Court narrates a compelling story and evolves into a hard-hitting realistic portrayal of the Indian legal system. Shoma Chatterji reviews the film with a deep exploration of all that sets it apart from a regular courtroom drama.

Shoma Chatterji talks about caste and the portrayal of Dalit in Hindi cinema beginning with Bombay Talkies Achhut Kannya (1936) to Bimal Roy’s Sujata (1959) followed by many mainstream films, and the small-budget, low-key ones which have focused on this significant social issue in the past so many years.

Debaranjan Sarangi, a documentary film maker, writer and human rights activist was arrested recently in Kashipur, Odisha. Shoma Chatterji writes about Sarangi's arrest, his activism and his films which deal with Adivasis and their struggles.

The tremendous rage against Pahlaj Nihalani around the Udta Punjab (2016) issue finally resolved by the High Court gives a reason to revisit some memorable deletions and suggestions made by the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) over the years, says Shoma Chatterji.

Manhole is a scathing celluloid indictment on the state of manual sewer cleaners in India, writes Shoma A. Chatterji.

Shunyota, a feature film in Bengali, has an all-India resonance that will echo across the country if and when it’s subtitled version will be screened, writes Shoma Chatterji.

4 Tamarinds and Toffees is a delightful and nostalgic film on two women directed by a young and thoughtful director, writes Shoma Chatterji.

The tragic reversal of roles is the result of national policies that have neglected agriculture and farming in the wake of globalisation, says Devinder Sharma.

Science's biggest tragedy, as we are reminded by the Columbia disaster, is that truly independent criticism is simply gone from its midst, says Devinder Sharma.

Developing countries must take a collective stand on 'Zero-Tolerance to Subsidies' to protect their agriculture, says Devinder Sharma.

Has the introduction of Bt Cotton been successful? The deliberate attempt to find a "yes" answer has required a lot of incredulous 'science', says Devinder Sharma.

With the 2003-4 budget giving agriculture the go-by, Devinder Sharma outlines five criteria that nation's finance minister must keep in mind while crafting budgetary policy for agriculture.

The concerns of Third World citizens have been routinely overlooked - until now, i.e., as technologies developed for animals are conveniently passed off as adequate for the world's poor as well, says Devinder Sharma.

Biofortification is no cure for hunger. Devinder Sharma says boosting nutrients in various crops isn't going to make them any more affordable for the poor.

The negative terms of trade against agriculture have to be turned around if the country is keen to emerge from the hunger and poverty trap, says Devinder Sharma.
Q&A on the Minimum Support Pricing policy

A new publication from the Delhi-based Forum for Biotechnology & Food Security. (40 pages)

Removal of agricultural subsidies should be a pre-requisite to further movement on the WTO agricultural negotiations, says Devinder Sharma.

If you raise the price of your product and offer a discount on the higher price, some people will get taken in by such 'sales'. The WTO has just pulled off this kind of scheme, says Devinder Sharma.

Compare the cost of agriculture subsidies to government salaries or the cost of farm policies that favour imports over domestic produce, to separate reality from rhetoric, says Devinder Sharma.

Devinder Sharma points out the deeper flaws in the thinking behind Budget 2004-5.

According to the European Union's plans for agricultural reforms, subsidies received by farmers will now become their entitlement until 2013. The big businesses that get most of these subsidies are quite happy; meanwhile the subsidies continue to create starvation and death in the developing world, notes Devinder Sharma.

Eight months before the upcoming WTO ministerial of December 2005, prominent economists are closing ranks to dwarf sustained criticism of agricultural subsidies in developed nations. Devinder Sharma asserts that the continued undermining of food self-sufficiency in developing nations is economic lunacy.

President Kalam's vision for rural development is at odds with Ashutosh Gowariker's Swades where Shah Rukh Khan charts a simple location-specific path to village development. The two different routes to the same objective bring out the conflict in our understanding of the rural crisis, says Devinder Sharma.

With an estimated 24,000 people succumbing globally to hunger every day, more than 120 million people could perish by the year 2015 from this shameful scourge. In Gleneagles, however, the leaders of the world's richest economies did not even provide lip-service to the hungry and malnourished, Devinder Sharma writes.

How can 'drastic cuts' in trade subsidies lead to no reduction? Simple: fudge the language. Economic jugglery and clever wording cannot, however, conceal the horrible effects of US and EU subsidies on livelihoods and food security in the developing world. Devinder Sharma urges the G-20 to simplify the terms of trade.

For the sixth time in a row, the trade ministers of the developing world have been duped to believe that agricultural trade is for development. Despite making loud noises and fuming over injustice, the faulty framework that underlies the WTO remains very much in place, says Devinder Sharma.

