Works on agritech/food. Half of @helloforktales Building @weareica Bylines: The Hindu, Mint Lounge, BBC. Book: bit.ly/3xVYcSw
Articles by Om Routray
These innovations have made Amrik Sukhdev Dhaba in Murthal the truck drivers’ favourite since 1967
Amrik Singh’s uncle, Sardar Lakshman Singh, ran a dhaba in Miller Ganj, near Ludhiana in Punjab, around 260 kilometres from Murthal. It was popular among truck drivers and business was thriving. He did not have a son, but his sisters did. He asked one of his two sisters who had four sons to allow him to adopt one (unofficially; this was common practice in India in those times). This is how Prakash Singh, her youngest son, arrived to help his uncle run the dhaba at Miller Ganj. All was going well.
A new chapter in Odia cinema
Home > How To Lounge> Movies & TV > LAST PUBLISHED 09.12.2023 | 02:30 PM IST Women in ikat saris, men in kurtas, posing for the cameras. People laughing, greeting each other outside the movie theatre. Amazingly, this was a screening of an Odia film, Phalguna Chaitra, at a theatre in Toronto, Canada, in May. Similar scenes were unfolding in the Netherlands, Australia, England, the US, the UK and Dubai.
What did job loss teach me about gender equations?
Home > Relationships> It's Complicated > LAST PUBLISHED 13.09.2023 | 01:15 PM IST 1 March, earlier this year, promised to be a regular Monday. That was until the chief executive officer of the technology startup, which I worked for, called me at 9 am to inform that I have been fired. This was not the first time I had lost a job. But this one felt different. For some years now, I had revelled in being a stable space and did not see this coming.
Is the journey of an entrepreneur a lonely one?
Home > Relationships> It's Complicated > Is the journey of an entrepreneur a lonely one? The journey from education to entrepreneurship is a solo one, with startup founders working eighteen hours a day and giving up on life outside of work.
Can the indie pop phenomenon of the '90s ever be repeated?
Home > How To Lounge> Art & Culture > LAST PUBLISHED 11.05.2022 | 09:30 AM IST It was the year 1995 when singer Alisha Chinai introduced us to a princess who had travelled the world—Japan, Russia, Australia, America—looking for love. The video was memorable as it turned the gaze from the female to the male figure. Milind Soman, who went on to become the national heart throb, was brought in a box as a gift to the princess.
L.K. Mahapatra put Odisha on the global map of anthropological studies
Professor Mahapatra, who passed away in June, was both a revolutionary as an Odia in what had been a white man’s field, and a builder of lasting institutions Back in 1998, when I was able to fend off my family and cross over to the arts stream for my graduation, I had two options — psychology and sociology. These were thought of as easy subjects and would never have got you a job. Still, they were considered somewhat cool.
Aggressive, inaccurate and unfair: How Odia food writers weaponise their culinary roots
Their approach generally refers to a long and glorious past, emphasising the inherent superiority of the cuisine, which almost blames the outsider for not having discovered it earlier Most cuisines in India are centuries old, but food writing is not. Writing that goes beyond documenting recipes is still new or as yet absent in many regions and ethnicities. Objective analyses of Indian food as a whole goes back only a few decades.
Why Odisha is a State without a stereotype
Language — specifically, accents — and food are perhaps the two easiest ways to stereotype a people. We’ve all heard jokes about Biharis, Punjabis and ‘South Indians’. Now, think Odia. Nothing. How did 4.6 crore Odias manage to slip under everyone’s radar for so long? For most of my life, whenever I have declared to a stranger that I am an Odia, the response has been a thoughtful ‘hmm’.
Songs, slogans, camaraderie and chocolate: a protest at India Gate
Most people have notions about the site of a protest. Protests are about resistance and we rarely associate them with peace. In the past few weeks, state-led violence and the actions of the police have made protests look far more chaotic than they are. While there is an attempt to intimidate people away from protesting, we must see protest as an act, as a space and as theatre. Let me walk you through one evening of protest at India Gate.
Let’s talk about the C-word
Something dramatic was happening in India in the 80s. Old India was breaking down. Most of our experiments as a new democracy were failing but no new models were to be seen. In politics, a new generation was growing up after the Emergency but there was no leader of eminence that India could boast of. The economy was hollow but the worst was yet to come. Popular culture was constantly propping up heroes who were angry, disillusioned and fighting the “system”.
Jobs going south
Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) releases estimated monthly unemployment figures for every State in India. A look at the figures over time shows that the rates had come down in 2017 after demonetisation (due to a spike in MNREGA jobs) but increased again in 2018. It would have become much worse if not for the southern States, where unemployment receded in 2018.
