mela in Haridwar, I first met Swami Mudita, a devoted disciple of Swami Dayananda Saraswati. He was delivering a profound discourse on the Bhagavad Gita when destiny brought me...

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Towards an Indian GAIA-X: A civil society-led data infrastructure for democratic digital sovereignty

Context and rationale India’s digital economy is marked by increasing centralization of data and platform control, with a handful of private actors – both domestic and global – exerting monopolistic influence over critical digital infrastructure....

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TN’s Keeladi dig shows us the perils of politicising the past

Archaeology, a science that requires slow, contemplative work to understand the human past through material remains, often makes headlines prematurely in today’s India. Digging up the past takes time, and findings are revealed to the...

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Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD)

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) refers to chronic conditions that cause inflammation in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. The two main types are Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis (UC). Symptoms often include abdominal cramps, diarrhea, blood in...

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Being The ‘Wrong’ Kind Of Chinese

Diversity still survives Xi, but it’s getting tougher After reporting from China for seven years, in 2022 American journalist Emily Feng found that her luck had run out. She would not be allowed back in....

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India of Sri Aurobindo’s dreams

By Ashoka Vohra A B Purani, a freedom fighter and a revolutionary, in his meeting with Sri Aurobindo in 1918 asked him, ‘Are you quite sure that India will be free?’ Aurobindo firmly replied, ‘You...

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Chip in now

Right now, the US and China are fighting a “chip war.” Chips are tiny parts that power computers, phones, and AI. They are super important for technology. The US had stopped selling powerful AI chips...

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Dharali tragedy: The night of terror

It had already been raining incessantly for a month. Then on the afternoon of 5th August, panic spread through the valley. First, we heard of the ice-rock avalanche at Dharali around 1.30 pm in the Khir Ganga...

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Managing the shift

Engineers & non-engineers both have a key role, as long as they are bilingual in human & AI languages There’s no taking comfort in these numbers. India produces 1.5mn engineers every year (ahead of US...

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AI and ‘Avyakt’

By Prasoon Joshi Every age and civilisation has redefined Creativity, but today, this Creativity is being subjected to unprecedented scrutiny and viewed through a different prism, that of AI. From celebration to caution and everything...

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Flying longer

Flexibility in retirement age is the way forward, India or West  Air India pilots will retire at 65, bringing parity between two merged entities – Tatas’ Vistara, and GOI’s Air India that the Tatas bought....

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Chandipur & Nilgiris – Where the sea walks away and the hills whisper

During my childhood, our family had a travel circle — my parents, my father’s colleagues, and their families. Four families in all, we vacationed together every year. One such trip took us to Chandipur, a...

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Finding god through exploration of the emptiness within

Anxiety, confusion, stress… These have become words of common parlance in today’s day and age. It is sad to observe that even people who seem to have every blessing in life are caught in the...

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Understanding ADHD: A common condition affecting focus and behavior

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a neurological condition that affects millions of people worldwide. It’s marked by challenges in focus, sitting still, and controlling impulses. People with ADHD may struggle to pay attention, follow...

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Lobon or noon? The trouble with using language to draw borders

There is indeed a ‘Bangladeshi’ language. But it’s not what Delhi police were thinking when they put out a notice looking for interpreters “proficient in Bangladeshi national language”.  Nor is it what BJP IT cell...

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Our lives are what we pay attention to

Information glut isn’t the real problem of these times Anxiety over the hold of technology on daily lives and minds drives everyday conversations – the ills of fake news and misinformation, how politicians exploit algorithms,...

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Why CSR funding for environmental conservation needs a rethink

CSR funding continues to favour quick wins and visible outcomes, leaving little room for the research and sustained effort that environmental conservation truly requires. Ever since the passage of Companies Act, 2013, which requires corporations to set...

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The shorter, faster, and the unhappier

In today’s fast-paced digital world, patience is shrinking, especially among Gen Z, it exists in nano form! This lack of patience is quickly becoming one of the biggest reasons for rifts in parent–child relationships. Consider...

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Wheels Within Wheels

SC right on Matheran’s hand-pulled rickshaws. But the how part of the change looks tricky How many mountains might need to be climbed before Matheran’s 94 rickshaw pullers can be transitioned into running their own...

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The Turning Tables: Geopolitics behind the tariffs

The recent US tariffs on Indian goods have sparked a debate that goes beyond economics. At first glance, these measures look like responses to trade imbalances or industrial subsidies. Looking closer, however, there is a...

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Stepping into Life’s Marathon with faith

By Stuti Malhotra At 100 years old, most people would consider slowing down. Fauja Singh, however, chose to speed up – quite literally. The British Sikh centenarian stunned the world by completing marathons well into...

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Won’t be Trumped

GOI has called out Trump’s extra tariffs for what they are. He was wrong to think hegemony will work Three weeks from now, India will be the most heavily tariffed seller in the US market...

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Gag × 3

A single word scores a hat trick by having a trio of different meanings in the country  English is a very hard working language. It’s forever rolling up its sleeves and borrowing words from other...

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Numbers Don’t Lie – But Leaders Might Not Like Them

In the U.S., something strange and worrying just happened. Former President Donald Trump fired a government official named Erika McEntarfer. Why? Because the department she worked in (which tracks how many people have jobs) updated...

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Flying into a slap

When road rage becomes air rage, it’s a whole lot more dangerous. Every incident must be dealt with firmly Commercial planes commonly have a cruising altitude of 36,000 feet. Loss of temper at that height...

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Dog Babu asks

After pets get registered, why can’t they claim residency too? The fat cats frowned that two Bihar babus, in a place they’d never heard of: Masaurhi in zilla Patna, found it legit to issue an...

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Make In India

High tariffs or not, self-sufficiency in critical areas must be a national imperative  It is possible for a people to be self-sufficient. The Sentinelese in the Andamans, for example. But such living is extremely limiting....

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Beatles’ Ashram: A witness to echoes of music and meditation

In 1968, the legendary Beatles journeyed to Rishikesh, India, in pursuit of inner peace and higher consciousness. They came to study Transcendental Meditation under the revered spiritual teacher Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at the Chaurasi Kutia...

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Turf wars to power plays, decoding Gautam Gambhir’s viral outburst

Phrases like ‘you are just a groundsman’ are part of a familiar genre of Indian anger where dominance is asserted by reminding someone of their job. This insult is more Indian than a McAloo Tikki....

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UK deal shows how much India will — or won’t — bend on tariffs

India is gradually breaking down barriers by signing trade deals and lowering tariffs while President Trump is pushing the US inward, erecting a wall of tariff to the world’s largest import market. On Wed, he...

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US, China and Russia: Navigating the superpower trilemma

Today, Indian foreign policy discourse is mired in an important debate. Two key assumptions govern this debate: that New Delhi’s ties with the US arguably constitute its most important relationship in the 21st century, and...

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Musk and Melons: A moment to rethink wealth taxes

On my first trip to Japan, wandering the streets of Tokyo in the early 1990s, I was totally enchanted. The miniature shopfronts often looked like they were decorated by an especially talented child. The gift-wrapping,...

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Trump calls India’s economy “dead” – but that makes no sense

Recently, Donald Trump, the former U.S. President, made fun of India’s economy by calling it “dead.” But that’s a strange and silly thing to say. Think about it: An economy is alive as long as...

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