I found this piece of writing in my inbox – something that I had done last year. It never made it to any publication because it was rejected for reasons best known to numerous editors. I honestly do not know what to make of it, so here it is. *** Back in 1999, I spent
Category: Writing
Chequered Pasts
For the last 9 months or so, I had been working on a story involving background verification industry, résumé fraud in the Indian IT sector and the state of technical education in India. The story took a lot — it is the toughest writing that I have ever done, and so finally I am glad
The Traffic Slowers
I have been published by The Caravan Magazine. This month’s (February 2012) issue carries an article that I wrote for them. It’s a story about four guys, security guards in Bangalore’s Domlur area, who ferry passengers from one side of the road to another. I called the article, “The Traffic Slowers”, while Caravan preferred to
How do you support Mr.Hazare?
A few days after Anna Hazare’s now infamous April 5 Hunger strike, I saw a car, in the posh Koramangala neighborhood, with the sticker “I support Anna Hazare”. Instinctively, I wanted to run after the car, have a glimpse of the person behind the wheel and ask: Sir, how exactly do you intend to support
Defending Secularism
This week’s tehelka magazine carries an essay I wrote about Chinatown buses that burst into flames and Pakistan’s notorious ruler Zia-ul-Haq, among other things. This is a story that took a lot off me, mentally and emotionally. A prelude to this actually appeared on my blog, in October 2010 I wrote a writeup called “Of
Waking Up a Nation’s Conscience
Eleven days ago, activist Anna Hazare, in the heart of India’s capital, started a fast unto death until the Government agreed to an anti-corruption bill that had been lying around for 42 years. Governments had come and gone without giving it a serious thought. The Jan Lokpal bill was what one could call the second
Scales of success
A few days ago, I had posted on this blog a link of an essay I wrote for the tehelka magazine. The online version had missed out on a paragraph which I thought, could not escape the chopping at the Editor’s desk but when I looked at the printed version, I was glad to find