Episódios
-
The Bhima Koragaon case has come to be seen as emblematic of the gravest problems with India's democracy. Between June 2018 and October 2020, 16 people were arrested in the Bhima Koregaon case, accused of inciting violence in a riot and of being part of a conspiracy to assassinate India’s prime minister Narendra Modi. The arrests occurred despite the lack of credible evidence.
The 16 individuals, who came to be called the BK-16, had all been working towards social justice causes, specifically on issues affecting India's minority communities – the Adivasis, Dalits and Muslims.Almost six years after the first arrest, charges against them have not been framed and the trial has not begun. Some of the BK-16 are presently out on bail, and some remain in jail.
In her book, The Incarcerations: Bhima Koregaon and the Search for Democracy in India, the social anthropologist Alpa Shah says that the case is a bellwether for the collapse of Indian democracy. It is a case study in how India’s neoliberal policies that hurt vulnerable communities, how state authorities abuse of its laws and how its institutions are in decline.
In this episode of State of Southasia, Shah speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the work of the BK16 with indigenous communities and other minorities, their pushback against neoliberal policies and why they were seen as threats by the Indian state, and how and why they were implicated in the Bhima Koregaon case. The case shows a “very direct link between the kinds of interests of the state and corporate powers in accessing resources that lie under [Adivasi] lands and the fight for justice of those people who those lands belong to,” she says.
This episode is also available on:
🎧 YouTube: https://youtu.be/L7SCh5q2GXg
🎧 Apple podcasts: https://apple.co/4jVVwab
🎧 Website: https://www.himalmag.com/podcasts/alpashah-bhima-koregaon-stanswamy-adivasi-dalit
Episode notes:
Alpa Shah’s recommendations:
- From the Phansi Yard: My Year with the Women of Yerawada - Sudha Bhardwaj (non-fiction)
- I am not a Silent Spectator: Why Truth has become so Bitter, Dissent so Intolerable, Justice so out of Reach - Stan Swamy (non-fiction)
- The Persistence of Caste: The Khairlanji Murders and India's Hidden Apartheid - Anand Teltumbde (non-fiction)
Further reading from Himal’s archives:
Anand Teltumbde on the contested legacy of B R Ambedkar: Southasia Review of Books podcast #21
Caging the canary
Prison writing sheds harsh light on our states and societies
Aakar Patel on the unprecedented threats to India’s election: State of Southasia #03
The battle for bauxite
Reading Arendt while India erupts
Himal Southasian is Southasia’s first and only regional news and analysis magazine. Stretching from Afghanistan to Burma, from Tibet to the Maldives, this region of more than 1.4 billion people shares great swathes of interlocking geography, culture and history. Yet today neighbouring countries can barely talk to one another, much less speak in a common voice. For three decades, Himal Southasian has strived to define, nurture, and amplify that voice.
Read more: https://www.himalmag.com/
Support our independent journalism and become a Patron of Himal: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Find us on: https://twitter.com/Himalistan
https://www.facebook.com/himal.southasian
https://www.instagram.com/himalistan/
-
A conversation with the Mumbai-based journalist on the roots of Hindutva, the proliferation of Aadhaar and the surprising origins of India’s identification project.
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the Mumbai-based journalist Rahul Bhatia, joining us to talk about his new book, The New India: The Unmaking of the World’s Largest Democracy (Abacus/Context/PublicAffairs, August 2024).
Ten years ago, Rahul Bhatia started hearing the people he once loved revive centuries-old communal disputes and spout venomous slurs directed at Muslims. How was it, he wondered, that “the old norms of secularism and equality—however flawed their execution—were being cast off”?
His new book is his attempt at an answer; to find out “where the poison was coming from” by speaking to those responsible for, and those victimised by, a virulent strain of Hindu nationalism that has swept through India in the last decade. By doing so, he provides a clear-eyed account of “the unmaking of the world’s largest democracy” since Narendra Modi’s premiership in 2014.
The New India chronicles the rise of the supremacist RSS movement, and the tensions around questions of citizenship. It sounds the alarm on how the push for a national identification project and its stated purpose – to curb corruption and improve welfare delivery – could be used instead to “deliver oppression more efficiently.”
This episode is now available on Youtube: https://youtu.be/DUt5T55jHs8
Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4lFshtC
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/4lG6UZj
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Sign up to receive the Southasia Review of Books newsletter for Himal’s spotlight on Southasian literature, our latest conversations, and more: https://bit.ly/southasia-review-of-books
-
Estão a faltar episódios?
