Society

Dr Malvika Iyer, a bomb blast survivor, is a motivational speaker and disability activist. Using the PM’s handle, @MalvikaIyer tweeted, “ People with disabilities should have equal representation—be it media, politics or any other field. The more we see them, the more we accept them as part of our society. Representation is key.” Malvika wrote, “Acceptance is the greatest reward we can give to ourselves. We can’t control our lives but we surely can control our attitude towards life. At the end of the day, it is how we survive our challenges that matters most.” The suspense was finally over…

For more than a 100 years now (since 1911 to be specific), the world has celebrated March 8th as International Women's Day. Every year, the day serves to highlight the strides taken by women around the world and also put together an idea of what needs to be the way forward. The idea of an equal world for men and women is still Utopian, but everyday we take some steps to achieve it, though the fight for womens' rights is still at a very nascent stage. But for 37-year-old Sumangali Balakrishna, the idea of a world with equal rights is…

On a gruelling hot Monday afternoon, Abdul S wakes up from a nap on his rickshaw parked on the Wall Tax Road. A few yards away, the Chennai Central Railway Station is abuzz with passengers. As scores of people walk in and out of the station, Abdul observes them expectantly, and hopes that at least one person from the crowd will approach him for a ride. Abdul belongs to the dying community of rickshaw drivers who bring back memories of the good old days in the Madras that was. The present, however, hardly brings any cheer for them, as they…

City of Women is an upcoming podcast about how women in the city explores the calculated strategies, the backdoor negotiations and the sometimes absurd lengths women go to have fun and feel free in their city. Every Indian woman knows that being out in the city comes with rules - rules that determine who gets to be where and what you can and can’t do. But this show is not about those rules. It’s about how they get broken, bent, and jumped over when women decide to do things just for themselves. City of Women is fun, complex, and a…

Dressed in white and khaki attire, he lets the vehicles at the Anna Rotary junction (under the Gemini flyover) pass towards Nungambakkam. It is 1 pm on a weekday and the mercury level is high. Perspiration trickles down the forehead of the serious-faced traffic cop, who stops a two-wheeler and penalises the rider for not wearing a helmet. Meet C Palani,  a stern, dark-skinned, 48-year-old Traffic Sub-Inspector from the E3 Teynampet Police Station who has manned traffic at various spots over a 10-km stretch in Teynampet, a busy area that is in proximity to the AIADMK office and the Chief…

Women’s labour is often unseen and their stories, often unheard. This unseen, invisible, and often unpaid labour is the ground upon which all ‘development’ in this monster economy takes place. We are witness to a moment in time when women are organising, fighting, and demanding their rights, questioning the very ideas of growth, progress and citizenship. In short, they are making their voices heard and making their labour visible. As part of our ongoing Satyagraha for the Sacred Economy, Gram Seva Sangh, Centre for Budget and Policy Studies along with few more organisations want to create a platform in the…

The locality of Chintadripet in Chennai is known for its popular fish market and also as a hub of electrical goods. With the river Cooum forming a horse-shoe shaped boundary to this locality and with only two entry points from Egmore and Anna Salai, this tiny neighbourhood is a storehouse of history. An early morning walk conducted by Madras Inherited -- an initiative of a group of architects and researchers seeking to unravel hidden architectural gems through heritage walks -- unveiled the treasures of this forgotten neighbourhood in Chennai. Chintadripet was originally called 'Chinna tari pettai,' which translates to 'a…

Last week, Amulya Leona, 19, a journalism student, was arrested and charged with sedition for sloganeering "Pakistan Zindabad" at a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in the city. In January, another student Nalini B was charged with sedition in Mysore, after she held up a placard that said "Free Kashmir". But do such slogans or placards really qualify as sedition? As a law student I was introduced to ‘sedition’ while reading Gandhi’s statement during what is known as The Great Trial of 1922. In his concluding remarks, Gandhi invites the judge to convict him of sedition, with the…

“Voice of Freedom.” That is how Kajal Singh describes her relationship with graffiti art. The 24-year-old from Delhi who goes by the name Dizy is currently in Berlin and has built for herself an international reputation as a woman graffiti artist. She was first introduced to the art through the Hip-hop culture which embodies graffiti as one of its elements. “Being a shy person, graffiti became my voice of expression,” said Dizy. “It also allowed me to go beyond the stereotypes set for women in society”. With its origins in the early 1960s in Philadelphia, graffiti art began when writers…

“Voice of Freedom.” That is how Kajal Singh describes her relationship with graffiti art. The 24-year-old from Delhi who goes by the name Dizy is currently in Berlin and has built for herself an international reputation as a woman graffiti artist. She was first introduced to the art through the Hip-hop culture which embodies graffiti as one of its elements. “Being a shy person, graffiti became my voice of expression,” said Dizy. “It also allowed me to go beyond the stereotypes set for women in society”. With its origins in the early 1960s in Philadelphia, graffiti art began when writers…