What is it like to be a modern-day Indian prince? Devinder Sharma and Bhaskar Goswami explain how, with the proliferation of Special Economic Zones everywhere, the laws of the land are being redefined to bring in the reality of the royal tag for the rich and beautiful. For the rest of the country, sub-Saharan Africa is the only comparison.

For 40 years, nearly 17 million cotton growers have been subsidising the textile industry. If only these farmers had got the right price for the cotton they produced, the number of their suicides would have been far less. Instead, cotton prices have been on a steady decline thereby acerbating the farm crisis, writes Devinder Sharma.

In clear disregard for the ongoing multilateral negotiations, the United States is attempting to protect its already heavily fortified agriculture further. The House of Representatives passed the US Farm Bill 2007 in July, proposing 286 billion dollars of support for American farmers over the next five years. Devinder Sharma on the implications.

With 60 per cent of India's population directly engaged in agriculture, and another 200 million landless workers indirectly banking on farming, the real stimulus to the economy can come only if the focus shifts to agriculture, says Devinder Sharma.

Business honchos are descending on the rural markets, expecting to make a killing from whatever is left in the pockets of India's poor, led by an NCAER forecast of robust sales growth here, writes Devinder Sharma.

It is ironic that 'Conservation Agriculture' the new wave from agriculture scientists, requires so much new technology, and focuses so little on existing traditional knowledge of conservation techniques, writes Devinder Sharma.

The television cameras and news reports tell us how dramatic the India Against Corruption campaign's rise to national consciousness has been. The story of how it unfolded is even more interesting, writes Devinder Sharma.

The real reason behind the Congress' performance in the recently concluded Assembly Elections may not be the rise of the Aam Aadmi Party per se, but more the economic concerns of the real aam aadmi. Devinder Sharma analyses.

Though FDI in retail is being projected as a cure-all for the ills in the agriculture and food sector, Devinder Sharma cites examples from the world over to argue why we should not be pinning our hopes on it.

The depressing sameness of the days for those locked-in as the epidemic rages, is relieved only by the 24X7 flow of electricity – the juice that keeps us all connected, informed, entertained and as summer...

Amidst this anomalous global pandemic, as the whole world wars against a sinuously strong, mutating virus what has metamorphosed is the human spirit. Whether it is a housewife who files her first writ petition to...

Mother is prowling around the house like an overzealous detective looking for clues of my ineptitude as a homemaker. This is an old habit. In the past, when I once asked her to babysit while...

I turn 50 this week!!! Yup! Half a century on this planet! Not exactly the sparkling celebration I thought I’d have, given the lockdown and social distancing, but it’s certainly going to memorable with its...

Aaaah! Rejoice… love is in the air…and it is beating the virus! Let’s unashamedly swoon over the parallel ‘love tracks’ of these two ‘Lockdown relationships’ — one featuring a 51-year-old, world famous, London-based scientist, the...

At a time when the government should be deeply troubled by the coronavirus pandemic and devising long-term health strategies, its inner circles are busy planning the upgrade of Parliament House and the Central Vista. But...

India’s lockdown has been eased by dividing the country into red, orange and green zones, with high, medium and minimal infections so far, and correspondingly tough curbs on economic activity. This can at best be...

One of the unprepared-for aspects of the continuing lockdown was the 40-day prohibition of over-the-counter sale of alcohol. To complain about its unavailability while people are fighting for lives and livelihoods would be, at best,...

The same qualities that make a woman a good mother, make her a better CEO too! A mirror was held up to me in a rather rude awakening just one day after I spoke passionately...

Pakistan has decided to lift lockdown to kick-start its tottering economy. The growth engine of Pakistan’s economic revival is powered by CPEC, flagship project of the Belt Road Initiative (BRI). It is tempting to conjure...

On 10 th of May, 1857 the Ghadar started. A group of Indian sepoys in employment of the ‘honourable’ British East India Company revolted in Meerut, killed its English officers and marched on Delhi. They...

India’s unemployment rate jumped to 27.1% from 8.4% as per the latest report by CMIE. The numbers in USA are 16.1% & 30 million folks unemployed, that’s close to ten percent of the American population…...

The Uttar Pradesh government’s retributive approach to tackling the coronavirus outbreak is dangerously counterproductive. Its intention to firm up the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, merely needed a law to protect doctors, nurses and health workers...

Coronavirus lockdowns and travel restrictions have forced people around the world to delay their nuptials or adapt to the unusual times by celebrating via web link. But in China -- where livestreaming is extremely popular -- some young couples are allowing anyone to watch their big day and even send them gifts.

When an advertising professional starts to tell the India Story, expect an interesting take. Chief strategy officer at Bates 141 India, Dheeraj Sinha, says in the introduction to "Consumer India" that his account is "from the playing field, not the sidelines."