Anjana Basu

Soumitra Chatterjee leaves behind a legacy and a presence that will be almost impossible to replace

A Puja during Covid, of court bans and thin crowds

Because of the covid pandemic, the question of crowd control is a crucial determinant in everyone’s planning for Durga Puja.

Right now our lives are uprooted – internet connectivity and mobile data are gone, milk is coming in a slow trickle – and what happened in the Sunderbans one can only guess.

Tomorrow, I will have to chase the missing gas cylinder – the distributor’s delivery boy claims that no one was home on the three occasions he attempted to deliver the cylinder in the past 10 days so the order was cancelled, writes Anjana Basu.

In a state that has no industry, it is quite obvious that Durga Puja is an industry that works brilliantly well engaging a whole host of people united towards one end.

Walkers around Calcutta's Rabindra Sarovar had grown used to being surprised by music; and from surprise it had become an indulgence. But gradually a note of disharmony crept into the proceedings...

Is it possible to do it in cold blood? The Nazis certainly did. But this? Looking into their eyes and asking them their names one by one?

The stink, the uprooted bamboos, the vegetable peels — all that is left behind once the prayers are said and the festival draws to an end

Nothing compares to the noise that Deshapriya Park was generating — an entire cement protima, and huge to boot, the goddess 88 feet tall.

A deeply-researched, semi-fictionalised account of William Sleeman’s hunt of the thugs breathes the air of pre-Mutiny central India

Confident young women defiantly run the gauntlet of life in this debut collection

A sharply-styled debut pursues a mystery in a smoggy slum, carried along on small feet

Plassey, with its web of cruelty, loot and intrigue, is relived in fresh pungency

An engaging analysis of Eastern popular culture’s ascendancy

Varying fates of the victims of a social evil

Queer, myth-based practices bring temples to life

Polite, self-effacing submission stands out in Iyer’s explication of Japan’s mystique

From petroglyphs to myths, people to climate change—a fitting history of the Himalayas

The gallows humour is dulled, but Chatterjee’s habit of framing at unusual angles helps a dark whimsy. From Thomas Roe to Art. 377, his canvas is wide.

Vidyasagar’s bust perhaps did self-destruct at the current state of affairs!