Polis Project Conversation Series

Suchitra Vijayan speaks with Abduweli Ayup, writer, linguist, and one of the most significant chroniclers of the Uyghur genocide. Their conversation traces how China’s “People’s War on Terror” in Xinjiang evolved into an unprecedented system of algorithmic suppression. This model of mass repression uses surveillance, biometric data, and AI-enabled policing function as instruments of erasure. They...

Suchitra Vijayan speaks with Abdullahi Boru Halakhe in a conversation that traces the longue durée of exploitation and violence in the Congo from the colonial atrocities of King Leopold II to the resource wars that continue to devastate the region today. They unpack how the technologies of extraction and the politics of dispossession remain intertwined, shaping a global system in which Congolese l...

Since 11 April 2019, Julian Assange has been held in the UK’s notorious Belmarsh prison that was once known as Britain’s Guantanamo Bay. This year marks his fourth year inside Belmarsh for revealing the US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Julian Assange is an Australian journalist and publisher who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. WikiLeaks broke one of the most important stories of the last decades...

Suchitra Vijayan speaks with Sabhanaz Rashid Diya, Sams Wahid Shahat, Mohammad Arafat and Apon Das of the Tech Global Institute. They unpack the aftermath of Bangladesh’s July 2024 uprising, which ended the Awami League’s 16-year rule but left behind a trail of unacknowledged deaths, disappearances, and state-sponsored impunity. Drawing on the landmark report Bloodshed in Bangladesh, the conversat...

Suchitra Vijayan speaks with Eric Sype and Jalal Abukhater from 7amleh, The Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media. They interrogate how Israel’s assault on Palestinians is enabled by global tech giants, weapon manufacturers, data brokers, and social media platforms. Building on UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese’s landmark report Forever-Occupation, Genocide, and Profit, they exami...

In this podcast, Francesca Recchia sits down with Helidah Ogude Chambert to discuss the racism and xenophobia inherent in the United Kingdom’s immigration policies, where it stems from and which communities are particularly vulnerable to it and why.

Suchitra Vijayan in conversation with Elizabeth Baer about her book "The Genocidal Gaze." The first genocide of the twentieth century, though not well known, was committed by Germans between 1904–1907 in the country we know today as Namibia, where they exterminated hundreds of Herero and Nama people and subjected the surviving indigenous men, women, and children to forced labor. The perception of...

Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Darren Byler about his book Terror Capitalism: Uyghur Dispossession and Masculinity in a Chinese City. In Terror Capitalism anthropologist Darren Byler theorizes the contemporary Chinese colonization of the Uyghur Muslim minority group in the northwest autonomous region of Xinjiang. He shows that the mass detention of over one million Uyghurs in “reeducation camps” is pa...

Twenty years after the Gujarat pogrom, Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Zahir Janmohamed about the moment, his experience on the ground and his work since. The conversation delves into the deep seated anti-Muslim sentiment in India and looks for ways to heal. The conversation was originally held as a Twitter Space session.

In this conversation, Urvi Khaitan sits down with Mytheli Sreenivas to discuss her book, "Reproductive Politics and the Making of Modern India'. The book explores colonial administrators, postcolonial development experts, nationalists, eugenicists, feminists, and family planners all aimed to reform reproduction to transform both individual bodies and the body politic.

In this conversation, Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Arvind Narrain about his book India's Undeclared Emergency: Constitutionalism and the Politics of Resistance. They touch upon the provisions in the constitution that have been interpreted to shove India into an unofficial emergency situation, reflect on how this compares to India's emergency of the 1970s and imagine what the way forward can look lik...

In this conversation with Francesca Recchia, Pakistani activist Ahmad Waqas Goraya speaks about the repercussions facing those who dare to criticize the military establishment in Pakistan, his own personal encounter with the institution and the subsequent experience of torture and exile.