Along the new Silk Roads
At the recent Paris Peace Forum commemorating the end of World War I, the heads of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank made the case for a more inclusive multilateralism. Drawing comparisons between 1914 and today’s situations in terms of inequalities, they warned against the temptation of a divisive globalisation which could only benefit the wealthiest.
Looking beyond the optics
President Ram Nath Kovind’s choice of Vietnam as the first Southeast Asian country to visit in his capacity as the President is not surprising. A close ‘ally’ of India for over 70 years, and not limited to official diplomatic ties, Vietnam is critical for India’s foreign policy at the regional and systemic levels.
Get the model right: on state-sponsored insurance
World Bank data, in 2015, showed that nearly 65% of health-care expenditure in India is “Out of Pocket” (OoP). A report by the World Health Organisation has shown that around 3.2% of Indians would fall below the poverty line because of high OoP health expenditure. Thus, a national health insurance scheme like the Ayushman Bharat is welcome.
How cities move
Indian cities and towns, bustling with people, vehicles, narrow roads, are among the most congested urban areas in the world. But there are variations among them. How do these cities and towns rank by mobility — the ability to move from one area to another? Varun B. Krishnan looks at data from a paper on “Mobility and Congestion in Urban India” to categorise cities on the presence (or absence) of a good road infrastructure and traffic congestion.
Will the BJP lose Rajasthan?
YES | Pawan Khera The BJP’s renewed recourse to emotive issues is an acknowledgement that it is staring at defeat Will the BJP win in Rajasthan is like asking whether Narendra Modi will become the U.S. President. The reason for the imminent defeat of the BJP in Rajasthan cannot be attributed to a “normal trend” or “Rajasthan is a see-saw State” kind of arguments. First, let’s look at candidates.
Gandhi opposed Partition
I was shocked when a young Indian professional recently advised me to listen to the audiotape of Nathuram Godse’s speech in the court trying him for Mahatma Gandhi’s murder to get the “right perspective” on both Gandhi and Godse. An obvious admirer of Godse, he found the assassin’s rant blaming Gandhi for abetting Partition convincing, thus implying that Gandhi’s assassination was a legitimate act of retribution carried out by a true Indian nationalist.
Which are the fastest and slowest cities in India?
Indian cities and towns, bustling with people, vehicles and narrow roads, are among the most congested urban areas in the world. But there are variations among them. How do these cities and towns rank by mobility — the ability to move from one location to another? Researchers Prottoy A. Akbar and others from various U.S. universities, in their paper titled 'Mobility and Congestion in Urban India', categorise cities on the presence (or absence) of a good road infrastructure and traffic congestion.
The notion of purity
The focus on female bodily functions has never been more critical or as intense than it is now. The Sabarimala judgment has sparked a clash between culture and nature, an amplification of a battle cry that began when women started questioning why they were barred from some places of worship. In 2016, a PIL was filed challenging the temple entry ban. That same year, women were allowed into Shani Shingnapur temple’s sanctum sanctorum, in Maharashtra.
Retweeting brahminical patriarchy
Imagine a celebrity Indian CEO going to the United States and having himself photographed with women of colour while holding a poster that said, “Smash racist patriarchy”. And then, imagine white Americans coming down on him like a tonne of bricks, accusing him of inciting hatred and violence against white Americans. Sounds absurd? Good. Now imagine him actually apologising to the American public for wanting to end racist patriarchy. Sounds even more absurd?
Limits of CBI jurisdiction
Can States bar the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) from functioning in their territory? Yes. The CBI is a national agency with police powers. Its primary jurisdiction is confined to Delhi and Union Territories. As policing (detecting crime and maintaining law and order) is a State subject, the law allows the agency to function outside only with the consent of the States. Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal have withdrawn their general consent to the CBI to operate within their territories.
Getting justice for Asia Bibi
Last month, the Pakistan Supreme Court acquitted Asia Bibi, a Christian woman accused of blasphemy, citing lack of evidence. The verdict must rank as the boldest in the chequered history of Pakistan. The judges showed remarkable courage in going against the far-right ideology responsible for the extralegal lynching of an estimated 60 persons accused of blasphemy since 1990.
The post and the person
The Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court is examining a public interest litigation (PIL) that could be critical for Indian democracy. The PIL, which seeks the strengthening of the Election Commission of India (ECI), includes a proposal to create an independent mechanism to appoint the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and Election Commissioners (ECs) who are, at present, simply appointed by the government of the day, without any defined criteria or processes.
The Maine example: on the U.S. midterm elections
The recently concluded mid-term elections in the U.S. received a lot of attention as the opposition Democrats managed to decisively bring about a “blue wave” to capture the House of Representatives flipping at least 37 seats in the process from the Republicans. One such win in a tiny district in Maine was particularly significant. Democrat Jared Golden won 45.5% of the vote. He was runner-up to Republican Bruce Poliquin (46.2%). The rest was won by an independent.