-
In early March this year, a massive gathering of some 10,000 royalist supporters gathered to greet Nepal's former king, Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah, as he returned to the capital Kathmandu from the city of Pokhara. The rally had political observers in Kathmandu wonder about the possibility of a return to monarchy in Nepal.
On Friday, 28 March, a similar pro-royalist rally in Kathmandu turned violent. Pro-monarchy protesters destroyed vehicles, looted a department store and attacked the offices of two political parties. Two people were killed that day. One was a driver who, by all accounts, was a bystander shot by security forces as he tried to flee the scene. Another was a TV journalist who died after being trapped inside a building that was torched.
Some Nepali commentators see the pro-monarchy movement and that day’s violence as a sign of the people’s discontent with Nepal political establishment and the country’s stuttering economy. But they also point out that the country is doing much better than it was under the Shah monarchy. The journalist and political commentator Pranaya Rana spoke to many young people who were at the pro-monarchy rally who did not profess a deep desire for the monarchy. Instead, their complaints were against Nepal’s three main political parties.
In this episode of State of Southasia, Rana speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the resurgence of the royalist movement in Nepal, who the key actors in the movement are and the what people from different sections of Nepal really want.
This episode is also available on:
🎧 YouTube: https://youtu.be/q_Gu8vzXb40
🎧 Apple podcasts: https://apple.co/3YtCi3a
🎧 Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4j16Rpc
🎧 Website: https://bit.ly/3EoobFz
Episode notes:
Pranaya Rana’s recommendations:
- The Bloodstained Throne: Struggles for Power in Nepal – Baburam Acharya (non-fiction)
- The Nepal Nexus: An Inside Account of the Maoists, the Durbar and New Delhi – Sudheer Sharma (non-fiction)
- Rajagunj: Pooja, Sir – Deepak Rounier (film)
Further reading from Himal’s archives:
- The incomplete end of Nepal’s Hindu monarchy (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/nepal-monarchy-protests-hindutva-india-rss)
- The saga of C K Raut and the Madhesh’s struggle for justice in Nepal (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/ck-raut-madhesh-janamat-aim-independent-federalism-nepal)
- Federalism is the most significant ideological divide in Nepali politics (https://www.himalmag.com/comment/federalism-elections-lamichhane-resham-chaudhary-ck-raut-ideological-divide-nepali-politics)
- Trekking while Nepali: A writer reckons with mortality, nationality and a changing Nepal (https://www.himalmag.com/culture/manjushree-thapa-trekking-while-nepali-writer-mortality-nationality)
- A plot twist makes Pushpa Kamal Dahal prime minister of Nepal (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/nepal-election-pushpa-kamal-dahal-prime-minister-2022)
- Nepal’s economic alarm bells (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/himal-briefs-nepals-economic-alarm-bells-2022)
- Weena Pun on the invisibility of women in Nepal’s society and literature: Southasia Review of Books podcast #15 (https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/weena-pun-kanchhi-women-rural-nepal-literature)
Himal Southasian is Southasia’s first and only regional news and analysis magazine. Stretching from Afghanistan to Burma, from Tibet to the Maldives, this region of more than 1.4 billion people shares great swathes of interlocking geography, culture and history. Yet today neighbouring countries can barely talk to one another, much less speak in a common voice. For three decades, Himal Southasian has strived to define, nurture, and amplify that voice.
Read more: https://www.himalmag.com/
Support our independent journalism and become a Patron of Himal: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Find us on:
https://twitter.com/Himalistan
https://www.facebook.com/himal.southasian
https://www.instagram.com/himalistan/
-
In a sharp critique of iconisation, Teltumbde pushes back against the hagiography surrounding B R Ambedkar, calling for a nuanced reassessment of his contested legacy in view of the ongoing oppression of Dalits in India today.
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the renowned public intellectual, scholar and activist Anand Teltumbde about his new book Iconoclast: A Reflective Biography of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar (Penguin India October 2024)
As a towering figure of the twentieth century, B R Ambedkar symbolises a monumental movement towards the annihilation of caste and the emancipation of Dalits. Ambedkar’s story becomes the story of this struggle. But like any human being, Ambedkar too had his share of limitations.
In contemporary India, Ambedkar’s iconisation goes beyond the devotion of people; it is being exploited by politicians across the spectrum in a project of ultra-nationalist myth-making. In his new book, Anand Teltumbde argues that it is important now more than ever to engage with Ambedkar as he defined himself, as an “iconoclast”, a breaker of icons.
