Flashback

As we celebrate Parsi New Year today, think about this. You cannot imagine modern India without the Parsis. The second president of the Indian National Congress was Dadabhai Naoroji. In 1971, Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw liberated Bangladesh from Islamabad’s oppressive rule. Soli Sorabjee, a legendary lawyer was a torch bearer for freedom of expression and...

SDGs were adopted on 25th September 2015 in Paris where 193 countries, including India, ratified and signed the convention to accomplish 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with its 169 targets by 2030. The goals take a pragmatic approach to achieve sustainable growth at all levels of the social, economic and environmental dimensions of the...

India is home to one-sixth of the world’s people and is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. It is the second most populous country and is on course to becoming the most populous in less than a decade. While its per-capita emissions are amongst the lowest in the world, India...

The ear-attacking sound of chalk on a blackboard. The woody scent of pencil-sharpener dust. The tattered pages of old schoolbooks. The arresting light of an overhead projector. These are just some of the classroom flukes that 21st-century students may never experience. Instead in Smart Classrooms, there will be the speed of the internet, the...

Earth Overshoot Day is the day that marks excessive resource consumption beyond what Earth can sustainably renew in an entire year. This year on the day (August 1), humans will have already used up resources allotted for this entire year, and for the rest of the year, and would be running in debt of...

In an earlier column, Anirban Ghosh, Chief Sustainability Officer, Mahindra Group, shared the need to shape urban spaces sustainably. As a follow up, here he elaborates on how cities across the world are pushing the agenda of being sustainable. Reliable utility services such as electricity, water, handling waste and providing transport services are an essential...

As shocking as it sounds, gambling could soon become legit. The Law Commission, in a report to the government, has recommended legalising sports betting and gambling. With the greater acceptance of liberal values in India, it’s harder to support a moralistic ban. The role of gambling in revenue generation is not new, even during Kautilya's...

Think of a Premier League game, any premier league game from last season. When the players are walking into the stadium, there’s one accessory ― in the case of many, it will resonate with almost any of us; it’s their headphones. This isn’t isolated to footballers only. Rather, it’s a ritual that is embedded...

It is not a fight for equal rights for the members of LGBTQ community. It is a fight for equal rights for all human beings. The LGBTQ community is one of the most repressed communities in many countries including India. India acknowledged its transgender population for the first time in 2011 census. According to the...

If you’re the fortunate one to be the parent (or guardian) of a girl child under 10, put the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana at the top of your investment priority list. The government has slashed the minimum annual deposit requirement for accounts under the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana to INR 250 from INR 1,000 earlier, a...

A minor girl gets raped by 17 men over several months in India. A minor boy commits suicide because he got raped by a neighbor. A girl’s father gets killed who fights for to get justice for his daughter who had gotten raped by an influential person. There has been a rise in number...

India is one of the only countries in the world to regulate Corporate Social Responsbility (CSR) under the Companies Act, 2013. The law provides a framework to address various developmental challenges. Specifically, 11 areas are listed as eligible developmental activities where a company can spend its CSR money. Companies with a net worth of...