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An interview with myself: On “Citizen of Paradise”, a travel book of love and hope – Sabith khan
Who or what is the Citizen of Paradise ? What prompted you to write it ? Sabith khan : The Citizen of Paradise, is a novel. A work of fiction, which can be considered a “travel book of love”, because it is about movement, of the protagonist, both physically and emotionally. It is a […]
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My Wish list on India’s Independence Day
What do I wish for my country on its Independence day ( Aug 15th ?). Well, a few things come to mind – as I look at my country from the outside. Having lived outside the country for over 4 yrs now, I have firmly established myself as a Non-Resident Indian ( some would […]
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5 Lessons for Norway from India’s model of multi-culturalism
What can Norway learn from India ? Well, not much, some would argue. Norway is among the richest countries in the world while India is home to more poor people ( 421 million poor people) than the entire continent of Africa put together[i] (400 million). Despite the obvious and glaring differences, there are similar challenges […]
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MENASA ?
The Acronym dictionary defines MENASA as – Middle East, North Africa and South Asia. When you google it, MENSA throws up. Not a very smart acronym, this one. But try harder, and you will find the definition for it. A new acronym. A fad. A smart ( and pretentious) way to club together groups of […]
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Dalai Lama: Achieving world peace through inner peace
On the west lawn of the US Capitol Hill, this Saturday, people celebrated something very unique: Peace. With the spiritual leader Dalai Lama leading the dialogue, it turned out to be one of the most inspiring talks that I have heard in a long time. His key message was this: We can achieve world peace […]
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The challenge of writing about India
An impossibly hard task – how do people do it ? I will start with a confession : This blog post is one of the hardest that I have written so far. Not because I don’t know much about my country of origin, but precisely because of it. India is such a complex, vast, diverse […]
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Is this really a social media revolution ?
Is this really a social media revolution ? “Egypt is on the lower end of face book penetration in the Arab world at 7.66 per cent, whereas the UAE, at the highest, is at 50 per cent” says a recent report on social media usage by the Dubai School of Government ( DSG). Having managed […]
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A heady week ahead for Middle East peace – time for the US to act ?
With President’s speeches out of the way, there seems to be much to look forward to this coming week in the realm of Middle East peace. The first speech on thursday, which failed to live up to the expectations of Cairo speech, is seen by most analysts as damp, weak and ineffectual. The second speech […]
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Q and A with Riz Khan, Anchor at Al –Jazeera English
It is not everyday that you get to meet your childhood hero. To me, Riz Khan has always been a role-model and continues to do the kind of work that I would love to do, though in a different format. Even though I am a bit star-struck by him, I managed an interview about an […]
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Today, I became an Indian – yet again.
2 April 2011 is a historic day in my life. India has won the Cricket world cup today and I am a new revert. A revert to being completely and truly Indian. There are few things that can define an Indian identity. To be an Indian in the year 2011, it would seem reasonable to […]
