Earthy Tales

Or, why India really needs to dig itself out of a mineral hole Last week I was on a flight to Mumbai About two hours…

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Mai-Baap re Baap

The Civil service still remain a big draw Fresh out of South Africa, Mohandas Gandhi made a particularly strong speech in Benares in February He…

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India, The Class Act

With this kind of rebellious example, how will fair play and righteousness prevail? Won’t the lower castes get out of hand? In this decadent age,…

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Desert – Greening Of Thar

Lush vegetation in the Thar? Groves jamun trees? Mighty rivers the size of the Ganga and Indus? Seasons of monsoon-like rainfall? None of this is…

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Spate Of Senseless Tragedies

Qutab Minar, the 72.5-metre-high monolithic tower that Iltutmish built 750 years ago, witnessed two shocks in its hoary life-span. In 1368, it was struck by…

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Stone Age Shakti

That Trite phrase ‘as old as the hills’ has suddenly taken on startling significance in relation to a thread that runs through Hindu beliefs: the…

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Killing me Softly

Death is inevitable, but not in a gas chamber He took a deep breath of air. Once again he caught a strangeness on the wind,…

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APOCALYPSE NOW

Forget global warming and focus on local warnings Kanpur, Faridabad, Varanasi, Gaya, Patna, Delhi, Lucknow, Agra, Muzaffarpur. Nine of the world’s ten most polluted cities…

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Jaat Kahan Ho

Some day extraterrestrials will thrill to Raag Bhairavi in outer space   Imagine there’s no countries / It isn’t hard to do Nothing to kill…

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The Air is Thick

On Earth Day, let’s look at what our politicians promise on air pollution The Good news is that both the Bharatiya Janata Party and Congress…

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