In 1979, Basu Chatterjee made Baaton Baaton Mein and unobtrusively brought to us the dating and courtship rituals of a community that was till then either caricatured or just overlooked in Hindi cinema. Nancy Perreira and Tony Braganza…
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Matriarchal manipulation in a patriarchal world is depicted unsparingly in Usha Priyamwada’s Pachpan Khambe Laal Deewarein (Now playing on Prasar Bharti). The mother resentful of her lecturer daughter’s comfortable life in her college residence because the younger daughters…
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“Start with hope..always start with hope. We went from being a shitty team to become one of the biggest dynasties in the sport and all it needed was one match to light this fire,” says Michael Jordan at…
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In 1947, my grandparents brought three children and the remains of an uprooted life from Pakistan to India in a train. One of those children was my mother. I grew up hearing a lot of stories about the…
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Three documentaries streaming right now show the ultimate culmination of the Bois Locker Room culture. And what happens when one gender is taught to mistrust its instincts of self-preservation and the other does not even learn something as…
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In Sudip Sharma’s Paatal Lok (Now streaming on Amazon. Co written by Sharma, Sagar Haveli, Hardik Mehta and Gunjit Chopra. Directed by Avinash Arun and Prosit Roy), India’s disowned inhabit the headlines we turn away from. A young…
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Mazgaon lies hidden, tucked away. The new Eastern freeway runs right over it on tall, thick pillars, alienating itself from the people below. Mazgaon has been forgotten for a long time as we seem to want to live and be present in the latest hip and happening suburb, forgetting the past that lies languishing in […]
One chapter from a book sometimes tells you everything you need to know; hell, the first page can usually do that. Into my hot little hands have come three books by Indian writers, and I gave them all the same treatment, opening chapters only, just to get a feel of where they might go. Isn’t […]
I read somewhere, “Nothing should live that isn’t a labour of great, great love.” But seriously, if nothing should live that isn’t a labour of great love, how come the people and things that are, sometimes vanish into the mist of time? It’s nothing you haven’t contemplated before. There ought to be some place beyond, a […]
Every home is born first in the imagination, in the longing for the culmination of a dream. Only in some homes, the dream like quality never really leaves long after the walls have sprung up and every roof tile, every brick, pillar and window has found its place. The first time you see the Jade […]
Music is a popular topic of debate in drawing room conversations, considering how conspicuously present it is at most get-togethers where music trivia begins to come out of your ears, after a while. Often, my heart goes out to the unsuspecting souls who have somehow managed to hold on to their romanticism about their kind of “good music,” only to innocently offer it to pontificating snobs for demolition on evenings like […]
“Utaar Ke Phenk De Sab Janjaal Beete Kal Ka Har Kankal Tere Talve Hain Teri Naal” ** So when you peel and throw all conflicts and let the skeletons of the past go and your heels are like hooves with horseshoes, then you don’t run. You fly. And sometimes in life, the full circle spans […]
Let us call her Divya. Because that is her name. And this is not a story that merits a ‘name changed to protect identity’ clause. Divya lived in a small town and was studying to be a nurse. And had the same dreams for her life like any other 21-year-old – a good job, a decent […]
Let’s go on a walk down Chimbai Road in Bandra. Through the bylanes, passing some vintage-cute bungalows, till we hit a decrepit bungalow with suspected squatters, take that left and walk till we reach the water’s edge. This is the Chimbai Koli village. Just across the water to the left, across the water you won’t […]
I utterly love the Taj Mahal, and am always awed by its simplicity and splendour… it is a wonderful monument built for love in a world that shows scant respect for the depth and gravity of that emotion; a world that has reduced love to the span of ‘days’ and ‘date nights.’ And when I […]
There was this guy. And this girl. The guy is like the heart of his family and the girl is perfection. Beauty and compassion, together. The girl is the maternal niece of the boy’s paternal aunt. So once every year, during their childhood, this girl used to visit the boy’s place and the two were […]
My best friend messaged me one fine morning , “Why haven’t you written anything in so long?” I replied that I haven’t had an experience worth sharing in a while. However I did inform her that I was on an active look out for a story and perhaps my upcoming travel plans would be of […]
Umberto Eco says, “To survive you must tell stories.” So here goes mine. This month is dedicated to my last breakup. Through the month I shall celebrate the relationship that I have come to call as the ‘Process of Disintegration,’ of what I used to call,’dreams.’ I was brought up believing in Cinderella and Prince Charming. And no I don’t […]