Society

Juned Shaikh’s Outcaste Bombay: City Making and the Politics of the Poor traces the history of Bombay, from the plague epidemic and rise of the textile mills to their dissolution. Assembled together from government archives, poetry, fiction, and translated Marxist literature, the book chronicles Dalit lives, identity, culture and politics in the city. The book challenges the notion that Bombay is devoid of caste, and instead, reveals that it is the orchestrating force facilitating the city’s industries, landscape and culture. Juned is an associate professor in the Department of History at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Below is an…

Parcham Collective, an organisation that facilitates football practice sessions for adolescent girls in Mumbra, Thane, organised a wall painting event in the area on October 2nd in the Fatima Bi Savitri Bai sports ground for girls, as an inauguration of the ground that the girls will now use for training officially. “The ground was reserved for the girls by the Thane municipal corporation, and the opposition party arranged for appropriate landscaping of the ground, a first by local authorities and the opposition.” said Sabah Khan, co-founder of Parcham. The name of the ground was an ode to Fatima Shaikh and Savitri…

Ever wondered what it would be like to touch the rifle used by former chief of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), Prabhakaran? Or get yourself locked up in one of the oldest prison cells in Tamil Nadu? Or, in the words of Steve Borgia, “to interact with history”? Well, it need not be restricted to just imagination: you can experience this and more right here in Chennai - the Tamil Nadu Police Museum in Egmore. Housed in the 165-year-old former office of the Commissioner of Police, the museum was opened to the public for the first time on…

In the early hours of 10th September, a tempo driver named Mohan Chauhan killed a 32-year-old Dalit woman in Sakinaka. The woman was found severely injured, bleeding in a tempo and was immediately hospitalised, after a First Information Report (FIR) was registered. CCTV footage recovered by the police found that the accused had raped and assaulted the woman with an unknown object. He was then booked for rape, and after she succumbed to her injuries, a murder charge was added to the FIR. The police allegedly recovered evidence that the two knew each other prior to the incident.  Additionally, on…

Gender balance in Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications is crucial to the goal of bringing about positive social change through use of technology. With artificial intelligence becoming ever more widespread, gender diversity in platform, data and AI governance can present solutions to gender inequities, protect and empower communities facing gender-related violence, and support diversity in the technology industry. Some crucial issues which we need to look at are: The right to internet As per a UNESCO report, women have a very low share in advanced technology jobs which include non-­routine, cognitive tasks that are in demand in the digital economy. This is…

Translated by Sandhya Raju இம்மாத தொடக்கத்தில், அண்ணாநகரில் உள்ள ஒரு முக்கிய சந்திப்பில் தன்னை முன்பின் அறிந்திறாத நபர் ஒருவர் பின் தொடர்ந்ததாக சென்னையைச் சேர்ந்த பத்திரிகையாளர் கிரீஷ்மா குத்தார், தனது ட்விட்டர் பதிவில் குறிப்பிட்டிருந்தார். தன்னை இடைமறித்து பேச முயன்றவரை கண்டு கொள்ளாமல் சென்றதாகவும், ஆனால் வேகமாக பின் தொடர்ந்து மீண்டும் இடையூறு செய்ததாகவும் தெரிவித்திருந்தார். காவலர்களிடம் புகார் அளித்ததை அடுத்து அந்த நபரை காவலர்கள் பிடித்து விசாரித்தனர். அதன் முழு விவரமும் கீழே: படம்: கிரீஷ்மா குத்தார் தன்னுடைய தோழிகள் பலருக்கு இது போன்று இடையூறு ஏற்பட்டுள்ளது என குறிப்பிட்டுள்ளார். பொது முடக்கத்திற்க்கு பின் அலுவலகம் செல்ல ஆரம்பித்த மடிப்பாக்கத்தை சேர்ந்த 25 வயது ஆர். ரெஜினா தனது அனுபவத்தை பகிர்ந்தார், "என் வீட்டிலிருந்து இரண்டு தெரு தள்ளி வசிக்கும் ஒருவர், சில வாரங்களாக பின் தொடர்கிறார், எப்படி அதை தடுப்பது என தெரியவில்லை" என கூறினார்.…

In 2010, journalist and activist Saumya Roy co-founded a non-profit organization called Vandana Foundation to support the livelihoods of Mumbai’s poorest micro-entrepreneurs by giving small, low-interest loans. By 2013, she started getting requests for loans from waste-pickers in Deonar. This year, she is out with a book about their lives, titled Mountain Tales: Love and Loss in the Municipality of Castaway Belongings, published by Profile Books. How it all began Saumya decided to write about the community of waste-pickers in 2016 when a fire began raging in the Deonar dumping grounds, however, her interest in the community was established in…

On the eve of 7th September, 11:00 pm, Aarti Aggarwal Gupta was alerted about a cat stranded on the parapet of the 4th floor of her building. For the next 3 hours, efforts to rescue the animal were in full swing. Shukri - the cat - had slipped into an open house and on being shooed, jumped out of the window. She landed on the ledge directly below. At first, Aarti, her husband and a watchman attempted to call the cat to safety. After several unsuccessful attempts, they decided to contact the BMC disaster management helpline, 1916. https://youtu.be/neaJCsIg7mM A fire…

Early this month, Chennai-based journalist Greeshma Kuthar found herself being stalked by a stranger at a prominent junction in Anna Nagar. The stalker stopped her and tried to initiate a conversation; Greeshma did not engage with him and simply rode ahead. He sped up and came in front of her scooter. Following a verbal exchange, she filed a stalking complaint with the police against the man, who was eventually nabbed by the police. Read the entire thread here: https://twitter.com/jeegujja/status/1435490467555131392?s=20 Greeshma, however, is not alone. In fact, in her tweet thread, she mentions that several of her friends too have been…

With the IT industry witnessing a boom, Chennai's demographic landscape is rapidly changing due to large scale migration of employees from other states and countries, giving the city a cosmopolitan character. But at the core of the city's society and culture, the sentiment towards the Tamil language remains intense and deep-rooted. Learning Tamil, therefore, not only helps avoid communication barriers during regular daily interactions, it also wins more friends. Tamil is one of the six "classical" Indian languages. For a language to be declared classical, it should meet three criteria: ancient origins, independent tradition and having a considerable body of ancient…