Storyteller. Enterprise Tech Watcher. Free Agent.
Bangalore
Joined December 2008
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Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
The strongest argument I’ve ever heard in defence of patriarchy is the hot chapati. Someone has to keep making them while everyone else eats, and that someone is rarely the man demanding another.
But what happens when you draw a line between rice-eating and roti-eating India? The Census, economists and several decades of research start telling a rather curious story.
Introducing Rotinomics: where a humble flatbread finds itself accused of being an accessory to patriarchy.
@PrasadScribe
timesofindia.indiatimes.com/…
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
They stopped the flow of the Ganga near Har ki paudi at Haridwar for next 18 days just so they can clean it before Diwali. And the moment the water level dropped the truth came out...the entire riverbed is buried under clothes, plastic bags, discarded slippers, and pure filth.
The natural stones that should be there..but completely hidden under our garbage.
Year after year the same story bhakts leave behind their waste the administration stops the water once a year, locals cleans up the mess we created and then we start dumping again the moment the water returns. 😒
You cant revere a river as divine and simultaneously turn her into a landfill.
If this is how we treat the river we claim to worship then maybe we dontt deserve to call her MAA at all.
Period !!
“… if there is any authority in this country that wants to curb the freedom of speech and freedom of association, … that authority will perish, unless it repents, before an India that is steeled with high courage, noble purpose and determination....”
Mahatma Gandhi, 28-12-1921
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
When India accidentally wiped out its vultures, half a million people died in five years.
The bird doing zoomies in this video runs the most extreme digestive system in the animal kingdom. Vulture stomach acid sits near pH 1, strong enough to destroy anthrax, rabies, and botulism in the carcasses they eat. A flock strips a cow to bone in about 45 minutes.
India had 50 million of them. Free sanitation at national scale, in a country where religious custom means most cattle die natural deaths and every dead cow becomes a carcass someone has to deal with.
Then the patent on diclofenac expired in 1994. Farmers started using the cheap painkiller on livestock. Trace amounts left in a carcass cause kidney failure in vultures. Within a decade, 50 million birds fell to a few thousand. The fastest collapse of any bird species since the passenger pigeon.
The carcasses didn't disappear. Feral dogs took the vultures' place and brought rabies with them. Rotting remains leached into waterways. In districts where vultures once thrived, human death rates rose more than 4 percent. Economists at Chicago and Warwick put the toll at 100,000 extra deaths a year and $69 billion in annual damages.
So yes, the goofy bird sprinting down the walkway is adorable. It's also a disease firewall that evolution spent millions of years building and one generic painkiller nearly erased in ten.
(In his cell) Next to a picture of the anti-colonial revolutionary Bhagat Singh, Khalid has scrawled his famous words: “I am that mad soul who is free even in captivity.”theguardian.com/world/2026/j…
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Hello again! Here's our piece from Sunday about Twitter. Bye! youtube.com/watch?v=p7ZG_xWY…
“Some will question spending administrative capital on animals amid so many other urgencies. The answer is simple. A civilised state must do more than one good at once…” hindustantimes.com/opinion/v…
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Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
FIAPO is participating in the upcoming TCS World 10K Marathon to raise funds for our legal work in protecting captive elephants and advocating for their rehabilitation. Donate by scanning the QR Code or accessing this link - lnkd.in/gcbGBRuh! Spread the word!
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
“As an editorial cartoonist, my job is to hold powerful people and institutions accountable. For the first time, my editor prevented me from doing that critical job. So I have decided to leave the (Washington) Post” - the brilliant @AnnTelnaes 🖌️
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Standup Comedy thrived in India post 2004. Dr. Manmohan Singh was the key because:
1. The generation and social class that benefited from liberalisation of the 90s grew up to be the voice of the confident new India - demanding accountability and seeing sense of humor as an essential trait of social discourse.
2. Another result of liberalisation - mobile internet became a reality for a huge section of the middle/upper middle classes, giving new, uncensored platforms for a new form of art/humor.
3. His government - like all governments - was flawed, creating enough relatable material to go viral. And they did push back - like introducing the draconian IT Act Sec 66A late in the day.
But unlike many other governments of past and future - MMS didn’t practice brutal censorship or punitive action against humour/satire. The entire social media opposed the IT Act or the various acts of alleged corruption/inefficiency without being labelled anti-national or getting r*pe threats.
The artists - not just professional standup comedians but big film stars also - felt safe sharing jokes about the govt policies/PM/ministers.
A sense of freedom is the biggest incentive artists crave for - and the MMS govt provided that above anything else.
Thanks Dr. Saab.
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Farewell, Dr. Singh. It will be a shame, if by choosing to replace rational analysis with empty slogans, and genuine reforms with nationalistic chest-thumping, India lets down the memory of its quiet internationalist. My @opinion piece, free to read: bloomberg.com/opinion/articl…
On Gandhi Jayanti, a heartfelt pledge to India, Indians and the Constitution by Maj Gen S G Vombatkere (retd)…
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Some incarecrations are a travesty of justice, all that is good. #UmarKhalid1400daysinJail #ReleaseAllPoliticalPrisoners there is also Gulfishan Mahesh Meeran Idisha Adviasi Actiists J & K...how free are we really? @banojyotsna
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
“If journalists are left to face penalties in lakhs of rupees in damages, will it not have a chilling effect on free and fair reporting?” wrote the Mumbai Press Club on X today, asking the Hindu to “not abandon” journalist Rahul Pandita in a 2014 defamation suit.
newslaundry.com/2024/07/09/c…
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
The press bodies across the country passed a resolution against proposed laws that meant to silence the press.
@PressCouncil_IN @MIB_India @PIB_India
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Parents of a fashion design student who died by suicide after allegedly being molested in #Bhubaneswar had to wait for over a fortnight to convince police to register an abetment of suicide case | ✍️ @mehta_asish
@NewIndianXpress @santwana99 @Siba_TNIE
newindianexpress.com/states/…
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
#IndiaElection2024 Here’s a free-to-read link to my latest @opinion piece: l1nq.com/cAHIP
Why India’s South Rejects Modi — And Why It Matters
Vijay Ramachandran retweeted
Umar Khalid continues to be in jail without trial or bail for 3 years, 4 months, and 14 days. Despite Justice AS Bopanna-led bench's assurance that the case would take "one or two minutes" to decide, over 6 months have elapsed since then.
The bail petition, in contravention of Supreme Court rules and convention, has shifted from one bench to another. From Bopanna J.'s bench, it moved to Justice Aniruddha Bose and ultimately to Justice Bela Trivedi's bench. The questionable manner in which the case was transferred, as I had reported in December (pinned tweet on my profile) to Trivedi-led bench by the master of the roster raises concerns about the impartiality of the process.
Now, despite Trivedi J.'s readiness to hear the case, Khalid's counsels have sought repeated adjournments and rightly so.
Even with the reportage exposing irregularities, the narrative has been conveniently manipulated to suggest a controversy over the "listing" of cases according to a lawyer's preference, which was never the actual issue. The master of the roster lacks the authority to shift cases from a senior judge's bench to that of a junior judge.
As Justice Trivedi retains control over Khalid's case despite noticing no confidence in her justice from his counsels, it is crucial to note the role of the master of the roster. The prolonged incarceration of an activist with a weak case is not solely the fault of the Indian state; the Supreme Court shares responsibility for failing to deliver justice. This collective inaction has a chilling effect on civil society.
In the face of such blatant foul play, the highest court in the land should be a bastion of justice. When confronted with evidence of such foul play in its own home, it is incumbent upon any learned judge to take corrective measures rather than attempting to manipulate the narrative.
