IntentBlog

To Sir, with love

Mon, 07 Apr 2008 04:44:21 -0800

The story of an award-winning, upper-caste Geologist who is silently changing the lives of underprivileged children, most of them from lower castes, in a remote corner of India. Read Here.

An airport and some mercenaries

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 08:51:27 -0800

My friend, Neelesh Misra has sent me this thought-provoking story. Read it here.

Not without my father

Sun, 30 Mar 2008 07:59:59 -0800

The story of how a young assistant director of Aamir Khan's Taare Zameen Par is fighting a battle for her father, who is under arrest on charges of being a Naxalite leader. Read Here.

On suicide, Wandhama and, perhaps, everything else in life

Fri, 25 Jan 2008 09:51:40 -0800

This evening, a middle-aged man with receding hairline jumped from the top floor of my office building and died on the floor, next to a promotional board of Johnie Walker which reads: Keep walking. His one shoe lay near his motionless body.

Friends don't die

Wed, 02 Jan 2008 07:43:34 -0800

“He was carrying his revolver when they shot him dead.” The old caretaker at the Ghadar Memorial Hall in Jalandhar takes out a blue handkerchief and spreads its content on the table. There is an old spectacles frame and a blood-stained bus ticket, recovered from Darshan Canadian’s shirt pocket. Read More...

The old man and the rum

Sat, 23 Jun 2007 09:53:00 -0800

Many years ago, an old man took the above path, one moonless night, in Lansdowne. He was going home, after visiting a friend’s place. It was quite late in the night, and the man had had a bit too much to drink.

Nights are tough

Fri, 13 Apr 2007 21:36:23 -0800

Eleven years have passed in this city. Next to where you are breaking your promise of serving breakfast only to me, I remember buying a book from my first salary: Safdar Hashmi - The fifth flame. Life had just begun to explore new theatres of existence.

Pursuit of happyness

Sun, 11 Mar 2007 09:51:52 -0800

What do I tell you? And how? Let me try...

Where is Swadesh Deepak?

Thu, 28 Dec 2006 23:06:58 -0800

As though we buried the sun

Wed, 27 Dec 2006 06:12:13 -0800

Between the pages and Should I take you to Shaheen

Her Master's voice

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 08:02:20 -0800

The sun is at its zenith and only when you come really close can you see the broken remains of what used to be the house of Dharmesh Bheel and his family. The clear skies invite winds and the dust enters Dharmesh’s eyes. He touches the empty ground where his house stood till recently and applies the sandy earth to his forehead. Read on.

Dignity to the dead

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 02:31:52 -0800

"How old is this?," the young labourer asks me. I take the plastic can filled with water from his hands without answering him. I'm still looking at the gravestone. I splash some water on the stone, removing layers of mud and dead leaves. The name is clear now: The Michaels. Died 2 July, 1868.

Landless in Punjab

Sat, 09 Dec 2006 18:25:43 -0800

The real face of the Green Revolution in Punjab.

The Die is caste

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 05:04:56 -0800

A crime committed in a small village in the North Indian state of Punjab threatens to snowball into a deep conflict between two castes. Read more.

The scarecrows of Kolezari

Sun, 19 Nov 2006 22:10:59 -0800

A travel into the Vidarbha heartland, where a village hoped to open its heart in front of the Indian Prime Minister but never got a chance. Here is how.