BIC TALKS

India is yet to get over its giddy excitement with the recently completed cricket Test series that was truly one for the ages. After being written off by all experts post the Adelaide Test (where India recorded its lowest ever score of 36), India bounced back to win at Melbourne, draw at Sydney and pull off a miracle at the Gabba in Brisbane (where the last time a visiting team won was in 1988). T...

Sudhir Krishnaswamy and Shruti Viswanathan unpack the enduring impact of the Indian Constitution's Basic Structure doctrine on India's socio-political and judicial landscape. India's Basic Structure doctrine arose from Supreme Court's Kesavananda Bharati judgment from 1973. It came about by a wafer-thin judgment with a margin of 7-6, and placed restrictions on the power of the Parliament to amend...

Ambassador Nirupama Menon Rao speaks to musicians TM Krishna and Ali Sethi about how a South Asian identity can be expressed through music. This episode of BIC Talks is an edited version of the first half of a live online event hosted by the South Asian Symphony Foundation. The foundation's co-founder Ambassador Menon Rao spoke to five artistes from across South Asia. The full event can be accesse...

Historian Omar H Ali talks about African origin leaders and shapers of medieval India on Episode 85 of BIC Talks. Africa and India have a rich history of interaction ranging several millennia, with African origin sailors, merchants, soldiers, scholars, musicians, and explorers finding home in India or contributing significantly to Indian history.  Perhaps the greatest among them was Malik Ambar, b...

Strategic affairs analyst, journalist, and former Indian Army officer Sushant Singh talks to host Pavan Srinath about the India-China conflict in Ladakh, eight months in.  Sushant shares what it takes for the Indian Army to deploy between 50 and 60,000 troops on the Line of Actual Control in Eastern Ladakh and maintaining a winter deployment. He also discusses the challenges faced by soldiers livi...

Durba Mitra and Sreeparna Chattopadhyay discuss Durba's book, " Indian Sex Life: Sexuality and the Colonial Origins of Modern Social Thought ." They explore how British authorities and Indian intellectuals develop ideas about deviant female sexuality to control and organise society in colonial India. They also discuss the legal and societal implications of these ideas that continue to shape Indian...

In this episode, Architect Bijoy Ramachandran speaks to Prof. Rabindra Vasavada, a celebrated practitioner, conservationist, teacher and historian about his time at the IIM Ahmedabad site office (where he started his career) from 1969 to 1972 working with Louis Kahn the American architect, who was commissioned to design the campus, and Prof. Anant Raje, the local architect in-charge. This time wor...

In this episode author Shoba Narayan discusses her new book- Food and Faith - A Pilgrim's Journey Through India with poet and scholar Mani Rao.  What is the role of religion in your life today? Do you commune with the divine through rituals? Or is it a comforting routine, going to church or temple once a week or month? Are these questions making you uncomfortable? Do you think religion is a privat...

The elusive Kariya or Saya, resident of the Nagarahole forests has become the stuff of folklore and legends, sending sighters into a tizzy. He even has his own film. In this episode, author and philanthropist Rohini Nilekani recounts her journey looking for this big cat in the wild.  Romancing The Black Panther was part of the Bangalore Literature Festival 2020 and this episode is an edited extrac...

This podcast is based on a talk that author Krish Ashok gave at the Bangalore Literature Festival 2020 at the Bangalore International Centre. Ever wondered why your grandmother threw a teabag into the pressure cooker while boiling chickpeas, or why she measured using the knuckle of her index finger? Why does a counter-intuitive pinch of salt make your kheer more intensely flavourful? What is the M...

Author Venkatesh Parthasarathy talks to Karthik Venkatesh about his first book around the history of one of India's most loved prayer, Suprabhatam. Prativadi Bhayankaram Anna, who composed this prayer in the fifteenth century, was a saint, a poet and an ardent devotee of Lord Vishnu. The poet's devotion shines through, most unforgettably in M.S. Subbulakshmi's rendition, which rings through many s...

In this episode Sociologist Amita Baviskar discusses her book Uncivil City: Ecology, Equity and the Commons in Delhi. Cities are now habitat for most of humanity.  But do they have the ecological capacity to sustain lives worth living? Amita talks about the environmental politics in Delhi, looking at the role of 'bourgeois environmentalists' who claim to speak for nature and society.  How well hav...

