New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Pune
www.livemint.com
Saturday, May 2, 2015
Vol. 9 No. 17
LOUNGE THE WEEKEND MAGAZINE
An installation titled Holi Beads—The Orbit by Rijin John was displayed in Gallery OED’s courtyard during the recently concluded Kochi biennale.
ART GAZING IN
GOOD SHOE DAYS >Page 8
KOCHI What difference have two editions of the KochiMuziris Biennale made to artists in Kerala and to contemporary Indian art?
DANGEROUS LIAISONS In Paris with Jacques Genin, who makes startling chocolates and pastries in a city overflowing with the good stuff >Pages 67
>Pages 1011
THE ‘SANGAI’ STRUGGLES TO LIVE Up close with the browantlered deer, Manipur’s state animal, floating on the beautiful Loktak Lake >Page 12
WOMEN AND THEIR INSTRUMENTS
Virtuoso tabla player Rimpa Siva and a small band of percussionists have made it in what is still largely a male preserve >Page 16
MIND THE GAP
REPLY TO ALL
SOHAILA ABDULALI
THE GOOD LIFE
AAKAR PATEL
SHOBA NARAYAN
DON’T MISS
in today’s edition of
I WON’T STOP: GIRLS THOUGHTS ON THE GANDHI, KEJRIWAL ON WHEELS WAYS OF THE PRESS AND EUDAEMONIA
H
anifa is 14 years old. She used to sell tea in Zarnegar Park in Kabul. Now she can teach you all about heelflips, nollies, 360s, and noseslides. Not to mention kickflips and impossibles. Hanifa is the best female skateboarder in Afghanistan. She doesn’t sell tea any more. Instead, she works at Skateistan, teaching other youngsters to skate. Skateistan, founded in 2007 by Australian skateboarder Oliver Percovich, is a non-profit organization using skateboarding as a tool... >Page 3
A
nd, for a Saturday, a few stray thoughts and a few general observations and a few points of view (almost all my own work). Like tomorrow is World Press Freedom Day. This is ironic because it is a Sunday which, as all journalists know, is a bad news day, however free the press may be. Nothing ever conspires to happen on Sunday and I have always held that the test of a good newspaper is the quality of its Monday edition. Like the UN says that 3 May “serves as an occasion to inform... >Page 4
R
ahul Gandhi could take a lesson from St Augustine of Hippo. Wait, before you roll your eyes, let me finish. St Augustine of Hippo was a remarkable man. Born a Berber, this Algerian-Roman philosopher began life as a pagan. His mother Monica, ordained a Catholic saint, entreated him to lead a life of virtue. In his youth, Augustine was anything but. He wined and dined, had a rollicking time, wavered between hobbies and passions, and had relationships with a series of women. >Page 4
PHOTO ESSAY
CATNAPPING
New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Pune
www.livemint.com
Saturday, February 28, 2015
Vol. 9 No. 9
LOUNGE THE WEEKEND MAGAZINE
DAYS AND NIGHTS
ON THE GANGA Can India’s worshipped and polluted National River be cleaned? A fatherson duo, who undertook a threemonthlong expedition on the Ganga, recount what they saw >Pages 1011
‘DASTARKHWAN’ REVISITED >Page 8
NO PLACE FOR WOMEN
Beneath Rohtak’s progress is a deeply entrenched, virulent patriarchy that won’t let its women live without fear >Pages 67
THE STOCKBROKER ON HOLDEN STREET
Legend and Everyman, Bradman’s presence in Adelaide is a paradox and a story uniquely of Australia >Page 9
Emmanuel Theophilus (right), his wife Malika Virdi, and their son Zanskar Theophilus Singh, at Sagar Island in West Bengal.
REPLY TO ALL
AAKAR PATEL
PIECE OF CAKE
PAMELA TIMMS
A SIXPOINT AGENDA A CASE FOR FOR RAHUL GANDHI ORGANIC BAKES
S
trange tidings from the family business. Congress heir Rahul Gandhi is taking a break to think over why he is failing. Reports say that he had “requested Congress president Sonia Gandhi for some time to reflect on recent events and future course of the party”. All of this thinking and reflecting, “for a few weeks”, was required because, the report said, he may be made the party president. Terrifying thought, but inevitable, given Sonia Gandhi’s age and health and concerns about continuity... >Page 4
MY DAUGHTERS’ MUM
M
y family never really ate out because my mother didn’t trust anyone else to cook dinner. So when I left home to go to university, I was ready to start exploring. Unfortunately, the choice wasn’t extensive but one of the restaurants I had a soft spot for was Cranks Wholefoods. Established in the Carnaby Street of swinging London in 1961, Cranks was one of the UK’s first vegetarian wholefood restaurant chains... >Page 4
NATASHA BADHWAR
KIRAN NAGARKAR SAYS THE UNSAYABLE
The author’s ‘Bedtime Story’ takes familiar Mahabharat characters and tear off their sheen. Censored in the 1980s, the play gets a new life >Page 14
LEARNING FROM THE MAN YOU LOVE
A
lot of times my husband and I look at each other and wonder afresh what a sterling person like him/me is doing with a strange person like me/him. Let me simplify this. I am sterling and he is strange and this is exactly what he believes too. Not that he is strange and I am sterling, he believes the opposite, but if you look at it in a certain way, we both believe exactly the same thing. That the other has got a much better deal than the self. So we are on the same page... >Page 5
THE DOUBLE LIFE OF ANUSHKA SHARMA The actor, who turned producer for her forthcoming film, on the tough job of being ‘normal’ >Page 16
New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Pune
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Saturday, January 3, 2015
Vol. 9 No. 1
LOUNGE THE WEEKEND MAGAZINE
STAND, WALK, PUSH, PULL
BUSINESS LOUNGE WITH BATA’S THOMAS G BATA >Page 8
Forget gadgets, apps, machines and fad diets this year—experts tell you the foolproof, nononsense fundamentals of staying fit >Pages 1011
WHAT TO EXPECT IN FASHION THIS YEAR As Indian fashion weeks complete 15 years, 10 highlights from the 2015 fashion book >Page 7
MIRACLES FOR SALE Fans of the lockedroom murder genre can look forward to much needed translations of Paul Halter’s work >Page 15
THE ART OF SEEING The pullup forces your core to tighten as much as it can.