Teltumbe’s biography educates us about the radical core of Ambedkar’s thought and action through the different phases of his social, political and intellectual trajectory. Cautioning against iconisation, he also invites readers to critically dissect the past and to assume agency in understanding the present.
This episode is now available on Spotify: https://apple.co/3R71BnSApple Podcasts: https://spoti.fi/3FWaj5L
Youtube: https://youtu.be/K0JYsAKZNJ8
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Sign up to receive the Southasia Review of Books newsletter for Himal’s spotlight on Southasian literature, our latest conversations, and more: https://bit.ly/southasia-review-of-books
-
The Rohingya are facing a new crisis. Cuts to foreign aid by the United States government under Donald Trump have caused huge upsets in the humanitarian sector worldwide and refugees are among the hardest hit. The cuts have caused a freeze on funds in healthcare facilities within Rohingya camps in Bangladesh leading to a reduction in doctors and healthcare staff available to the residents. The World Food Programme recently announced that it would have to reduce the rations by more than half, raising the spectre of malnutrition and starvation.
Myanmar’s repeated brutal campaigns against the Rohingya, the latest in 2017, have driven hundreds of thousands of Rohingya across the border and into Bangladesh for decades. About a million Rohingya now live in Bangladesh. While Bangladesh has been seen as a compassionate host for accommodating the Rohingya, it has kept the refugees on the edges of society and transformed them into pawns in negotiations for aid.
In this episode of State of Southasia, the journalist and documentary filmmaker Shafiur Rahman speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about how Bangladesh has treated the Rohingya as a disposable population to be contained, controlled, exploited and ultimately abandoned.
This episode is also available on:
🎧 YouTube: https://youtu.be/bbHgMdJc7QY
🎧 Apple podcasts: https://apple.co/41TjaxR
🎧 Website: https://bit.ly/4cc3xFf
Episode notes:
Shafiur Rahman’s recommendations:
Myanmar’s Enemy Within - Francis Wade (non-fiction)
Wasted Lives: Modernity and its Outcasts - Zygmunt Bauman (non-fiction)
Tula Toli: Testimonies of a Massacre - Shafiur Rahman (documentary)
Rohingya Network News (newsletter)
Further reading from Himal’s archives:
How Bangladesh is exploiting the Rohingya refugee crisis (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/bangladesh-rohingya-refugees-myanmar-aid)
A Rohingya photographer’s dispatch on food-aid cuts in the refugee camps (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/rohingya-photographer-dispatch-on-food-aid-cuts-in-the-refugee-camps-coxs-bazar)
Myanmar, Bangladesh, and the global game over Rohingya repatriation (https://www.himalmag.com/comment/myanmar-junta-bangladesh-united-states-china-rohingya-repatriation)
Statelessness and Rohingya rights (https://www.himalmag.com/comment/statelessness-and-rohingya-rights)
The Rohingya crisis at sea, and beyond (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/the-rohingya-refugee-crisis-at-sea-and-beyond-struggle-for-justice)
Modi government’s reactive Myanmar policy keeps it from being a constructive force for democracy (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/india-modi-election-2024-myanmar-aung-san-suu-kyi-rohingya-military-junta)
Himal Southasian is Southasia’s first and only regional news and analysis magazine. Stretching from Afghanistan to Burma, from Tibet to the Maldives, this region of more than 1.4 billion people shares great swathes of interlocking geography, culture and history. Yet today neighbouring countries can barely talk to one another, much less speak in a common voice. For three decades, Himal Southasian has strived to define, nurture, and amplify that voice.
Read more: https://www.himalmag.com/
Support our independent journalism and become a Patron of Himal: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Find us on:
https://twitter.com/Himalistan
https://www.facebook.com/himal.southasian
https://www.instagram.com/himalistan/
-
A conversation with the Sri Lankan-Pākehā writer on exploring anger, trauma, queerness and displacement in a multigenerational saga of three women from the Southasian diaspora.
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the Auckland-based Sri Lankan-Pākehā writer Saraid de Silva about her debut novel, Amma (Moa Press/ Weatherglass Books April 2024), now longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025.
It’s 1951 in old Singapore. Ten-year-old Josephina kills her abuser. This becomes the defining moment in the lives of Josephina, her daughter Sithara, and her daughter Annie.
Amma follows three generations of these Southasian women, whose stories move across Singapore in the 1950s, Colombo in the 1970s, Invercargill in the 1980s, Christchurch in the 2000s and present day London, Melbourne and Colombo.
