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Asha Bhosle The Original Gangster of Playback

The Original Gangster of Playback

Asha Bhosle, iconic versatile singer, redefined music across genres, languages,

The Original Gangster of Playback

Asha Bhosle, iconic versatile singer, redefined music across genres, languages,

Whoever is happy will make others happy too.

— Anne Frank

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What's New

Latest readings for today

Metropolis Musings
Editorial

Towns, cities and metropoles tend to become integral parts of the people who inhabit them.

Asha Bhosle The Original Gangster of Playback
The Original Gangster of Playback

Asha Bhosle, iconic versatile singer, redefined music across genres, languages, and generations, leaving an unmatched legacy of passion, resilience, and timeless voice.

War Without Borders The Moral Machinery of the US–Israel & Iran War 3
War Without Borders: The Moral Machinery of the US–Israel & Iran War (Part 3)

War persists through systems that normalize continuation, diffusing responsibility, shaping narratives, and quietly preparing conditions, justifications, and acceptance for future conflicts.

Rhythms of the Soil: Celebrating Bikot Kali Ma puja  in Dakshin Dinajpur
Rhythms of the Soil

A world where the mask not hide truth but reveals a deeper spiritual reality flourishing under Goddess Dapot Kali Ma.

The Charyapada
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Bengal Sketches – Mystics, Metaphors and Margins: Notes from Bengal’s First Poetic subculture

For centuries, the Charyapada remained a mere whisper in history, remembered only by scholars and monks but lost as tangible cultural artifacts.

Ustad Alla Rakha
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Timeless Heartbeat – Ustad Alla Rakha

In his teens, Alla Rakha lost his singing voice for months; frustrated and restless, he turned to the tabla.

RAINFALL
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Rainfall

First rain revives the city; alone, I drown in memory, regret, and loss - love gone, silence remains, hope fades in endless night.

Editorial: The Pomegranate & The Promise- Vol: 2

The mini-saga, as a form of fiction, was invented by British science fiction writer Brian Aldiss and popularised by The Daily Telegraph in the 1980s.

Loyalty
Loyalty

On 8 August 1942, one shot, point blank. The loyal student ensured the professor rested in peace without him suspecting a thing.

Tomorrow
Tomorrow

Every year on this day, she returned to the café and ordered his favourite – two Americanos.

The Refund
The Refund

“You’re the perfect host,” the doll whispered as Rajesh kissed its rosy cheek goodnight. He recoiled saying, “No – I’ll kill myself!”

The Return
The Return

Wishing for her late husband’s return, Emma blew out the candles – her nightly ritual. Suddenly, her bedroom door creaked open.

The Presence
The Presence

The old clock struck midnight. A nervous Lydia stood before the mirror in her dimly lit room, whispering the forbidden name.

The Echo
The Echo

He pulled the woman from the edge of the bridge. “No one left,” she sobbed, echoing his late mother’s words.

The Thank-you Note
The Thank-you Note

One day, I froze suddenly – the handwriting in that letter was identical to the daughter’s suicide note.

The Gunshot
The Gunshot

They burst in, anxious, only to find the nervous old man before his TV muttering, “Actions films scare the hell out of me, help me

The April Fool
The April Fool

Jake was ecstatic at Lily’s early morning message, “Moving to your city.” Her second message an hour later, “April Fool,” shattered his joy beyond repair.

Identity
Identity

After a successful heart transplant, Martha drifted into consciousness to her husband’s unexpectedly chilling words: “A stranger’s heart beats within my wife.”

The Care
The Care

Each morning, Karan wakes in his lonely flat to half a glass of milk and two sandwiches. His ironed shirts and polished shoes gleam with

The Moment
The Moment

All she wanted was to stretch her perfect four years longer. She wasn’t ready to let their laughter fade into memory.

The Report
The Report

Arun’s trembling hands couldn’t open the biopsy report. ‘Stage four,’ he was certain. A sudden, searing pain tore through his chest.

