Matthai is probably best remembered today as the main author of the Bombay Plan of 1944, an action plan for economic development in independent India, underwritten by a few industrialists. He worked on it at the behest of JRD Tata, as Matthai had had a long and successful stint with the Tata group.

Like his works of fiction, the essays showcase what Ghosh is best at — lending an attentive ear to migrants, sailors, soldiers, tribal communities, friends, neighbours

We weren’t lovers yet, just two teenagers teetering on the edge of tenderness, balanced between black ink and blue sky. He never said he loved me. He didn’t need to. He showed up. Until he didn’t.

For an arid region that once produced nothing but millets, the Malaprabha river’s rocky valley ultimately made amends by spawning an empire so powerful that it reigned supreme over the Deccan variously between the 6th and 12th centuries CE

Dehradun’s little river system flowed and curved, carrying paper boats and memories until flyovers and malls crowded its banks

From the American River to the Yamuna in Delhi – the ducks, the gulls and the slipping sand

I found it mystical and mysterious how one river could hold such ability to empower and evoke such enduring faith

"In its early days — the VKA was formed in 1952 — the organisation focused on two things: countering Christian influence among tribals and spreading Hindu values. However, from 1970 onwards, many Left-oriented organisations started raising the issue of forest and land rights," says the author

The translator of the Kannada short fiction collection Heart Lamp on why the act of writing and translating is always hyphenated, the criticism that the book has faced and why translating a work by a woman is very different to that by a man

The short fiction collection is not a seductive read in the traditional sense. It doesn’t dazzle with plot twists or offer the slow burn of psychological complexity. Instead, it demands something more uncomfortable from the reader: to sit with pain, to listen to voices that have long been smothered, and to recognise that certain stories aren’t told to entertain; they are articulated to hold space for grief, for defiance, for survival

In this world of hyper-influence and algorithmic affirmation, we’re all chasing aura over authenticity. We’re measured not by meaning but metrics.

The Kechki Forest Rest House and its surroundings in Jharkhand are an integral part of Ray’s classic Aranyer Din Ratri, a restored version of which was screened at the Cannes Film Festival. But unlike the film that became eternal, the Kechki of the film exists no more. This is its story

This thinly fictionalised account of the 1975-1977 Emergency years is a breath of fresh air

The more I lived, the more I saw that meaning was made in the margins. Not in the limelight, but in the lingering.

The artist speaks about the influences that shaped her and why she doesn’t shy away from depicting trauma in her work

The compositions follow the jazz drummer's quest for identity born out of a yearning for his grandfather and the homeland of Sindh

From the Asiatic lion to the Indian rhinoceros to the Pygmy hog, we only try to save our fauna when they’re close to extinction

Today, in a world that churns, collapses, scrolls, posts, forgets—we need Faiz more than ever. We need his words like we need water—fierce, flowing, and essential.

Given the public outbursts by Aiyar that apparently caused him his position within the Congress party, this autobiography also details the decline of the party he belongs to

The book showcases the resilience that ordinary people can show in the face of repression and deception. Her characters turn love into an act of quiet defiance that thrives in longing glances across forbidden boundaries

Early in the book, we are thrust into the chaos that marked the Weimar years, when Karve stepped into Berlin for her doctoral studies. This was a city of contradictions, a city of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis and Josephine Baker’s electrifying dances, a city reeling from war and Nazism

These homegrown gins tell the story of coming together of two individuals who offer Indian brilliance in a bottle

Gulammohammed Sheikh’s ‘Of Worlds Within Worlds’ at KNMA offers insights into his diverse repertoire. He speaks to his former student and artist Indrapramit Roy, an associate professor at MS University, Baroda

Animals and birds are not very different from humans when it comes to looking for the right partner