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Issue 19: Spring 2022

Fiction

Proper Perspective by Paromita Goswami

Below us the water from the main canal flows into the branch that feeds the paddy – first in a trickle and then in a flow. Water snakes its way through crevices and furrows. Pradeep and his team smash the operator and the screw; they throw the chain and lock in the canal. It will take a long time for the irrigation officials to repair the sluice gate.

The Missing Syllable by Veena Narayan

…So that month, when I paid my usual visit to Divakara Panikkar, I didn’t show him Sreedevi’s horoscope. Oh, Divakara Panikkar is such a soothing person. And his predictions are so accurate. Even Muktedathi goes to him I know that for a fact. She might be a red, but Lathae, when it comes to one’s own children, everyone is anxious, red or not. Whenever I get too worried, I just pick up the horoscopes and go to consult Divakara Panikkar. He’s a gem.

Dirgha Ayushman Bhava by Sumitra Shankar

 I don’t know how to tell her – when I eat her delicious cooking, all I taste is its absence in my adopted faraway land.

Another Night by Utkarsh Sharma

Roshan turned and looked outside the window again. His body seemed to be shuddering with an urgency, like at the sound of approaching footsteps that never really materialize. He thought about the time left to fill with sleep. He still had to wake up at 8 for his shift.

Poetry

My lungs recall unfondly by Shilpa Kamat

the teacher misreads my polite, Oh
really? and gloats, Absolutely.

A Glossary of Artillery Terms by Nnadi Samuel

In the next, I want to have more crime in my name.
Pakistan’s temper veining through my wrist.

Stories of Durga: Rain by Ayesha Chatterjee

Memory, like poetry, can’t be trusted.

What Is Love In Your Language? by Suchita Senthil Kumar

and now I’m breathing in a language
I don’t know to speak a word in. 

Essays & Interviews

Navigating the Labyrinth of Privilege by Arpita Gaidhane

Parts of me are powerful in society, and other parts are marginalised. All parts are scared of being unloved. The healing started from seeing this.

Chai time by Archana Ramesh

The white kids in North Carolinian suburbia, who already looked at me like I was out of place, weren’t going home to the smells of cardamom and ginger. They went home to the clean smells of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches – the smell of freedom and fitting in. And at a time when belonging seemed more important than comfort, my parent’s unswaying and painfully ethnic routines felt more like a bear trap than a lily pad.

‘Where do we belong?’: Exploring the absurdity of partition through selected short stories of Sadaat Manto Hasan by Junaid Shah Shabir

While history can only convey superficial events, art dwells deep into the human psyche to bring out truths which cannot be factualized. Manto blends facts with realistic fiction to document the depth of human suffering caused by the partition of the subcontinent in a way that historians have failed to do. 

Reviews

Two Commas and That Voice by Richik Banerjee

Reviewed by Ghada Ibrahim 

Raw and Innovative!

Time Regime by Jhani Randhawa

Reviewed by Sushumna Kannan 

Innovative and fresh! 

Mamaji by Elisheba Haqq

Reviewed by Jasmine Vyas

Powerful and Inspiring!

Bombay Hangovers by Rochelle Potkar

Reviewed by GJV Prasad

Topographic plots!

A Moveable East by Siddharth Dasgupta

Reviewed by Rochelle Potkar 

A lyrical memoir of nostalgia! 

Visual Artists

Vidya Warrier

Ruchika Kapila