This is a novel about how deeply the past impacts the present, and how shifting culture, circumstances and misunderstandings have forced the women apart despite their love for each other, and what it will take to knit them back together. It’s ultimately about the often difficult and resilient connections between mother and daughter, and the inexplicably special relationship between grandmother and granddaughter and how these reproduce themselves and change over time.
This episode is now available on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4iw3nuH
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/4iwbure
Youtube: https://youtu.be/vg0VLUnkt7Q
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Sign up to receive the Southasia Review of Books newsletter for Himal’s spotlight on Southasian literature, our latest conversations, and more: https://bit.ly/southasia-review-of-books -
In January this year, soon after taking over as president of the United States for the second time, Donald Trump announced a suspension of all prgrammes of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), pending review. Six weeks later, the United States government announced that it was shutting down 83 percent of those programmes, which it perceived as antithetical to the interests of the country.The development economist Jayati Ghosh points out that USAID, like a lot of foreign aid, has often been offered with strings attached, with donor countries using it to impose conditions or dictate policy to recipient countries. But foreign aid, especially USAID, has also helped marginalised communities ignored by their own governments and people. The impact of USAID withdrawal from Southasia has been swift and dramatic with several programmes shutting down in India, Nepal, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan. In this episode of State of Southasia, she speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the politics of foreign aid in general, the sudden withdrawal of USAID, and how Southasia can move beyond aid dependency.
This episode is now available on
🎧 YouTube: https://youtu.be/DvYJNtAvUH0
🎧Apple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jayati-ghosh-on-the-usaid-shocker-and-the/id1464880116?i=1000699440923
🎧Website: https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/jayati-ghosh-usaid-trump-southasia
Episode notes:
Jayati Ghosh’s recommendations:
- Aid As Imperialism - Teresa Hayter (non-fiction)
- The Self-Deception Trap: Exploring the Economic Dimensions of Charity - Dependency with Africa-Europe Relations - Carlos Lopez (non-fiction)
- Perilous Passage: Mankind and the Global Ascendancy of Capital - Amiya Kumar Bagchi (non-fiction)
- Tax Wars - Hege Dehli and Xavier Harel (documentary film)
Further reading from Himal’s archives:
- Trump’s approach to Southasia bolsters China’s regional sway (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/united-states-trump-southasia-india-china)
- A Rohingya photographer’s dispatch on food-aid cuts in the refugee camps (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/rohingya-photographer-dispatch-on-food-aid-cuts-in-the-refugee-camps-coxs-bazar)
- Neoliberalism, foreign aid and trade unions in Nepal (https://www.himalmag.com/interview/mallika-shakya-on-nepals-political-economy-garment-industry-neoliberalism)
- How Thailand and India continue to fail Myanmar refugees (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/myanmar-refugees-india-thailand-military-junta-conflict-manipur-mizoram)
- How the IMF bailout is changing Sri Lanka’s foreign policy (https://www.himalmag.com/politics/imf-bailout-sri-lanka-china-india-us-foreign-policy0
- “Nobody is interested in Bangladesh” 9https://www.himalmag.com/comment/nobody-is-interested-in-bangladesh-naomi-hossain-2021)
Himal Southasian is Southasia’s first and only regional news and analysis magazine. Stretching from Afghanistan to Burma, from Tibet to the Maldives, this region of more than 1.4 billion people shares great swathes of interlocking geography, culture and history. Yet today neighbouring countries can barely talk to one another, much less speak in a common voice. For three decades, Himal Southasian has strived to define, nurture, and amplify that voice. Read more: https://www.himalmag.com/
Support our independent journalism and become a Patron of Himal: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himalFind us on: https://twitter.com/Himalistanhttps://www.facebook.com/himal.southasianhttps://www.instagram.com/himalistan/
-
A conversation with Mohamed Shafeeq Karinkurayil on documenting the cultural imaginaries of Kerala and the Gulf through migrants’ literary and visual records of their transnational lives and aspirations.
https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/ mohamed-shafeeq-karinkurayil-kerala-gulf-migrant-archives
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to Mohamed Shafeeq Karinkurayil about his new book The Gulf Migrant Archives in Kerala: Reading Borders and Belonging(Oxford University Press, June 2024)
The realities of Gulf migration from Kerala is not lost on anyone. But the discourse around the cultural dimension of labour migration remains invisible. In analysing the cultural records of Gulf migrants from Malayalam literature and visual culture, Karinkurayil’s pioneering book is an effort to salvage the migrant archive in Kerala.