In this episode Sociologist Amita Baviskar discusses her book Uncivil City: Ecology, Equity and the Commons in Delhi. Cities are now habitat for most of humanity.  But do they have the ecological capacity to sustain lives worth living? Amita talks about the environmental politics in Delhi, looking at the role of 'bourgeois environmentalists' who claim to speak for nature and society.  How well hav...

In this episode Sociologist Amita Baviskar discusses her book Uncivil City: Ecology, Equity and the Commons in Delhi. Cities are now habitat for most of humanity.  But do they have the ecological capacity to sustain lives worth living? Amita talks about the environmental politics in Delhi, looking at the role of 'bourgeois environmentalists' who claim to speak for nature and society.  How well hav...

Political scientist, lawyer and journalist Vinay Sitapati speaks to entrepreneur Manish Sabharwal on his book Jugalbandi. Narendra Modi has been a hundred years in the making. Vinay Sitapati's Jugalbandi provides this backstory to his current dominance in Indian politics. It begins with the creation of Hindu nationalism as a response to British-induced elections in the 1920s, moves on to the forma...

Economist Narendar Pani talks to journalist Anusha Ravi Sood about rural India's enduring economic and social crisis that does not seem to have an end in sight.  They discuss some of the root causes of the ongoing farmer protests, and go beyond them to explore the dynamics of farming, migration and urban jobs over the last few decades. They discuss challenges that have remained unaddressed, and ha...

In this podcast William Dalrymple and Moin Mir discuss The East India Company through their books  The Anarchy  and  Surat: Fall of a Port. Rise of a Prince. William Dalrymple's The Anarchy has been called 'his most ambitious and riveting book to date'. It tells the story of the East India Company as it transitioned from being a 'conventional international trading corporation dealing in silks and...

Medical Scientist Dr Gagandeep Kang returns to BIC Talks and speaks to host Pavan Srinath about the latest news on COVID-19 vaccines, and the road ahead for public vaccination for all Indians.  It is extraordinary to see not one, but three COVID-19 vaccine candidates announce successful interim results in November. This happened within 10 months of isolating the virus, SARS-CoV-2. Dr Kang shares h...

Jyotsna Jha talks to host Pavan Srinath about how Indian girl children have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.  Jyotsna and her colleagues have published a new study on how children's education is faring amidst deep economic uncertainty faced by millions of Indian families, by surveying over 3,100 households across 4 states – Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Assam and Telangana. In this episode, Jyotsna...

India's police forces have long been under the direct control of state politicians, but the challenge of police politicisation is coming the fore increasingly in recent years. Instances of harm caused by the politicisation are apparent in the police handling of the Delhi Riots of 1984, the Gujarat riots of 2002 and the recent riots in N.E. Delhi. The police is trained to enforce the law impartiall...

Joshua Mathew talks to Sheila Kumar about the life and story of Donald Anderson (1934-2014), one of the last colonial hunters or shikharis, who was a resident of Bangalore and lived a life quite removed from 21st century experiences and norms. They discuss Joshua's 2018 book, The Last White Hunter: Reminiscences of a Colonial Shikhari and the themes explored in the book. They talk about the changi...

The COVID-19 pandemic has always spread faster than we can test for, and it's all the more true in India.  We have known for a while now that for every single person who has tested positive for the infection, there are several who have been infected – either with or without symptoms. Serosurveys therefore become an important tool in helping us figure out how far the infection has spread within a p...

Mayur Suresh talks to host Pavan Srinath about the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), and how thousands of Indians are in prison or in custody, without recourse to bail, and awaiting a trial that may never take place. Mayur discusses how the UAPA came about, how it absorbed some of the worst features of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, and how it can be used without much judicial oversight...

Caleb Simmons and Manu S Pillai talk about how sovereignty was conceived in India in the 18th and 19th centuries. They explore how two very different rules of Mysore: Tipu Sultan and Krishnaraja Wodeyar III laid their claims to sovereign rule over their kingdom. They discuss Caleb's recent book, Devotional Sovereignty: Kingship and Religion in India. Dr. Caleb Simmons is an Associate Professor of...

Simran Mangharam and Dipti Ramesh talk about how modern relationships and marriages are evolving in urban India. They explore how gender and personal dynamics are evolving within each relationship, and Simran shares examples from the thousands of people she has coached.  Simran Mangharam is a Dating and Relationship Coach. She is the founder of Floh, a dating community that connects singles in rea...