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India

A collection of 26 issues

Bijli, Sadak, Makaan: Art at the Crossroads of Infrastructure and Culture

The questions that Ashok Sukumaran asks of us are, to say the least, unusual. The way he asks them is more unusual still. Yet these are questions that are uniquely applicable to India â€“ especially an India that is in the throes of globalization and a technological revolution. Mr. Sukumaran,

Thwarting Failure in South Asia

Six South Asian countries are among the 25 states likeliest to fail on the “Failed States Index”, co-created by Foreign Policy magazine and The Fund for Peace. The same six countries – Afghanistan, Pakistan, Burma, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka – (in the same order) were also featured amongst the top 25

Waxing poetic

“India has a growing middle class estimated at 300 million people.” Emily Wax 300 million is an astounding figure and just a shade below the US population. If indeed India has a “growing” middle class that is 300 million strong, then the US and the rest of the world better

Selected Ethnography of Marketing in India

Biscuits (cookies) in India are marketed for their glucose shakti (power), bathing soaps for their ability to get rid of germs, hair oil for its efficaciousness in keeping the lice away, and a “fair and lovely” cream for its eponymous abilities (fair=lovely). We have popular biscuits made by Britannia,

What Does it Mean to be Literate in India?

A country hailed internationally for its engineers is also home to about a third of the world’s illiterates (UNESCO, 2000). The Indian government defines literacy as the ability to read and write, which is similar to UNICEF’s definition. The 2001 census put India’s literacy rate at 65.

Piracy, the Real Mantra Behind Indian Success

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) ran an opinion piece yesterday arguing that India is “rapidly evolving into Asia’s innovation center” and “leaving China in the dust” because of its famed intellectual property regime. Not only is the claim patently bogus, but the opposite—that the Indian innovation is surviving