What is Gause’s Law in Ecology?
Also known as the competitive exclusion principle, this refers to the proposition that the populations of two competing species cannot remain at stable levels over time. When two species compete for control over a limited amount of resources, the dominant species will take advantage over its weak competitor. This will cause the weaker species to get excluded from its previous territory and its population to drop over time.
Amid institutional decline
Allegations of interference in major institutions have been the big news of late. The ongoing fracas in the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has got out of hand, with the two top officials in the chain of command accusing each other of corruption. The recent pronouncements in the Supreme Court do not promise an early resolution. The fight against widespread graft in the country has been set back.
Justice delayed: crores of cases pending across India
At present, there are 2.85 crore cases pending in lower courts across India. States with a high number of judge vacancies and a relatively low number of judges corresponding to their population, such as U.P., West Bengal and Bihar, tend to have a higher number of pending cases. The number of cases that are pending for long are also higher in such States.
The many secrets buried in sheaves of paper
The Right to Information Act of 2005 is a journalist’s favourite tool. It enables us to liberate information from bureaucratic stranglehold and discover the limits to how much information Ministries are willing to share. The year was 2009. The Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry held the key to “proper programming” of news on television, entertainment and cinema. This was also the year of Indian Summer, an adaptation of Alex von Tunzelmann’s book of the same name.
#MeToo: A gender curriculum
Over the past few weeks, many women have spoken about their experiences of sexual harassment. Some have named the accused. Many of these accounts have been of incidents at the workplace and by co-workers, and expose the prevalence of deep-seated sexism across professions. There have been various responses by the accused to these testimonies: unconditional apologies, resignations, stepping away from duties until further investigation — but also denial, intimidation and even further harassment.
Science outside labs
‘Chai and Why,’ a popular outreach programme conducted by a group of faculty members of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, hosted its 250th event on November 18. The programme, which has been going strong since 2009, comprises talks and demonstrations by scientists or research scholars on a science topic, pitched at an easy-to-grasp level. These talks take place on alternate Sundays at Mumbai’s Prithvi Theatre, among other places.
P.N. Haksar, a true counsellor
P.N. Haksar, whose 20th death anniversary falls this month, on November 25, was one of India’s most eminent public servants. He served with great distinction as Secretary and then Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, leaving an indelible mark on India’s domestic and foreign policies. Congress politician Jairam Ramesh’s book, Intertwined Lives: P.N. Haksar and Indira Gandhi, illuminates the crucial role Haksar played at a critical juncture in India’s history.
The Brexit question: Britain on the edge
Over the past week, a 2015 tweet by former British Prime Minister David Cameron has been widely reshared online. “Britain faces a simple and inescapable choice — stability and strong Government with me, or chaos with Ed Miliband,” he wrote on May 4, before the general election. Mr. Cameron won that election decisively, but the rest of his prediction has been looking darkly comic as Britain continues to stumble from one political crisis to another.
Claiming Sabarimala
An unexpected fallout of the controversy surrounding the entry of women of all age groups into Sabarimala is the ownership rights of the Malayarayan tribal community over the hill shrine. The controversy has also led to arguments about the Brahminisation of at least some temples in Kerala, which some historians believe were either Buddhist shrines or in the control of the avarna castes. The United Malayaraya Mahasabha has now moved the apex court seeking ownership rights over Sabarimala temple.
Further stressed by thermal power
The Composite Water Management Index (CWMI) by the NITI Aayog, which was released this June, shows that 600 million people face high to extreme water stress in India. The report, which was published in association with the Ministry of Water Resources, Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation and the Ministry of Rural Development, places India at a dismal 120 among 122 countries in the water quality index.
Unnecessary, destabilising and expensive
On November 5, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that India’s first indigenous ballistic-missile armed nuclear submarine (SSBN), Arihant, had “successfully completed its first deterrence patrol” and claimed that this “accomplishment” would “always be remembered in our history”. However, he failed to address some fundamental questions: why does India need such a submarine? And, are the enormous resources spent on the nuclear-submarine programme justified?
2019: Is a grand opposition against the BJP possible?
YES | Manoj Kumar Jha Coalition politics is an imperative because of the threat today to the ideas of social justice The making of a coalition is no more a matter of choice for the parties opposed to the right-wing authoritarian postures of the BJP but a command from the common people.
Sabarimala, and the quest for equality
Sabarimala, it appears, could be our new touchstone for understanding liberals, especially from Kerala. The intellectual emptiness in the arguments of Congress MP Shashi Tharoor and former Foreign Secretary Nirupama Menon Rao on the Sabarimala imbroglio require both investigation and introspection. Mr. Tharoor contends dangerously that “abstract notions of constitutional principle also have to pass the test of societal acceptance”.