The Promise
The Promise

Luke, without medical insurance, mortgaged his house to fund his open-heart surgery. Mark, his idealistic friend, scoffed, “I’d rather die active – sixty’s the perfect

Reviews

Essential readings for today

Review of The Loneliness of Sunny and Sonia by Kiran Desai
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Review of The Loneliness of Sunny and Sonia by Kiran Desai

Desai rightly characterizes Salman Rushdie as an Orientalist, but in her own case, magic is not a substitute for realistic depiction.

Homebound
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HOMEBOUND (2025)

But don't let the snub tell you what this film is worth. Trophies are politics. Homebound is art.

Twin Peaks
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Twin Peaks: Return to the Dream That Never Wakes

Atmospheric analysis of Twin Peaks exploring duality, trauma, supernatural mythology, small-town secrets, and its lasting cultural impact.

Window With a Train Attached
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Window With a Train Attached by C P Surendran: A Review

Bringing together intense moments of human experience, this collection transforms memory, loss and trauma into luminous and unsettling poetic insight.

Battleship Potemkin
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The 100 Years of Battleship Potemkin – A Tribute and An Assessment

Battleship Potemkin is primarily known for its innovative film language. It became a template for filmmakers world-wide.

The Academy of Fine Arts
,
The Fine Arts of Criminology

A bold, darkly comic neo-noir where violence, wit, and subversive storytelling redefine the boundaries of modern Bengali cinema.

,

Review of The Loneliness of Sunny and Sonia by Kiran Desai

Desai rightly characterizes Salman Rushdie as an Orientalist, but in her own case, magic is not a substitute for realistic depiction.

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History & Heritage

Essential readings for today

The Charyapada
,
Bengal Sketches – Mystics, Metaphors and Margins: Notes from Bengal’s First Poetic subculture

For centuries, the Charyapada remained a mere whisper in history, remembered only by scholars and monks but lost as tangible cultural artifacts.

From Panipat to Paratha A Very Persistent Past, Mughal Legacy
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Bengal Sketches – From Panipat to Paratha: A Very Persistent Past

Mughal legacy reflects cultural exchange, shaping cuisine, architecture, language, and identity, urging plural understanding beyond politics and historical biases.

Chronicles of the Bengali Calendar
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Bengal Sketches – Chronicles of the Bengali Calendar: From Star Charts to Tax Nightmares (and Everything in Between)

The Bengali calendar evolved from astronomy and empire, aligning time with agriculture, culture, and festivals, remaining vital despite modern systems.

Chandrabati
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Bengal Sketches – Chandrabati: Bengal’s First Woman Poet Who Reclaimed the Ramayana

Her Sitayana stands out for presenting the Ramayana from a woman’s perspective, giving voice to Sita and upending a well-known story.

Good Friday: The Paradox at the Heart of Christian Faith
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Good Friday: The Paradox at the Heart of Christian Faith

Good Friday reveals a paradox: suffering becomes redemption, darkness leads to light, and sacrifice transforms grief into hope and deeper human understanding.

McLeod Rail
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When the Little Trains of Bengal Told Big Stories: The Forgotten Saga of McLeod Rail

Tiny trains stitched Bengal’s villages together—stopping for waved hands, carrying lives, memories, and a century of softly moving dreams.

,

Bengal Sketches – Mystics, Metaphors and Margins: Notes from Bengal’s First Poetic subculture

For centuries, the Charyapada remained a mere whisper in history, remembered only by scholars and monks but lost as tangible cultural artifacts.

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Transcreation

Essential readings for today

Poetry
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Beyond the Screen’s Horizon

These poems drift through lit chambers of wakefulness, dreaming of error, darkness, and the old, broken mercy of sleep.

Pablo Neruda
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Pablo Neruda: Selected Poems

Silence gathers around us, and in that pause, Pablo Neruda lets the trembling world reveal its hidden wounds and brief hopes.