THE GOOD LIFE
MY DAUGHTERS’ MUM
SHOBA NARAYAN
THE DANCE QUESTIONNAIRE
I
am a failed dancer. As a child in Chennai, some of my most memorable visits were to my aunt’s house. Her name was Kamala and she was known in dance circles as Kumari Kamala. My uncle, Major Lakshminarayan, was her second husband. He would take us to The Music Academy, Madras, where we could sit in the front row and watch her perform. She received the Padma Bhushan and scores of other awards. To us children, however, she revealed quirky human foibles. >Page 4
NATASHA BADHWAR
WHAT DID YOU WANT TO BE AT 17?
I
t was a sense of panic. Like the sound of wild horses galloping towards us in a dusty field that only I could hear. The first day my daughter boarded a yellow school bus wearing a proper school uniform, I knew I had to quit the office job that took me 50km away from home. The thought in my mind was that I had to hover nearby, be close enough to the school boundary wall. I realized that I was afraid of school. Something had happened to me in those years and I wasn’t quite sure what it was. >Page 4
REPLY TO ALL
AAKAR PATEL
Atul Dodiya’s new exhibition at the Bhau Daji Lad museum reveals how important viewers are to art >Page 16
DON’T MISS
in today’s edition of
WHAT OUR MUSIC SAYS ABOUT US
W
hat defines our music, when compared to the music of the West? What does it say about us? My observations about Hindustani and Western classical music are as follows: Our music 1) The most important element is the vocal. 2) The singer performs while seated. 3) The size of the group is small, and usually less than six people. 4) There is a hierarchy of instruments and performers on the stage. 5) The singer performs with eyes closed. 6) The music is not written. 7) The performance is improvised. >Page 5
PHOTO ESSAY
WEAVE WILL ROCK IT
New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Pune
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Saturday, March 28, 2015
Vol. 9 No. 12
LOUNGE
TR
AV
EL
SP
EC
IA
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THE WEEKEND MAGAZINE
Submerged mangroves at Havelock Island, Andamans.
RUGGED TECH >Page 17
HOME OF THE COCO DE MER Deep woods, birdcalls, pirate legends, and the world’s largest seed >Page 6
ULTRA MARINE
SEAFOOD ON THE SEASHORE
The story of holiday food on the coast is as bumpy as India’s shoreline >Page 7
Old shipwrecks, a tuna auction at the world’s largest fish market, a volcanic eruption viewed from sea—and other marvels CRANKY CUSTOMER
I
f there’s one time I’ll do the Indian head-nod in sync with the conservatives—cultural apocalypse! Modernization has destroyed us—it is in the matter of Hindi film music. I was the wide-eyed Lolita in a love affair that introduced me to longing, betrayal and sorrow long before I actually encountered any of these emotions. Lights out, I pressed a crackly mediumwave transistor radio to my pre-teen ear, listening to music and lyrics that were even then labelled Bhoole Bisre Geet... >Page 4
Three of India’s best surfers on where to surf in India, and their favourite global destinations >Page 15
MY DAUGHTERS’ MUM
PRIYA RAMANI
THE EMRAAN HASHMI AGE
BARREL RIDERS
REPLY TO ALL
NATASHA BADHWAR
LESSONS I LEARNT ALL BY MYSELF
A
s any candid child or honest adult will tell you, being out and about in the world is often a cakewalk in comparison to being at home and together with one’s family. I showed this sentence to my 12-year-old daughter and asked her if she thought it was accurate, and she laughed out loud. “Yes, mamma, sometimes this is true,” she said. Encouraged by her kind endorsement, I shall share with you five unexpected lessons I have learnt all by myself ever since... >Page 4
AAKAR PATEL
DON’T MISS
in today’s edition of
THE ‘SHOLAY’ TITLE THEME: A TRIUMPH
I
s there a more perfect piece of music Bollywood has produced than the title theme of Sholay (which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year)? I don’t think so. It is a little gem—simultaneously a symphonic triumph, and one of the most underrated achievements in popular art. It begins with a single guitarist strumming an open chord, a suspended fourth. The guitarist, incidentally, is the great singer Bhupinder, who sang one of R.D. Burman’s... >Page 5
PHOTO ESSAY
THE NOWHERE PEOPLE