Here is a story I wrote with Andrew Buncombe on this month’s blasts in Mumbai. It was published in the Independent of London. The spectre of terror and violence returned to India’s financial capital yesterday as three explosions were set off within a matter of minutes, killing at least 21 people and injuring more than 140. […]
Category Archives: International
MUMBAI, India — A beautiful blonde South African cheerleader came to India, dazzled cricket fans with her glamorous looks and fancy moves, and partied with the players after games. But then, and here was her fatal flaw, she blogged about it. The Indian Premier League (IPL) reportedly fired the young woman, Gabriella Pasqualotto, and sent […]
MUMBAI, India — Over the past few years, Somali pirates have posed a bigger and bigger challenge to India, disrupting its trade, capturing its merchants, attacking closer to its shores and — like a game of Calvinball — changing the unwritten rules as they go. But India will not give up. Faced with a growing […]
MUMBAI, India — Covered from head to toe, the women stood separate from the men and in many ways acted out traditions common to all Muslims. They prayed in Arabic and beat their chests. Thousands of Dawoodi Bohra Muslim women cried as their leader, Syedna Mohammed Burhanuddin, spoke on the occasion of his 100th birthday at […]
MUMBAI, India — Subash and Vimal Barve live in a 200-square-foot shack deep in the slums of Ghatkopar East, a suburb of Mumbai. Outside their home, rats run over broken cement slabs and children pick through a fly-infested dump that ends at the couple’s doorstep. Inside, Vimal prepares a pot of chai as Subash, blind and HIV […]
MUMBAI, India – Nearly four decades ago a janitor at a Mumbai hospital raped a young nurse, strangling her with a dog chain. The nurse, Aruna Shanbaug, plunged into a vegetative state from which she never recovered. Thirty-seven years later, the courts say she could be allowed to die — should those who care for […]
An exhibition featuring the work of India’s first female photojournalist is showing at the National Gallery of Modern Art through April 11. The collection of about 150 photographs by Homai Vyarawalla includes images of the last days of the British Empire, the Indian Independence movement and the birth and subsequent struggles of a new nation. […]
MUMBAI, India — “Chai Baby,” “Baby Masala” and “Made in India.” These are a few of the many blogs written by infertile Westerners trying to start a family through surrogacy in India. For the most part, the blogs tell tales of frustration, nervous anticipation and joy. Commercial surrogacy has boomed in recent years as a […]
MUMBAI, India — A poor girl in northern India is a member of the lowest caste. She winds up in jail after fleeing her alleged rapists. These alleged rapists are powerful men. What are the odds the story gets better from here? Slim, to say the least. “Here child marriage is rampant, abuse of minor […]
Presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain talk a lot about the Iraq War. They talk about troop withdrawals, permanent bases, legal battles over Guantanamo detainees. But then there’s everything else they rarely if ever mention – for example, the entire humanitarian crisis caused by the war. There are now more than 4 million Iraqis […]