Transcreation
Against the Silence: Bengali Poems of Protest and Hope

This compilation presents four major twentieth-century Bengali poets, demonstrating poetry’s role in resisting, remembering, and renewing during socio-political upheaval.

Firefly
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Firefly or Minuku Hulu by ManjuNayak Challuru

I should collect all the chits from these people so I can calculate the amount of pain in the world.

John Taylor_Franca Mancinelli_Altar at the Sea_Updatede Cover
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At the Altar of the Sea

Franca Mancinelli’s poems, in John Taylor’s translation render the ordinary, the natural, many-hued and wondrous.

Ajir Kutty Bus Stop Poem Cover
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The Bus Stop at Kandanassery and Other Poems

The poignant poems of Rafeeq Ahmed, deftly translated, touch the veins of village life at Kerala, negotiating constantly between tradition and modernity.

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Beyond the Screen’s Horizon

These poems drift through lit chambers of wakefulness, dreaming of error, darkness, and the old, broken mercy of sleep.

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Fiction and Poetry

Essential readings for today

Missing You
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Missing You

She is not here. But her smell lingers on in the bath towels...

Rabindranath Tagore
The last Flames: A Play

A play based on Rabindranath Tagore and BAsanta Koomar Roy, a US based journalist and author.

Our Old Selves

Short poem by Oishika Ray

Uncut Poetry : Calcutta – A Lover’s Epitaph

The city of Kolkata has seeped deep into Suni Bhandari making inroads into his soul. His poetry is a mere reflection of his relationship with

The Dowry (Tagore translated)

They demanded ten thousand rupees and a large number of gifts as a dowry.

Poems to Treasure

Vikram Seth became my path finder and made me the poet I am today.

The Catskill Mountains by Vir

Vir Sen paints the Catskill Mountains he visited during a recent vacation.

I Will Cross the Sea of Desires
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I Will Cross the Sea of Desires

Translated from the Bengali song by Tagore. The original song was composed at Santiniketan, in 1922.

,

The Bridge

In a small town, violence breaks bonds, but compassion restores humanity as two boys rebuild friendship across hatred, like a fragile bridge.

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Cartoons

Space Cartoon

Hey diddle diddle, we have a problem.

Videos

Essential readings for today

Ustad Alla Rakha
,
Timeless Heartbeat – Ustad Alla Rakha

In his teens, Alla Rakha lost his singing voice for months; frustrated and restless, he turned to the tabla.

William Wordsworth
,
The Daffodil Poet: William Wordsworth

Every time you step outside, feel the wind, and feel that quiet urge to just be - that’s a Wordsworthian moment. He gave that feeling

Vincent van Gogh
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Video: Echoes of a Starry Mind – Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh taught us to see the world not just as it is, but as it feels. He painted the very soul of things.

Akira Kurosawa
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Video: The Man Who Made the Rain Fall – Akira Kurosawa

In 1990, Kurosawa received an honorary Academy Award for lifetime achievement. By then, his influence stretched from Japan to Hollywood and beyond.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir
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Video: Pierre-Auguste Renoir – Birthday Tribute

Renoir admired van Gogh's passion, once saying a true painter needs a touch of madness. But they were never close friends.

J.M. Coetzee
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Video: J.M. Coetzee – Birthday Tribute

He is the programmer who cracked the code of the human condition. He is the outsider who became a central pillar of world literature.

,

Timeless Heartbeat – Ustad Alla Rakha

In his teens, Alla Rakha lost his singing voice for months; frustrated and restless, he turned to the tabla.

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Photostory

Essential readings for today

Rhythms of the Soil: Celebrating Bikot Kali Ma puja  in Dakshin Dinajpur
Rhythms of the Soil

A world where the mask not hide truth but reveals a deeper spiritual reality flourishing under Goddess Dapot Kali Ma.

Eye Love You
“Eye” Love You

Across visual art, the eye reveals emotion and truth; in street photography, fleeting glances capture honest human connection and meaning.

