nightlifemumbai

- By Deepa Krishnan These days I am enjoying my forays into academic research.  Economic Times The first research project  I did was on the impact of demonetization on families living in slums. It got significant coverage in the Economic Times, trending as Top News on their website. It was also in the Top 10 daily list among the articles on the Social Science Research Network (SSRN). For a rookie researcher, this is very encouraging! The second research project (group photo below) is about the economic rationale for giving legal title to slum families. In this photo, you can see our field researchers are being trained in how to collect data. They are college students, who live in low-income/slum neighbourhoods; so they have access to the types of families we want to interviw. Students who live in different wards of Mumbai These research projects are part of my  "Earn while you Learn" scheme for students. Data collection doesn't interfere with college lectures, and is the ...

- by Deepa Krishnan Today I went to the independence day celebrations at my school. And I learnt what freedom means. The girls from my school presented an energetic, physically demanding - and very liberating show. The audience - students ranging from 5 years to 15 years - shouted out their encouragement. The mutual energy was infectious and electrifying. In an exhilarating flash, I realised something: this generation of girls has a sense of personal body freedom that my generation simply did not have. We would not have leaped with so much abandon. We would not have tossed our heads back and postured so defiantly; and if we had indeed done so, I don't know if the audience would have cheered us on so wildly. The background music was a patriotic song - a soldier's song, a man's song, really. But the girls gave it their own interpretation. My photos really don't do justice to what I saw. These girls were not doing the usually Bollywood dances with sexualised poses. They ...

- by Deepa Krishnan These days we're doing a training / sensitization series at my office. It is a summer program for young people who work in the tourism industry in Mumbai. We're discussing a wide range of topics - caste, gender, education, legal system, history, architecture, and so on. The idea is to help these students speak with some level of depth about these issues. They meet and interact with many tourists each month - so it is very useful for them. I have myself also been enjoying these discussions on social, economic and political issues. And I'm looking forward to more of them. We have three interns this year, students from St Xavier's College (including my daughter Aishwarya!). They're helping to research topics and they're conducting the sessions. I'm the moderator, sort of. There is lots of participation. I love the dynamics, and especially I love way learning works when there's discussion and fun, and most importantly, when everyone ...

- by Deepa Krishnan I went to Bandra yesterday to see an exhibition of photographs clicked by children in Dharavi. I confess I did not expect much. But I was blown away by what I saw. The first thing I realised is that this is a very different sort of story-telling: it is an inside and intensely personal viewpoint, rather than an outsider's temporary peek into Dharavi (which is what you usually see in the press).  The second thing I realised is that the photos themselves set a high aesthetic standard. Meaning, it is not a bleeding heart exhibit where you put up with poor output simply because of the background of the artists. They don't have the slickness of professional photographers, yes, but they are very good. Third, I couldn't help responding to the sheer emotion in the photos. They go straight to the heart of the subject. Perhaps this kind of directness can only come from children. There is innocence, grace, beauty and the sheer magic of childhood shining through th...

- By Aishwarya Pramod The school bell rings one last time signalling the end of classes, and food vendors outside school get ready for a rush of orders. Bhel, frankie, pakora, dabeli, vada pav, bhajiya pav, sandwiches, groundnuts, and singhara are some of what's generally offer, depending on the day of the week and the vendors in the area. And inevitably there is one thela selling amla, kairi, starfruit, bor, imli, and other sour treats.                                   Schoolgirl at thela Up until I was about 12, I was a goody-two-shoes who made a beeline for home straight after school - not looking at a single food stall. But a friend of mine who was crazy about kairi eventually began dragging me after school everyday to see whether the thela-wala had come that day. Pretty soon, I was hooked to kairi and amla (with salt and enough red chilli powder to set my tongue on fire). And this was someone who'...