Published inAge of Awareness·PinnedMember-onlyHow Colours, Seasons And Love Made My Cancer Treatment Memorable2022 was an exciting year. After a long time, we visited India as a family and there were lots of reunions. I connected with more people who loved my book and with authors who had inspired me. But I also had to confront a truth about my body that I…Cancer12 min readCancer12 min read
PinnedMember-onlyHow I got my daughter to love India and stay close to her roots“You have been away from India for so long; how is your daughter so attached to the place? My children hate to travel to India; even if they do, they can’t wait to leave! …India15 min readIndia15 min read
19 hours agoMember-onlyIndia must tap into her own native ecological intelligenceAn assumption is often made that India’s open defecation problem was rooted in a lack of hygiene that sprang from a general backwardness emanating from Hindu texts. Nothing can be more preposterous than this. Indians inferred the linkage between personal hygiene and health thousands of years ago, long before the…Sanitation20 min readSanitation20 min read
May 25Member-onlyInvasive fish have caused an ecological disaster at Mansar Lake20 years ago, when I wrote an article in Asian Water Magazine on the invasive organisms that are spreading havoc around the world via the ballast water carried by ships, it won me an award at the World Water Forum held in Tokyo. But, I had never actually seen for…Ecology6 min readEcology6 min read
May 22Member-onlyG20, Temples, History and Sacred Water Bodies — My Dream Trip to Jammu (Part 2)Read Part 1 of this story here. It was my last free day at Jammu after the Y20 consultation at the University of Jammu (a side event of G20) and I wondered how much I would be able to pack into it. Who knows when I would visit this region…Jammu14 min readJammu14 min read
May 18Member-onlyG20, Temples, History and Sacred Water Bodies — My Dream Trip to Jammu (Part 1)More than 30 years ago, when I visited Jammu and Kashmir with my family, I had little idea that the state will be rocked by a genocide of Hindus leading to their exodus from the Kashmir valley. With a neighbouring country perpetually sending terrorists across the border, the beautiful land…Water11 min readWater11 min read
Apr 25Member-onlyThe girls’ college next door— how I found a hidden gemWhen I got married in 1995, I moved to my husband’s home in Delhi‘s Satyawati Nagar— a nice neighbourhood with amazing parks and a community shopping centre. Very soon, I began to feel a part of my new family. There was a college near the house — the Lakshmibai College…Education8 min readEducation8 min read
Mar 9Member-onlyIndian martial art Kalarippayattu needs to be a part of educational curriculumI did not think that Kalaripayattu (called Kalari in short), the famous martial arts from Kerala in India could ever be attempted by non-athletic persons. I have seen skilled experts leaping around with their sticks, swords and shields, but it always seemed like a very esoteric art. …Martial Arts5 min readMartial Arts5 min read
Feb 28Member-onlyDown to Earth — An evening with Pankaj TripathiI had only seen one movie of Pankaj Tripathi’s in which I had been struck by his simple, down-to-earth persona. At that time, I had no idea he had such a huge fan base despite rarely playing the lead role in a Bollywood film. …Bollywood6 min readBollywood6 min read
Feb 12Member-onlyWhat would you say if your daughter calls to say she wants to kill herself?How strong is your love for your child? What would you do if she called to tell you that she wants to kill herself? I came to know a story that shook me up when I was at a conference on Indian Knowledge Systems in Kerala last week. I bonded…Suicide4 min readSuicide4 min read
