Romal Laisram caught up with Rohini Divakar at her residence in Chennai for a long conversation about her inspiring story — one that we were really keen to discover. Here are excerpts from that conversation… What prompted you to join the IRS? I was always...
HOW WOULD YOU DEFINE YOURSELF? I’m an everyday woman. Basically a fun, straightforward person. THE FIRST THING YOU DO WHEN YOU WAKE UP? Search for my misplaced phone on my bed. LAST THING YOU DO BEFORE YOU SLEEP? Unfortunately I do the same morning routine...
How would you define yourself? I’m a fiercely ambitious guy who’s trying to be the best version of myself; a cinema fanatic; love travelling, riding and driving; a guy driven by integrity and a sane presence of mind; I’m always positive; I am a nature...
What got you into designing? I am a business graduate. My family and friends including myself never thought I’d get into designing, but I always was inclined towards the arts since I was a kid. My mother accidently introduced me to interior designing and I...
Jigar Pala could have coasted along, doing what he already did: he could run his little Brahmin Udupi eatery in a small suburb of Mumbai, making a decent living, serving food he has served for decades, food his father served for decades before him. On...
These days nationalism seems to be the ‘in’ thing. What with current trends and the way the world around us abounds with deshbhakti for all the wrong things — India seems to be suffering from a sense of amnesia, or at least a part of...
What is Ashika Rangnath like off the camera? Actually, the only difference is that I’m extremely talkative off camera. When I’m on the set, I usually keep to myself and don’t talk much. But when I’m in my comfort zone with friends and family off...
When news broke last year that Kevin Joseph, a 23-year-old dalit Christian youngster had been killed by the family of his newlywed wife Neenu, Malayalis didn’t initially suspect that it was a case of ‘honour killing’. They had associated the term mostly with villages in...
Calcutta in the 1880s —cultural, artistic, revolutionary. A well-connected class and caste of reformers made waves through India, and the Indian revolution, for generations. One small part of this story, lost in our revolutionary nostalgia, is the nascent formations of the Indian circus — specifically,...
It was one of those rainy nights during the Mumbai monsoon, the sky outside seemed angry with the city… thunder, lightning, trees falling, random politico-religious songs playing in the background — you get the picture, right? Somewhere in some part of this large metropolis a...
