By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Travelling abroad used to be a refined experience. One dressed smartly, was served meals on porcelain plates with real cutlery, and returned home with stories, souvenirs, and perhaps a few undeveloped rolls of film. It was as much about the journey as the destination. Today, it feels more like running an…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam If patience is truly a virtue, then every employee in my office building — the venerable STC building (officially known as the Jawahar Vyapar Bhavan) on Janpath, New Delhi — should be eligible for sainthood. It is not because we have suddenly become paragons of meditation and self-restraint. It is due…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam A jetlagged pilgrimage through aisles of nostalgia Jetlag is a strange thing. You arrive in the US, pumped full of optimism and airplane peanuts, only to wake up at 3 am questioning your place in the universe and whether sleep is a myth designed to sell mattresses. It was during one…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam It all started with a phone call. A distinguished voice on the other end said, “We are putting together a high-powered committee and we want you to chair it.” Chairman. The word had a certain ring to it. A title that exuded authority, wisdom and — let us be honest —…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Once upon a time, I believed words could change the world. I wrote about policy reform, development models, corruption crackdowns and governance frameworks. I thought if I kept at it — data in one hand, righteous rage in the other — I would eventually tip the balance. The world would read,…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Every office has one. Every classroom. Every Indian family. That one person for whom the concept of punctuality is more of a “friendly suggestion” than a social norm. Their internal clock is permanently set to “just missed it.” Yet, despite the delays, despite the frustration, you have to hand it to…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Attending an alumni meet is like stepping into a time machine. The machine is slightly rusted and the destination is blurry. The fellow travellers have all mysteriously aged. Except, of course, for that one person who somehow still looks like they walked straight out of our final-year group photo. The moment…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam First time International travel is an eye-opening experience, especially when the first challenge you face is simply finding a place to pee. My first such experience came while transiting through Singapore several decades ago. My search for a toilet — a perfectly respectable word in my vocabulary — led to unexpected…

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam Ah, the literature festival circuit — where authors go to be celebrated, debated, occasionally mistaken for someone else, and ultimately left questioning their life choices. When you first get an invitation, the excitement is real. You imagine engaging conversations, adoring readers and intellectual stimulation. You now feel like you’ve ‘officially’ arrived….

By Dr. R. Balasubramaniam We all know them. We’ve seen them. In fact, we can’t not see them. They are everywhere — on TV panels, YouTube debates, podcasts, social media threads and increasingly, in your uncle’s forwarded WhatsApp videos. They are the modern-day philosophers of our fractured democracies: the Armchair Political Commentators. Armed with a…