Moon engineering

When I stand there and look around, this is really a spectacular sight. The steel grey sky, the way colours stand out against it, the sharply cut brown and green of the hillside, the luminous ochre of wet mud everywhere, the yellow of the equipment, the black and blue uniforms in a long line emerging [...]

Asking for the man

Dr Manoj Pande is trying to find a particular family. You know where they are? he asks of the men in a dark room. That tall man with the bandage on his face, remember him? Where’s he? I have to find him quickly!
I’m sitting speaking to the men, some of whom were hurt in the [...]

On the road again

To me, the Marol road that leads to Saki Naka stands for everything that I find wrong-headed about a liberalising India. The traffic is simply putrid. The road is horrible, plenty of potholes and stones waiting to be kicked up by a passing vehicle. On one side are stretches of unimaginable — I don’t know [...]

Living downstream

A thought-provoking essay by a friend (no relation). I have a copy of the report she refers to.
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LIVING DOWNSTREAM: Mumbai Floods and the Mithi River
While most of Mumbai has struggled to reach home over the last few days, very few have questioned why Mumbai has suddenly become a victim of floods that would have done [...]

The way of our work

Days ago in the rain, a Saki Naka hillside collapsed on the homes of several construction workers, killing and orphaning. And I’ve been thinking about my encounter with some such workers, behind my home a few years ago.
An old bungalow stood there for years, then was torn down. The men who did it were migrant [...]

Wallet box

Thought about it while on a bracing evening walk. This morning was the last straw. I’m switching, starting tomorrow. I encourage others to do the same. And more important, write to the Times to tell them exactly why you are doing it. Not email, but fax or post. Registered post.

Image of a nutcase

Inexplicably, I remember a tiny bit of news from January 1 1997: somewhere in this city, a woman pushed her two daughters to their deaths off the terrace of their block of flats, and then jumped herself. Days later, her family and the police were still baffled by this tragedy; then we all moved on [...]

Does not recede

I think I may have to start an occasional Mumbai Mirror fix series. Here’s something from the Mirror today (Thursday July 28): from a column titled “What rains! Why this was the worst deluge the city has ever witnessed”. It lists 5 reasons. I began reading thinking, there must be some serious science in here. [...]

Bombay every time

My column for rediff.com, on the rains in this city.

Not DD News

Roaming our Bombay suburb half a day after the vast downpour, things seem deceptively normal. Well, there’s that street that’s like a long swimming pool, but then that street gets like a long swimming pool after 10 minutes of moderate rain. There’s the Dhirubhai Ambani School bus that’s been abandoned at an angle across a [...]