Echoes Along the Shoreline
Echoes Along the Shoreline

Tides paint fleeting stories on sand - gentle, fierce, human and natural - captured in golden light along Mandarmoni and Talsari shores.

Gajan - Echoes of Faith
Gajan – Echoes of Faith

Celebrated at the end of the Bengali year in West Bengal during Chaitra, it culminates on Chaitra Sankranti—the final threshold between ending and renewal.

Darjeeling
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Beauty of Darjeeling

The mall road is the place of beauty at Darjeeling where you can see multiple cultures and people together.

Koraput Tribal Haat
Ballad of the Water, the Woods & the Woman: Monsoon Haats of Koraput

This was the earliest form of Market which, through exchange of commodities and culture, used to run an economy and shape a society.

Rhythms of the Soil

A world where the mask not hide truth but reveals a deeper spiritual reality flourishing under Goddess Dapot Kali Ma.

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Games & Puzzles

Crossword 103
Crossword 102
Crossword 101

Voice & Views

Essential readings for today

Technocrat
Shining Bright: An Interview with Maitreyi Chatterjee, an Young Technocrat from Kolkata

Maitreyi is not only building safer, more trustworthy technology—she’s living proof that determination and heart can turn modest beginnings into extraordinary impact.

Tom Stoppard
,
The Playwright as an Intellectual Jester

Saikat Majumdar reflects on Tom Stoppard, theatre, postmodernism, and the personal memories that shape writing and performance.

Anuparna Roy
,
The Voice for the Unheard 

A conversation with Anuparna Roy by Surela Chakraborty, exploring her Orizzonti Best Director Award and the making of Songs of Forgotten Trees.

Frederick_Forsyth_scribles_mousumi_duttaray_10.6.2025_VB
Remembering Frederick Forsyth

I woke up to the news that Frederick Forsyth has passed away, and instantly,Life was all about sneaking thrills and chasing stories.

Arundhati_Gupta_Devicraft_Book_Review_30.5.2025VB
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Devicraft Each Stitch Tells Her Story…by a woman for the women!

It is an 18th century Pahari miniature where Lord Shiva is shown helping Parvati stitch a quilt.

Woman Artist_
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“A woman has to find her own path”

Artist Kiran Dixit, who exhibited in Kolkata recently, is the only female living disciple of Ramkinkar Baij

Shining Bright: An Interview with Maitreyi Chatterjee, an Young Technocrat from Kolkata

Maitreyi is not only building safer, more trustworthy technology—she’s living proof that determination and heart can turn modest beginnings into extraordinary impact.

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Travel

Essential readings for today

Bhutan
Blissful Bhutan: A Himalayan Secret – Part 2

A slow unfolding of mountains and myths, where faith, kings, food, and silence travel together through Bhutan’s breathing landscapes.

Bhutan
Blissful Bhutan: A Himalayan Secret – Part 1

A slow unfolding of mountains and myths, where faith, kings, food, and silence travel together through Bhutan’s breathing landscapes.

Khonoma
A Walk in the Hills: Khonoma, Nagaland’s Green Heart

As we climbed the final concrete switchback, Khonoma emerged: a green amphitheater of life, anchored by that grand church at the entrance.

Hangseshwari Temple
Hangseshwari – where tantric philosophy merge with architectural brilliance!

Hanseshwari Temple rises in lotus-like spires, blending tantric symbolism, royal history, and unforgettable architectural wonder in quiet Bansberia.

Grand Teton
Hayden Valley, Yellowstone Lake, West Thumb Geyser Basin (Part: 3)

A journey through Yellowstone and Grand Teton—where nature’s grandeur humbles the soul, blending wild beauty, geology, and quiet spiritual reflection.

Yellowstone
Grand Canyon of The Yellowstone (Part 2)

A vivid journey through Yellowstone’s grandeur, from its fiery geology to wild valleys and timeless history, where nature meets human wonder.

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