OPEN Magazine

Monday, 20 May 2013

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Features
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The hilarious case of Avatar Tulsi

The Ramayana essay that Delhi University banned

The man who survived 42 hours trapped in a lift

The hypocrisy of Indian fashion designers

The fraud of Vedic maths

The making of Baba Ramdev

The mystery of the leopard that was not

under Pallavi Polanki

Porn Unfreed

After the fiasco over Savita Bhabhi, the illustrated porn website that got banned, the Maharashtra government is threatening another round of censorship, this time a blanket one. Maharashtra Minister of State for Home Ramesh Bagwe announced in the Legislative Council that the government was considering a ban on porn sites. This comes in the light of an Army officer caught uploading clippings of child pornography. The state machinery says it has started a clampdown, with night patrolling of cyber cafes and police training on cyber crimes.

9 Aug 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

Revolutionary Road

A fact-finding team from the Human Rights Lawyers Network visited Jharkhand, a state where Operation Green Hunt is underway. An inside view of such a mission.

30 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

Electric Clothing!

A 21-year-old from Varanasi has designed an electric device that can be attached to shirts and jeans.

29 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

To Beef or Not to Beef

Holy cow! The BJP wailed. No beef on the Commonwealth Games (CWG) menu, it had demanded of Suresh Kalmadi, Chairman of the CWG Organising Committee.

23 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

India’s Next Gen Harvard Professor

Gita Gopinath is the first Indian woman to be granted tenure as a professor at the university’s economics department. A true inspiration

22 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

Men Who Cry

The men’s movement in India has gathered speed. Time to look at who they are and what they are about.

15 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

Your e-Passport is Here

As the mammoth task of issuing unique identification numbers gets underway, the less ambitious and long-awaited e-passport scheme seems to be ready for take-off.

12 Jul 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

The House of Dimming Halos

David Davidar was the superstar of Indian publishing. Now sexual harassment charges by a former colleague threaten his career, and his reputation.

18 Jun 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

Untouchability Declassified

Discrimination is a dynamic industry in India. A survey recorded an astonishing 80-odd practices of untouchability—new, bizarre, vintage.

10 Jun 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

No Entry for Females

The Union Public Service Commission likes to tell it like it is. Are we surprised?

10 Jun 2010 | BY Pallavi Polanki

most commented this month

Rape at Home

The trial of a French Consulate employee, accused of raping his minor daughter, has begun in Bangalore. His wife Suja Jones speaks to Open

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Aimee Ginsburg

The Man Who is Afraid of a Skullcap

Two books on Narendra Modi establish why it is silly to hope that the bigot will ever be any less bigoted

Hartosh Singh Bal

Waiting for Deliverance

What families in Haryana will do to have a son. A witness’ account

Ruhani Kaur

IN Lounge > Arts

REPURPOSED, UNFINISHED: As the performance progresses, Chopra transforms from an austere figure standing out in white against the bare concrete walls of an unused space in a half-empty mall to a dark shadow, blackened and enervated by the labour of recreating a remembered Saket (BLACKENING V, 2013/KIRAN NADAR MUSEUM OF ART | PHOTOS: SAHEJ RAHAL/COSTUME: LOIS BRAGANZA)

Inside Out Artist

Nikhil Chopra redraws history in performance

BY Divya Saxena

IN Lounge > Books

Selasi’s storytelling only bears fruit when you allow yourself to be rocked by the sometimes choppy wave motion of her prose—gushes, pull-backs, slowly building undercurrents—and surrender to the way she plays fast and loose with punctuation and sentence-structure.

Nothing Lush, Soft or Verdant

Taiye Selasi’s first novel runs circles around the ‘African story’ you’re used to

BY Devika Bakshi

IN Lounge > Cinema

That’s the thing about Mithun. He is not ‘cool’ like the English-speaking Amitabh.(Photo: DINODIA)

The Poor Man’s Pop Star

For years, Mithun Chakraborty has been a victim of elite prejudice—what multiplex goers call a ‘downmarket’ star.

BY Shaikh Ayaz

IN Lounge > Science

The study can perhaps also explain why individuals prefer one piece of music over another.

The Seduction of Music

Listening to what you like activates a part of your brain linked with good food and sex

IN Lounge > Www

The time it took to try cheating, by altering the ‘settings’, is enough to make one consider the consequences of doing so and decide against it.

Addicted to the Net?

If you are wasting too much time on ‘interesting’ sites, let this browser manage your time.

BY Avinash Subramaniam

Public Opinion
The Unreliable Source

The second rung of the Congress party, where there is much jostling for power, is the origin of some of the most ridiculous political spin in recent times

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On the Contrary
The All-Seeing Eye

What cases of police personnel getting caught on camera hitting women say about a welcome new world in the making

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ARM’S LENGTH
That Fizzling Sound

As cola drinks are shunned by health junkies

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THROWAWAY
The Bungle Jumble Party

God’s gift to the Congress

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RELOAD
Eternal Tales in The Electronic Age

The first act of Amar Chitra Katha’s rescue is over. The brand has survived. But Act Two will be tricky

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Doosra
The Khan Who Couldn’t

Nawaz Sharif’s party won a near majority in Pakistan’s National Assembly. But it was Imran Khan’s campaign that animated the polls

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HAZARD
Poison in Paradise

How burning garbage and indiscriminate quarrying on the coast could spell the death of the Andaman Islands

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True Life
Just Another Massacre

Sinam Ongbi Chandrajini lost children in a massacre in Malom in 2000. It was the horror of this incident that led Irom Sharmila to begin her fast against AFSPA

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WHISTLE BLOW
Collateral Clean-Up

It may not entirely be a sense of duty that is motivating CBI Director Ranjit Sinha

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COOL-OFF
Inside Scoop

The joys of artisanal ice-cream

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Outrage
Case No. 1

Azad Khan, 12, was shot in Manipur, allegedly for being an insurgent. This was one of six extra judicial killings

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Divine
The Devil in a God-fearing Home

The parents of S Sreesanth, a devout couple, might be thinking even god can't help their son now.

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