Tea with Auntie: a poem

Dedicated to all the paan-chewing, advice-giving, haldi-supplying desi aunties out there...

When Shakespeare meets Bollywood

Anyone who's ever had the misfortune to be in my English class will have heard the words "well, in the Bollywood version..." Shakespeare's plays have been adapted the world over; in India, Othello becomes Omkara, Hamlet is Haider, and Romeo and Juliet are Ram-Leela.  While the East has its own versions of the tragic love story, most notably Layla and...

Interviewing Shrabani Basu, author of ‘Victoria and Abdul’

'Victoria and Abdul', which has been adapted into a film starring Judi Dench, tells the true story of Queen Victoria’s friendship with an Indian servant, Abdul Karim. He became the queen's ‘munshi’, her teacher, teaching her Urdu and the Qur'an to the chagrin of her English staff. I contacted the author, Shrabani Basu, who kindly agreed...