Francesca Recchia speaks to Ashley Jackson about her book Negotiating Survival: Civilian–Insurgent Relations in Afghanistan. Based on over 400 interviews with Taliban and civilians, this book tells the story of how civilians have not only bargained with the Taliban for their survival, but also ultimately influenced the course of the war in Afghanistan. While the Taliban have the power of violence...

Suchitra Vijayan sits down with author Jessica Namakkal to discuss her book "Unsettling Utopia". The book presents a new account of the history of twentieth-century French India to show how colonial projects persisted beyond formal decolonization. Through the experience of the French territories, Namakkal recasts the relationships among colonization, settlement, postcolonial sovereignty, utopianis...

Suchitra Vijayan speaks to Prasanna S. about data privacy in India, the state's use of the Pegasus spyware to surveil voices of dissent and what it means for civil rights in the country. The discussion was originally held on Twitter Spaces.

Francesca Recchia speaks to Adrian Levy, co-author of The Forever Prisoner: The Full and Searing Account of the CIA’s Most Controversial Covert Program. Based on four years of intensive reporting, on interviews with key protagonists who speak candidly for the first time, and on thousands of previously classified documents, The Forever Prisoner is a powerful chronicle of a shocking experiment that...

In this podcast, Francesca Recchia speaks to Hassan Javid about the decision to introduce electronic voting machines in Pakistan for the general elections to be held in 2023. Javid explores the circumstances under which the legislation was passed, the viability of the plan and its impact on electoral transparency given the history of military interference in Pakistan's democracy.

In this podcast, Francesca Recchia sits down with Abbas Nasir to discuss the rapidly deteriorating press freedoms in Pakistan. They discuss the Pakistan military's intervention into the news media industry, news outlets that provide regular platform to state propaganda and the hope for the future. Abbas Nasir is a former editor of Pakistan's English language newspaper Dawn and the former executive...

In this episode, Suchitra Vijayan sits down with Dinesh Narayanan to discuss the formation of the RSS, its links with the BJP, its role in violence and the distortion of history to create role models out of RSS figures like V.D Savarkar.

In this episode, Suchitra Vijayan sits down with Abhishek Saha to discuss the xenophobic rhetoric around issues of migration and citizenship. What does belonging to a land look like? How is the way we imagine citizenship inherently violent? And how do state negligence and ill-intent come together to deny someone their right of existence in their homes? Saha explores all these questions and more.

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Reem Khurshid, a political cartoonist and illustrator based in Karachi. Reem Khurshid recently collaborated with Justice Project Pakistan to illustrate their latest project "Who is the murderer?" The project is an interactive fictional story surrounding the mystery of a murder, a subsequent arrest, a confession and a death sentence, inspir...

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Mohammad Hanif, a fiction writer and journalist based in Karachi. Mohammad Hanif, an acclaimed name in South Asian literary circles, often uses fiction to reflect upon realities oft forgotten in the privileged mainstream. In this conversation, Hanif delves into reasons that motivate him to create fictional worlds, the lens through which he...

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Fatima Zaidi, a journalist, activist and member of the Karachi Bachao Tehreek. Karachi Bachao Tehreek is a grassroots coalition of lawyers and activists who are concerned about the sustainability of the development projects in the city. They work in collaboration with community leaders in the working class localities that bear the brunt of...

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Arif Hasan, an architect, urban historian and activist from Karachi. Looking at the recent anti-encroachment drives that have targeted vulnerable communities the city, Hasan details how Karachi changed from a bustling multi-ethnic city after Independence to one blatantly favoring upper classes. He analyzes the impact of neoliberalism and p...

In this episode, Francesca Recchia is in conversation with Sandi Hilal on her project “The Living Room.” Reflecting on her experiences with refugees in Boden, North Sweden, Dr Hilal speaks of the passivity and agency of refugee lives and cultures as they navigate the manifestly European distinctions of the public and private space. How do refugees see themselves as political subjects who are in th...