The book draws from a variety of sources to re-centre migration as a lived experience that cannot be reduced to the economic role of the migrant alone or the passivity they have been accorded as victims of unjust labour conditions. In doing so, Karinkurayil highlights migrant creativity and narratives of migrants’ own condition as an attempt to factor them into the homeland from which they are away.
This episode is now available on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4i9kQc6Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3Fj3bAfYoutube: https://youtu.be/rnHmmrOIpS4We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://bit.ly/support-himal
Sign up to receive the Southasia Review of Books newsletter in your inbox to keep up with our latest episodes and more: https://bit.ly/southasia-review-of-books
-
A conversation onLahore’s histories, the role of itinerancy, memory and violence, and the questions of state control and nationalism in Pakistan.
https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/manan-ahmed-asif-lahore-pakistan-writing-history
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the historian Manan Ahmed Asif about his new book Disrupted City: Walking the Pathways of Memory and History in Lahore(The New Press, October 2024).
In Disrupted City, Asif parses Lahore’s centuries-old literary, social and cultural history and the ways in which these resonate today. From the role of memory and violence, as well the city’s people, their survival and questions of nationalism, he explores the impact of imperial and state power, dislocation and erasure on this Southasian city.
Inviting readers to walk with him across Lahore, Asif evokes a rich cast of figures and contemplates how the city has been made and unmade over the years, while challenging the narratives and erasures of the Pakistani nation-state and its larger project of re-writing history.
This episode is now available on Spotify:Apple Podcasts:
Youtube:
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://bit.ly/support-himal
-
In December, the International Truth and Justice Project (ITJP), an international non-government organisation working to promote justice and accountability in Sri Lanka after its civil war, announced that it had in recent years submitted more than 60 sanction and travel ban requests against Sri Lankan officials and security personnel for alleged human rights violations committed during the country’s decades-long armed conflict and after it. The ITJP has sent these requests to countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and the European Union and also the United Nations.
The requests are based on the ITJP’s extensive documentation of violations that include extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests, torture, and sexual violence. The people who the ITJP has requested sanctions against had various roles to play in these abuses and belong to the Sri Lankan military forces, paramilitary groups, civil servants – including judges and former government ministers – and also former members of the Indian Peace Keeping Force.
In this episode of State of Southasia, Yasmin Sooka, a human rights lawyer and the executive director of the ITJP, speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the sanction requests, the importance of accountability and reconciliation in Sri Lanka and her hopes from the country’s new political dispensation that there will be some movement towards transitional justice.
Himal’s podcasts bring you the best conversations on Southasia. Become a paying Patron for just USD 5/month to support our work! https://payhere.lk/pay/oa7c71ca3
Episode notes
Yasmin Sooka’s recommendations
- No Fire Zone: In the killing fields of Sri Lanka by Callum Macrae (documentary film)
- Muttrupulliya by Sherine Xavier (documentary film)
- Still Counting the Dead: Survivors of Sri Lanka’s Hidden War by Frances Harrison (non-fiction)
- Truth Commission: Special report broadcast by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (televised series)
Further reading from Himal’s archives
- Anatomy of a murder investigation – the Lasantha Wickrematunge case
- The wait for justice for Nimalarajan Mylvaganam, murdered Jaffna journalist
- The devastating poetry of Tamil women who fought in Sri Lanka’s civil war
- The long wait for justice: On the chronic failures of criminal justice in Sri Lanka
- Sri Lanka’s complex dance of Sinhala and Tamil nationalist politics
This episode is also available on YouTube, Apple podcasts and on the Himal website
Himal Southasian is Southasia’s first and only regional news and analysis magazine. Stretching from Afghanistan to Burma, from Tibet to the Maldives, this region of more than 1.4 billion people shares great swathes of interlocking geography, culture and history. Yet today neighbouring countries can barely talk to one another, much less speak in a common voice. For three decades, Himal Southasian has strived to define, nurture, and amplify that voice.
Support our independent journalism and become a Patron of Himal: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal
Find us on:
https://twitter.com/Himalistan
https://www.facebook.com/himal.southasian
https://www.instagram.com/himalistan/
-
Uncovering her maternal ancestors’ past rooted in the Bhantu identity, the cinematographer and writer Nusrat F Jafri offers a rare account of the so-called criminal tribe, the circumstances of their conversions and the continuities of caste oppression in India today.
himalmag.com/podcast/nusrat-jafri-caste-conversions-identity-india
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to Nusrat F Jafri about her memoirThis Land We Call Home: The Story Of A Family, Caste, Conversions And Modern India (Penguin, April 2024).
