In Kashmir Valley a 40-day dry spell, locally called the wahraat, generally begins in the third week of June, and is marked by scorching sunny afternoons during which the mercury
Some years ago, a friend from Calcutta, a veteran journalist who had covered the Gorkhaland agitations of the 1980s, had this to say about the relationship between the Gorkha National
Elections in West Bengal are always politically charged affairs. But the recent elections to the Panchayati Raj, the local self-governing bodies, were even more tempestuous than usual. These polls were
The verdant hills of Nagaon District, the main centre of stone quarrying in Assam, mask a web of labour exploitation. Visits to the quarries reveal workers clearing the ground of
It has come full-circle. The friends-turned-foes say they are friends again. The latest peace agreement between the Pakistan government and the Taliban could well cease hostilities in the serene Swat
"If you are patriotic and you love your nation, you must give an affirmative vote," state-run television told Burmese citizens a few days before the 10 May referendum,
The Gulf Air plane from Bahrain to Qatar is exclusively filled with Nepali workers travelling from Kathmandu. Clad in cheap but new clothes, each wearing a manpower agency cap, what
My only sin was my profession, for which the previous rulers made my life miserable," says Gulzar Alam, the heartthrob of scores of Pashto music lovers. In 2003, the
I remember the shock of seeing an AK-47 hanging from the shoulder of Hayatullah, a tribal journalist from North Waziristan. It looked like an ungainly appendage, which had no business
The phone rings in a one-room office in Navyug Mansion, located in the Grant Road area of south Bombay. Forty-nine-year-old Shivaji Sakaram Sawant, who has been delivering dabbas for the
The thought of spending the night at Dhalkebar was not too exciting. On Nepal's east-west highway, 24 kilometres from the Tarai town of Janakpur, Dhalkebar wore a deserted
