The Mussaenda Memories
I was in Pondicherry three decades after I had left the place. Pondicherry is where I grew up, and memories from those formative years clung to me like a second skin. The house where we lived for…
The Suitable Boy
It was the last month of 1997. December 12th to be precise. I had just given my MD Pathology exams and was waiting for the official results to be declared. The college rules said that we had…
Silent conversations
Conversations which meandered Into the stillness of the night The mingling of our minds The music in our words The crescendo of our laughter The calmness of our thoughts I miss them all. Now the stream of…
Hiuen Tsang and his pilgrimage of discovery
Indians traditionally have never been good at recording history. Knowledge was often transmitted through the oral tradition. Most of what we know about our ancient history comes from the writings of foreign travellers. Hiuen Tsang was one…
Bitter love
Each morning I hear you rummaging near my bedside And the crackling of my medicine wrappers Wakes me up. You do it every day With clockwork precision And I always look at you bleary eyed A…
Indian silverbills or white-throated munias
Quite often these drab-looking tiny birds are overlooked in favour of their more colourful counterparts. The Indian silverbills are one such species which though ubiquitous, are often ignored. They usually forage in groups and are very gregarious.…
The Langurs of Sevagram
Sevagram is synonymous with Mahatma Gandhi. He spent a large part of his life here during India’s freedom struggle. And one of his prized possessions was a tiny figurine of three wise monkeys who embodied the principles…
Melodramatica
When my face betrays What my heart feels- Or when the ink spilled from my pen Scribbles the story of my pain I am labelled melodramatic. Likened to the vulgar and the coarse And who knows, maybe…
Raazi: The price of patriotism
Patriotic films are shrill. You walk into the theatre and expect chest thumping, heavy dialogues, and perhaps even find a muscular gentleman pulling out a hand pump with his bare hands. And so when I heard that…
Passage through history: Heritage walk in Ahmedabad
We happened to be in Ahmedabad to attend the convocation ceremony of my niece Jyotsna at the Indian Institute of Management. Since we had an extra day in Ahmedabad, we were wondering how to spend it, and my…