In 1871, the British colonial regime in India enacted the Criminal Tribes Act, branding numerous tribes and caste groups as so-called “criminals”.
InThis Land We Call Home, Nusrat traces the roots of her nomadic ancestors, the Bhantus from Rajasthan, who belonged to one such community in northwestern India. Through the stories of her relatives’ decisions to embrace new religions, the acts of defiance against caste-based oppression, and the pathbreaking women of her family, Nusrat offers an arresting portrait of an Indian family across generations, and also of modern India itself.
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://bit.ly/support-himal
This episode is now available on: Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3EIvjw8Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3EvwwXQYoutube: https://youtu.be/h0CmkRTMMlo
And wherever you listen to podcasts!
-
A conversation with the book historian on how Daryaganj’s Patri Kitab Bazaar tells the story of Delhi’s urban aspirations, spatial politics and informal economies: https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/kanupriya-dhingra-delhi-daryaganj-book-bazaarWelcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the book historian Kanupriya Dhingra about her recent monograph, Old Delhi’s Parallel Book Bazaar (Cambridge University Press, November 2024)
Tucked in the lanes of Old Delhi, the Daryaganj Sunday Book Market is a name that’s familiar to many. Synonymous with the sale of used, rare and pirated books since the 1960s, the bazaar continues to evolve over the years of its several relocations and regulations.
As a site of resilience and possibilities, the market also tells the story of Delhi’s urban aspirations, spatial politics, informal economies, and more. In this collective biography of the bazaar and its booksellers, Dhingra traces an ephemeral literary culture that has managed to survive in a world where printed words are as endangered as ever.
This episode is now available on Spotify: Apple Podcasts: Youtube: https://youtu.be/1pYYSjfD6to
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://bit.ly/support-himal -
On 3 January, the body of Mukesh Chandrakar, a journalist in the Bastar region of India’s Chhattisgarh state, was found in a septic tank, bearing signs that he had been brutally killed. He had been missing for two days. Investigations into the case indicate that his murder is linked to his reporting for a national news channel about corruption in a road construction project. The main accused in the case is the project contractor, who also happens to be Mukesh’s cousin.
In 2011, Jyotirmoy Dey, a crimes and investigations editor for a newspaper in Mumbai who had written extensively on the city’s underworld, was shot dead by armed men on a motorcycle. In 2016, Rajdeo Ranjan, a journalist in Siwan district in Bihar, was gunned down by assailants on motorcycles. In 2017, Gauri Lankesh, the editor of a Kannada language newspaper who was a vocal critic of right-wing politics, was shot dead outside her home in Bengaluru.
Over the years, despite calls by media bodies for better protections, the risks for media workers have not reduced. The risks are greater for journalists like Chandrakar and Ranjan, who work in small towns and districts, who are less visible and have less access to support than their counterparts in big cities.
In this episode of State of Southasia, Priyanka Dubey, the journalist who reported on Ranjan’s murder in 2016 speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the precarities of journalism in India’s hinterlands.
Himal’s podcasts bring you the best conversations on Southasia. Become a paying Patron for just USD 5/ month to support our work: bit.ly/support-himalFurther reading from Himal’s archives:
State of Southasia #05: Laxmi Murthy on journalism in crisis across Southasia
Rana Ayyub on the dangers of doing journalism in India
The political economy of reporting on the War on Terror in theAfghanistan–Pakistan borderlands
Keeping journalism alive in Kashmir
The crisis in Pakistani journalism
Letter from Myanmar: Journalism under attack
Sign up for Himal’s newsletters here to get updates on our latest podcasts.
-
A conversation with the Nepali-born writer on her debut novel ‘Kanchhi’, and capturing the realities of women’s lives in rural Nepal.
https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/weena-pun-kanchhi-women-rural-nepal-literature
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to Weena Pun about her new debut novel Kanchhi (Hachett India, September 2024).
In Torikhola in the western midhills of Nepal, Kanchhi, the only daughter of her single mother, is at odds with the rules and customs of her hamlet and opposes the shame imposed on her ambitions and curiosity. One November morning she leaves home, and that is the last anybody sees of her. A decade later, Maiju still prays for her daughter’s return.
This heart-wrenching coming-of-age story follows Kanchhi and her mother negotiating life and societal pressures in rural Nepal. And as much as the book looks closely at women’s place in Nepali society, it also captures the realities of life in the hamlet Kanchhi is from, and the socio-political reasons for Kanchhi’s disappearance.
