Features

Mercurial Monsoon

Sopan Joshi

The famously capricious rains are reinforcing their reputation every year. Our planners need to take a hand in this Act of God

Where Queer is Cool

Pallavi Polanki

The Union health minister’s attitude to alternative sexuality is typical of a prejudiced majority. For queer students who suffer alienation or worse, relief comes in the form of a campus network

Playing for a Nobel Peace Prize

Charukesi Ramadurai

How seriously should we take people who design digital games?

Communist Manifest Foes

Dhirendra K Jha

As Maoists turn the heat on CPI cadres in Bastar, the latter find themselves in a double bind

Shale Gas in Deep Trouble

Shailendra Tyagi

Current methods of shale gas extraction can pollute ground-water, say protestors in France

Warhorses Gone Wild

Avantika Bhuyan

Unique to this part of the world, these feral horses are a sight to remember. Especially once you know the secret of their lineage

Helpless in Chitapur

Aimee Ginsburg

An Israeli journalist wonders if there is any difference at all between how Israel treats Palestinians and how India treats its poor

The Origins of Ramdev

Rahul Bhatia

The making of Ramdev is inevitably the story of the intriguing world of spiritual TV

Where the Forests Have No Trees

Jay Mazoomdaar

Of the total 60,000 claims filed under the Forest Rights Act in Assam, nearly 30,000 came from a single district. Little wonder, then, that the administration controls less than a third of Sonitpur’s forests. While no political party minds legalising this mass encroachment in the Bodo heartland, the fate of the wilderness hangs by a 2009 High Court order.