All Stories

Jenny wants to Sing

Jenny wants to Sing

The song draws to a close. We are a small group sitting, mostly cross legged, on the floor of a ...
Read More
Bakshi Barir Pujo: An Old Custom and its Storied History

Bakshi Barir Pujo: An Old Custom and its Storied History

The penchant for witnessing a traditional ’bonedi-bari’An aristocratic home, associated with traditionally refined landowning familiesDurga pujaThe autumnal festival dedicated to ...
Read More
An Iconoclast, a trailblazer, my mother Padma

An Iconoclast, a trailblazer, my mother Padma

She is an iconoclast, a trailblazer and a lot of things put together. She is also my mother. Fifty years ...
Read More
Love, Loss and Objects from the Past

Love, Loss and Objects from the Past

Smile - and the world smiles with you. Grieve - and you grieve alone. These had been the words I had ...
Read More
The Mere Tale of an Er....

The Mere Tale of an Er….

'Everyone thinks that they have the best dog and none of them is wrong' On one rainy day, the tiny ...
Read More
Fight, My Beloved Country

Fight, My Beloved Country

Call it a woman’s intuition, but for a week I had been fearful that something was about to happen. I ...
Read More
My life with Baba

My life with Baba

I have always been proud to be my Baba’s daughter. I do not have his  outstanding intellect or his ability ...
Read More
The Tragedy of the Roy Choudhurys

The Tragedy of the Roy Choudhurys

In 1946, a year before the Partition and Independence of India, I was a young seven year old girl living ...
Read More
Crossing the World's Most Dramatic Border

Crossing the World’s Most Dramatic Border

It's the world's most dramatic border. A nation cruelly divided as the British quit the subcontinent in 1947. Portraits of ...
Read More
Of festive feastings, not fastings

Of festive feastings, not fastings

My earliest memory of Dashami (the last day of the Durga Puja festivities) is sitting on the terrace under the ...
Read More
Bijoya: Sadness and Longing

Bijoya: Sadness and Longing

“I will return here once more, by the bank of Dhansiri, to this Bengal”  Jibananda Das          ...
Read More
Haunting Memories

Haunting Memories

When I joined Bird & Co. in 1960, there were 8 jute mills under its control. One of the mills, ...
Read More