This episode is now available on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4h0HUJA
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3PJFumC
Youtube: https://youtu.be/uB0DNnfBY94
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: bit.ly/support-himal
-
Bhutan’s Nepali-speaking diaspora, created by the expulsion of the Lhotshampa in the 1990s, can help the country’s tottering economy, the researcher says – if the Bhutan government were ready to reach out.
In the introduction to her book The Ecosystem of Exile Politics: Why Proximity and Precarity Matter for Bhutan’s Homeland Activists, Susan Banki, a researcher of the international refugee system, tells the story of Bhakta Ghimire, a homeland activist from the community of Nepali-speaking Bhutanese. In the early 1990s, Ghimire was a young man working in a cement factory in Samste, in southern Bhutan. One day, he heard rumours that Bhutan’s ethnic Nepalis – also known as the Lhotshampa – were being evicted from their homes following a national census exercise. He rushed to his parents house to find it empty, crossed into India to find them, and eventually joined the stream of Nepali Bhutanese leaving Bhutan.
Tens of thousands of Nepali-speaking Bhutanese were forced to flee their homes in southern Bhutan after a citizenship policy disenfranchised them, a cultural policy imposed Bhutan’s dominant Drukpa traditions – including clothing norms – on them, and a census exercise forced them from their homes. These families have lived as refugees in Nepal, India and other parts of the world – many in precarious conditions in refugee camps, others resettling in countries such as the United States and Australia. And activists like Ghimire have been asking for the right to return to Bhutan.
On this episode of State of Southasia, Banki speaks to Nayantara Narayanan about the status of these refugees today, the history of the Lhotshampa question and why Bhutan’s king and government are missing an opportunity by not reaching out to the Nepali Bhutanese community amid Bhutan’s current economic troubles. She says that Bhutan’s Nepali-speaking diaspora, created by the expulsion and refugee crisis of the 1990s, can help the country’s tottering economy with remittances and through exchange programmes, if the government were to reach out to them.
Himal’s podcasts bring you the best conversations on Southasia. Become a paying Patron for just USD 5/ month to support our work: bit.ly/support-himalThis podcast is now available on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4gL5Y2W
Apple podcasts: https://apple.co/3WfoLLJ
Youtube: https://youtu.be/h5HS0e7CE9w
Website: himalmag.com/podcast/nepali-bhutanese-lhotshampa-refugees-diaspora-susan-banki
-
In her biography of the city, the Kashmiri writer highlights the complications of Srinagar’s identity and recentres the everyday lives of its people, particularly women.
https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/srinagar-kashmir-identity-women-memory-tourism-history-sadaf-wani
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the Kashmiri writer Sadaf Wani about her new book City as Memory: A Short Biography of Srinagar (Aleph Book Company, June 2024).
Srinagar, in its changing forms, has been the centre of political and cultural activity in Kashmir for centuries. The city has a rich history that has been overshadowed by its turbulent political past and present, which has shaped all readings and accounts of the place.Without losing sight of the ongoing political conflict and militarisation in India-administered Kashmir, Wani offers a corrective. In her biography of the city, she explores the collective historical, cultural and personal memories of Srinagar. From its cultures of leisure to the manufactured “normalcy” of life in Srinagar today, Wani unpacks how the city’s people, and its women in particular, are reclaiming their narratives.
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron for just USD 5/month to support the Southasia Review of Books: https://bit.ly/support-himalThis episode is now available on
🎧Spotify: https://spoti.fi/4a6WEDX
🎧Youtube: https://youtu.be/38PoFGJkwEw
🎧Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/4a9aRk3
-
Putting the year in perspective, editor Roman Gautam and the hosts of Himal’s podcasts take a look back at the highlights, stories and episodes that shaped an extraordinary and challenging year
December is nearly over, and 2025 is just around the corner, so we’re bringing you a very special episode where Himal’s editor Roman Gautam and podcast hosts Nayantara Narayanan and Shwetha Srikanthan reflect on what has been an incredible year here at Himal Southasian.
In 2024, we launched a new website, a revamped Himal’s Patron programme, brought you more ambitious stories and great Southasian journalism, improved and expanded our newsletters, and launched two new podcasts.
We’ve also doubled our output of podcasts: from publishing an episode every two weeks, we’re now releasing a new episode every single week. Now you get even more of the State of Southasia, where Southasia’s top minds unpack essential news and events, and the Southasia Review of Books, the place for all things literary in the region.
So here’s a roundup of what we’ve been able to pull off this year and what’s in store for Himal in 2025.