When judges legislate
In many recent judgments, the Supreme Court has become hyper-activist in making laws. But can judges legislate? This question has already been answered in the past by the court. In Ram Jawaya v.
What is 'dumb agent theory' in economics?
This refers to the hypothesis that decisions made by groups of individuals turn out to be better than the decisions taken by isolated individuals. It is used to emphasise the wisdom of crowd knowledge. The dumb agent theory has been used in support of the efficient market hypothesis which states that the the prices of securities properly reflect their true underlying value.
The gold standard for a Prime Minister
India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, is now moving through an eclipse that B.R. Ambedkar experienced and yet emerged from more luminous. During his life, Ambedkar was vilified by both the left and the right, and decades after his death, he was at best ignored. Later jurists and scholars joined his followers to dust up his legacy and recognise him as a guide in political, social and constitutional matters.
Selective histories
In 2011, Delhi University’s academic council succumbed to pressure and dropped the scholarly essay, “Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five examples and three thoughts on translations”, by linguist A.K. Ramanujan, from the curriculum. The essay had been the subject of controversy since 2008, when right-wing organisations objected to some of Ramanujan’s findings.
Bittersweet judgment
Bakeries in the U.S. and the U.K. have become the latest sites of contestation about fundamental rights. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a Christian baker’s right to refuse to bake a cake for the wedding of a gay couple. On October 10, the U.K. Supreme Court held that a baker’s refusal to bake a cake with a message in support of gay marriage does not constitute unlawful discrimination.
Explainer: Protecting the tiger’s habitat
Why is the death of tigress Avni controversial? Since 2016, the deaths of 13 people in the Pandharkawda divisional forest of Maharashtra have been attributed to tigers and at least five of them to Avni, a 6-year-old with two cubs. India’s wildlife laws permit a tiger which is believed to have preyed on humans to be killed. The State’s chief wildlife warden claimed he had evidence.
What is 'contact hypothesis' in sociology?
Also known as the inter-group contact theory, this refers to the hypothesis that people-to-people contact may be a good way to resolve conflict between groups. It was proposed by American psychologist Gordon W. Allport. The contact hypothesis is based on the idea that peaceful and friendly interpersonal contact can help in reducing prejudices between groups and foster better cooperation and friendly relationships.
Setting a proper diet plan
Despite being one of the fastest growing economies in the world, India has been ranked at 103 out of 119 countries, with hunger levels categorised as “serious”, in the Global Hunger Index 2018. Strikingly, in July, three girls died of starvation resulting from prolonged malnutrition in the national capital Delhi, which has a high per capita income. India’s child malnourishment level is not only the highest in the world but varies considerably across States.
What is 'group polarisation' in psychology?
Also known as the group polarisation effect, this refers to the tendency among groups to assume positions that are far more extreme than the initial positions of the individual members of the group following a group discussion. Increased interaction between like-minded individuals can cause groups as a whole to assume more extreme positions. Such polarisation, however, may not happen when the group consists of individuals with vastly different view points.
A reality check on cooperative federalism
Since at least 1974, when the Supreme Court commented on the Constitution envisaging a cooperative federal structure, federalism has come a long way in India. In relation to the imposition of President’s rule under Article 356 of the Constitution, federalism is far more mature. Between 1947 and 1977, there were 44 instances when the power to impose President’s rule was exercised. Between 1977 and 1996, the power was exercised almost 59 times.
Beyond ideology?
Ideology may be dead in the Indian political landscape, except in some crannies of the Left parties. Fast-changing developments, where alliances are being forged to take on a bigger adversary, are without any long-term allegiances. These have produced a sense of déjà vu. Bitter enemies until yesterday are turning into friends, prompting wordsmiths to apply words like frenemies. Most recently, the source of déjà vu has been the decision of Telugu Desam Party (TDP) leader N.
A lost opportunity for the Congress?
With the first phase of polling for the 90-member Chhattisgarh Assembly concluding on Monday, the month-long election schedule for the five States — Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana and Mizoram — finally began. Despite a boycott call by the Maoists, the turnout was about 70%, according to provisional figures put out by the Election Commission of India.
The most inconvenient question of them all
Often, storytelling is a mechanical process for reporters. If you are particularly lucky, stories appear in your head already told: five Ws and the H all set to meet the printer’s ink. Then, rarely, a story comes along that makes you question the tools at your disposal. Rarer still, you search that toolbox and come up empty. Five people were held in Thanjavur district in Tamil Nadu based on the complaint of a 13-year-old girl, neighbour to four of them.
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