By Mary Ann Chacko
Sushama Deshpande has been performing this play for over 25 years. Hence, there have been occasions when someone who had first seen the play in her adolescence was now the mother of an adolescent herself. Once in a village a lady came and told her that she had decided to educate her daughter despite all obstacles after watching the play.
By Neha Basnet
Young women contribute greatly to the youth initiatives, specifically in freedom struggle, but they are conspicuously absent in the conceptualization of ‘Youth’. Drawing upon youth initiatives during the freedom movement in India and the post-conflict context of contemporary Nepal, this piece questions the limited participation and conspicuous absence of young women vis-à-vis young men.
By Cafe Dissensus
This is what Indian media would not like you to see about Modi’s visit to Australia. The numbers might appear small but they are a dissenting voice to the supposed majority that have elected Narendra Modi. Here are some pictures of the protests that were held in Sydney and Melbourne.
By Mosarrap H. Khan
Natasha’s film works on two different registers: first, it reveals to us the extensive labor infrastructure and social life behind the everyday objects that we encounter in the built environment of the city, thereby highlighting our own alienation in modern life; second, it exposes the hazardous working conditions that are masked by the shiny surfaces of our great metropolises.
By Joyeeta Dey & Anushka Sen
The movement protesting police violence against students in Jadavpur University, Kolkata, is right now in its most vulnerable position. The marching has calmed, a high court order aimed at restoring “normalcy” to the campus has been implemented, the issue is beginning to fade from television and the public imagination, while, in all this time, not a single demand of the protestors has been met.
By EPM Swalih
Akhil Gupta’s study is different from other postcolonial scholars working within a western theoretical framework. He shows a unique way to engage with Euro-American theories. And that is why I began to love his work. His interrogation of the theories of governmentality, biopolitics, and sovereign ban results from his grounding in Mandi district of Western Uttar Pradesh, India. He compels us to think with the Euro-American theories only if we are able to critically approach them. I find his attempts in provincializing Europe[1] as one of the most rewarding tasks ever undertaken by the postcolonial scholars.
By Joyeeta Dey
Children’s rights activists with their wealth of data condemning the efficacy of CP (that it teaches the child nothing, perpetuates violence in later life, and leads to lower academic performance) reach an impasse when faced with adults who vouch for it based on their own experience. While one may try to dismiss this as nostalgic idealizing of one’s childhood it is much more important to realize the irrelevance of trying to answer whether it ‘works’ or not.
By Lopa Banerjee
Being born a girl, I should have sensed when invaders had pushed through the padding of closed doors, throwing me back into the irredeemable domain of bruise and hopelessness. By now, I should have learnt to focus on my own life as an outcast, to thrive in my madness and be pleased to walk alone amid the crowded city streets with impetuous fools.
By Riti Das Dhankar
Be it the Ice Bucket or the Rice Bucket, the challenge is not to unwittingly imitate. True challenge lies in understanding the ideals, the needs, and the causes behind the issue and, then, to do the bit that would actually make a difference, irrespective of the ‘views’ or the ‘likes’ or the ‘shares’ that happen on the social network.
By Safia Begum
In the month of Ramadan, she was observing fast and stitching the heavy dining-table cover. Since the new academic year has started, she has to pay for her children’s school fees and buy books for them. Her husband asks her to stop the girls’ education as they can’t afford to pay so much money. With a salary of three-thousand-rupees per month, she barely manages to pay for their education.
By Concerned Citizens for Salman
We strongly condemn the arrest and inhumane treatment of Salman Zalman at the hands of the Kerala police and call for his immediate release. We consider the charging of IPC 124 A (sedition) on him as a gross over stretching of the sedition act to encroach into the rights of a citizen to criticize the nation.We also condemn the abusive campaign that is being conducted on Facebook against him and the discriminatory nature of the media reporting, which is aiding such human right abuses.
By Bhaswati Ghosh
Given the ongoing nature of personal histories forged by the Partition of India, re-storying seems not only a worthwhile but even a necessary exercise, if one is to make sense of the histories that stitch the lacerated subconscious of the populace scattered over India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.
Cafe Dissensus Everyday 