Become a paying Himal Patron to keep our podcasts paywall-free and open-access for everyone in Southasia, and help us bring you more intelligent conversations on the region’s politics, culture and society in 2025 and beyond: https://www.himalmag.com/support-himal -
On 21 November, a deadly attack targeted a convoy of Shia Muslims traveling from Parachinar to Peshawar in Pakistan’s Kurram district, a region with a long history of sectarian violence. The convoy, consisting of over 100 vehicles, was ambushed by Sunni extremists on the Tal Parachinar Road, a crucial lifeline for the Shia-majority area. Despite being under security escort, the convoy was attacked at multiple points with heavy gunfire, leaving 130 people dead, including women and children.
Survivors claimed that the attackers were Sunnis and some accounts said that announcements had been made from mosques in the area calling for the killing of Shias. The event highlights the growing sectarian violence between Sunni and Shia communities in Pakistan, especially in Kurram, a region historically marked by land disputes but increasingly shaped by extremist ideologies.
The hostility towards Shia Muslims extends beyond Kurram. Nationally, they face hate speech, discrimination, and systemic marginalisation. Even though the media often remains silent or underreports sectarian violence, this lack of coverage further dehumanises the victims, allowing violence to continue unchecked.
In this episode of State of Southasia Sana Batool, a researcher and writer, explains how this conflict has evolved from local resource disputes to ideological battles, particularly during the Soviet-Afghan war in the 1980s, when sectarian violence intensified. She says that despite constitutional guarantees of religious freedom, the judiciary rarely prosecutes sectarian violence effectively, and state inaction has bred deep mistrust among Shia communities.
State of Southasia releases a new interview every two weeks.
-
In his new memoir, spanning the 1980s and the present, the renowned writer and activist reflects on neoliberalism in the West and turmoil in Southasia, and fiercely critiques the War on Terror and the crimes of Israel: https://www.himalmag.com/podcast/writing-dissent-activism-southasia-palestine-revolutions-memoir-tariq-ali
We’re on a mission to give Southasian literature the spotlight it deserves. Become a paying Himal Patron to support the Southasia Review of Books! https://www.himalmag.com/support
Welcome to the Southasia Review of Books Podcast from Himal Southasian, where we speak to celebrated authors and emerging literary voices from across Southasia. In this episode, Shwetha Srikanthan speaks to the renowned Pakistani-British activist, writer and public intellectual Tariq Ali about his new memoir, You Can’t Please All: Memoirs 1980-2024 (Verso, November 2024).
Through anecdotes and reflections, Ali offers glimpses of the fascinating company he has kept – Edward Said, Satyajit Ray, Hugo Chávez, Benazir Bhutto – as well as moving accounts of his family and how they lived during the early years of Pakistan.
A sharp-eyed eyewitness to a chaotic and confusing world, Ali understands that its problems don’t ever change, they just take different forms. In this memoir, he recounts a life committed to socialist and anti-imperialist activism, to writing and cultural intervention that ushered in a new era of dissent.
This episode is now available on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/49viosP
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3OLtTDa
and Youtube: https://youtu.be/xAjFyMVhLGw
-
Manipur has been mired in an ethnic and political conflict since May 2023, primarily involving violent clashes between the Meitei community, which predominantly resides in the Imphal Valley, and the Kuki-Zomi-Hmars, which are tribal communities mostly living in the state's hilly areas. The violence, fueled by longstanding ethnic tensions, has resulted in hundreds of deaths, widespread displacement and the destruction of property. The state’s governance has collapsed and citizens have armed themselves against each other because of the failure of law and order. Several incidents of murder, rape, kidnapping, torture, sexual assault and arson have been reported on both sides.
At the heart of the crisis is a demand by the Meiteis for Scheduled Tribe status, which would grant them affirmative action benefits in education, employment, and political representation. This demand has been fiercely opposed by the Kuki and Naga tribes, who fear that such a move would undermine their own rights and lead to greater dominance by the Meitei community.
The state government has been accused of neglect and mismanagement and the central government has failed to intervene effectively. Manipur’s chief minister Biren Singh, of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, has been criticised for inflaming tensions, particularly after calling the Kuki people “narco-terrorists” and stoking ethnic divisions. Despite strong calls for his removal, India’s prime minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah have allowed him to keep his post.
In this episode of State of Southasia, Patricia Mukhim, a senior journalist from Shillong, highlights the state’s failure to address long-standing inequalities and warns of the current dangerous stalemate, with both communities disillusioned and no resolution in sight.
State of Southasia releases a new interview every two weeks.
- Mostrar mais
