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10

A courageous newspaper editor, whose commitment to his home state of Maharashtra has never been in doubt was attacked last week at his home by fellow Maharashtrians. His windows were broken, his doorway was tarred and stones were hurled into his rooms. All for writing an editorial suggesting that the glory of Maharashtra cannot be achieved by the proposed plan to build an expensive 309-foot tall statue of Shivaji in the Arabian Sea. Instead, the editor wrote, the government should provide jobs and alleviate farmers' misery. For writing this Kumar Ketkar was attacked by thugs from a little known group called the Shiv Sangram Sangathan. Alas, Ketkar should have known better. He should have known that in India statues are holy cows to be worshipped. Ketkar was writing about life, but our politics is increasingly about death. Death that is celebrated, death that is as cold and as....

The rise of the tropical modern

10

When Kareena Kapoor attained "size sero", there were fears of an apocalypse of suicidal dieting among young Indian women. Instead our level-headed behenji brigade (with the exception of a few airheads) said they-and their gentlemen- preferred breasty and curvy instead. While the ravages of anorexia and heroin chic blitzkrieg through Western womanhood, Kareena Kapoor's dietician, confirmed that her thin-ness had been achieved not by heroin but by eating aloo paratha and paneer. Thin for us desis has never meant self-destruction. Instead, when the Indian woman gets thin, more often than not, she's still managed to sneak in a little bit of paapri chaat. India is never far away from our west-inspired fitness. At weddings, birthdays, award ceremonies and anniversaries, the sari has never been more chic. The blouses may show off swathes of pretty alabaster backs, necklines may plunge, cutaway sleeves might display newly waxed arms. But the good....