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…
Read More
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…
Read More
“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…
Read More
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…
Read More
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…
Read More
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…
Read More
You are browsing archives for
“Job Offer” read the subject of an email I had been waiting to receive for over two months. I finally had a job in Bombay- a city I’d wanted to move to for two years. I was ecstatic, and then of course, terrified. You see, I have a special knack for always finding the bad […]
The best way to travel back in time is to step in to any of the Irani cafes in Mumbai. Many have written about their old world charm, the no-frills ambiance, the authenticity and the distinct personality of this vintage generation. Their stoic presence is a pleasant reminder of Bombay that was. Koolar & Co. at Matunga […]
‘Beautiful things don’t ask for attention’. This quote from The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is an apt description of some unassuming restaurants in Mumbai. Tucked in quiet corners of the city, these are genuinely one of a kind experiences in a world of much hyped theme restaurants serving specialty cuisines at exorbitant rates. Here go […]
Yet another gang rape, yet another spate of protests and furor and now people are busy discussing and arguing whether Mumbai is going the Delhi way. To begin with, where does this question even come from ? Is one city safer than the other ? In India, there have been reports of tourists being gang […]
It was a hectic morning as always. Driving for a full 10 minutes in rush hour Mumbai traffic and successfully crossing the grid-locked Khodadad circle, I was ascending the Tilak bridge at a crawl. Looking out of my window, I saw this beautiful and tall bougainvillea vine that had crawled on the top of a […]
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 […]
** The black and yellow lifeline Traverses, travels, triumphs over Claustrophobic by-lanes and Temporary disdains; As the sweat and grime, oozing with mundane Expectations and harsh realities coat the conscience, The lusty winds by the sea face offer hermitage to a Troubled mind. There is Hope. Between the tensions and pretensions and the 6.45 Churchgate […]
And so the 20-something terrorist was hanged to death this week and the question remains. Does capital punishment resolve, solve anything? Does it bring real closure? And who are we to judge whether a criminal, no matter how hardened and beyond redemption deserves to live or die? Who are we also to judge people […]
At a recent event, I was meant to give a talk on “Mumbai and the power of collective conscience”. I went prepared for the speech, but the unimaginable happened.Something that has never happened to me before. The moment my turn came, and I stepped on to the stage to speak, I blanked out and lost complete […]
In Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi’s The Lost Flamingoes of Bombay, the protagonist Karan is an outsider who wants to make Bombay his home. How he sees Bombay through his camera lens is what forms the primary plot of the story. The narrative weaves together different characters and incidents which influence Karan’s life. As per the author’s note, the […]
Pic by Kunal Karan Kapoor Sometimes, the merest thing can trigger off memories- an image, a sound, the whiff of a perfume. I recently viewed a photograph of Mumbai….endless tall buildings, a grey snaking road and a bird soaring in the sky and there I was transported back to my favourite city. I was suddenly that bird…..free, […]
Living life in the mass lane, Churchgate local fast train. Travel the western line, commute takes time Music for the journey, Rap MC’s, verses sublime Local moves from station to station, as folks get on and off, to their final destination. *** Train speeds by track side ghetto projects And retail establishments, house material objects […]