By Satya Sagar. Rafi Saab. Not out at 100: The voice that taught us not just how to fall in love — but how to live.

By Monita Soni. Love had changed. Become deep. Wistful. Shifting in shape.

By Ramsharan Joshi. The libraries in these schools are extraordinary. Public libraries offer memberships to 6-month-old babies! I saw this in Edmonton, the capital of Alberta, Canada. Even 4th and 5th graders are used to ‘heavy books’. In summer, children are encouraged to read and write, and discover their  independent minds.

By Narendra Pachkhede. His music was steeped in jazz and cabaret; his dialogue was in the Beiruti dialect, his wit was mordant. He wrote not of cedars but of unpaid rent, not of timeless landscapes, but of shifting alliances. He did not so much mock Lebanon’s hypocrisies as make them speak.

By Arjun Janah. But, still, be gentle with yourself.

Ayasha Kaur. People have been so afraid of educating their daughters because they would say, “If tomorrow daughters become educated, they will write letters to boys.” This exposes the inherent fears of this patriarchal society. This means that if girls become educated, they will fight for their rights, they will take their rights themselves, they will not need to become dependent on anyone.

By Binu Mathew. Yes, we are Davids facing Goliath with just a stone in our hands. At first glance, we are destined to fail. But if we act collectively, we can win.

By Ratna Raman. Mangoes breathe life and meaning into the summer season. Mango ice cream, mango shake, and kulfi remain perennial favourites. The avant garde are spoilt for choice with desserts such as mango soufflés, mango cheesecake, plain mango cakes, mango yoghurt, mango jellies, jujubes, sandwiches and more. Mango jam, mango toffee, mango burfee, mango, halwa, mango kheer, mangoes in cream, are eternally delicious household visitors. Mango is the Queen.

By Aayushi Rana. Rakhi has always been described as a thread of protection, of love, of belonging. But what happens when the ritual remains, and the emotion feels absent? This year, I found myself asking that question.

By Rakhshanda Jalil. Read this book, maybe not from cover from cover, but dip into it in no particular order, perusing the stories included here one at a time at your leisure allowing their full import to sink in. Read it for its affirmation of the ‘idea’ of India that is under threat, yes, but is not fully effaced. Read it also for its robust assertion that the Urdu language is alive and well, and yes, Urdu is not the language of the Indian Muslims, alone.

Raju Mansukhani. 60 rich years of the Museum Society of Mumbai: Knowledge, culture, aesthetics. An intense labour of love. A report.

By R Kalpana The stance on divorce, however, is slightly different, and creates curiosity. This is because I know many couples who have divorced, then got back, divorced again, and got back. These things are best left unanswered and not analysed too much, because even if you ask the questions, they really do not have any answers.

By Tathagata Chatterjee. Filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt once said, nations aren’t built by borders -- they’re held together by stories. And Sholay is one of those stories.

By Uttara and Sudarshan Shidore. To mark 50 years of the greatest entertainer, blockbuster, and the most successful Hindi film ever made, here's a quiz on the film, designed by Uttara and Sudarshan Shidore.

By Amit Sengupta. No food, no milk, no baby formala, no mother’s milk, no medical care for thousands of orphaned children with entire families wiped out, no nourishment, no maternal care – the babies must die.

By Harshit Rana. In this dark world, there is a need of little spark, so as to make a better world where at least two people can love, work, study, play and share, without the fear of age-old boundaries and prejudices imposed on them.

By Monita Soni. If you’ve ever held on to someone longer than you should have, this narrative will feel achingly familiar.

By Avinash Kumar. Just a cool evening, a small pond and two friends gazing at it, arm in arm.

“Heart-smashed” by her mother’s death, Arundhati Roy began writing the memoir to process her grief and understand her complicated feelings...

By Janaky Sreedharan. Atreyakam, a novel in Malayalam penned by R Rajasree (2024), in its 25th edition now, is the latest entry into the world of contemporary Mahabharata retellings. She discovers that equations of male virility in bed, with manliness in war, make honour a key word around gender identities.