An excerpt from Chandu Maheria’s memoir, reflecting on growing up in Ahmedabad’s working-class chawls and the place of Mohandas K Gandhi in Dalit life and political thought
Linguistic and historical analysis of Southasian swear words shows that they act as a linguistic mirror, reflecting deep taboos and cultural prejudices as well as unexpected social camaraderie
Vijay’s rise as Tamil Nadu’s new chief minister has bamboozled analysts, and his political vision is hypothesized based on “punch dialogues” rather than ideological clarity
The acclaimed comic-journalist discusses ‘The Once and Future Riot’, violence as a political tool, and the controversy surrounding Penguin India’s decision not to distribute his book
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s unprecedented electoral victory in West Bengal exposes the deep Bengali roots of Hindu nationalism and shatters the myth of secular bhadralok liberalism
In a conversation on his new book 'Iconoclast', Anand Teltumbde challenges the hagiography surrounding B R Ambedkar, calling for a more nuanced reassessment in view of the ongoing oppression of Dalits in India today
Ravikant Kisana’s ‘Meet the Savarnas’ dissects dominant-caste notions of merit, intimacy and power, showing how caste survives beneath India’s claims to modernity
An unsung giant of Gujarati literature, Dalpat Chauhan has fought to reclaim a Dalit history, identity and idiom that resist Gujarat’s exclusivist politics and pride
This is part of the second season of Partitions of the Heart: Conversations with Harsh Mander, a Himal Southasian podcast series produced in association with Karwan-e-Mohabbat.
The 1975 Hindi blockbuster Sholay now unwittingly underlines the degradation of India’s landscape over the last five decades and the representation of gender, caste and Muslims in Bollywood
