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SG Writings On The Wall

Writings on the Wall is a metaphor that grew out of my travels, mostly through the poll-bound regions of India and the neighbourhood over nearly 25 years. Because, even more than its big festivals, the subcontinent comes to life during its elections. And what’s on people’s minds, their aspirations, joys, concerns and fears, you can pretty much understand by reading these writings on the wall. These can be graffiti, advertising, skylines, fences, or even rubble.

Bihar isn’t ‘ruined’ by agri reform. This ‘branded underwear theory’ from 2010 shows why

Shekhar Gupta - December 11, 2020

Punjab’s frustration & anger is rooted in its steep decline, now visible in farmers’ protests

Aspiration and desperation in UP’s East

In Uttar Pradesh, the campaign’s back to being old trench warfare

Shekhar Gupta - February 25, 2017

Aspiration is turning into desperation. Nobody has much hope in an era of new Hindu Rate of Growth, and identity politics is back.

Reading the realigning colours of politics in Bengal

Shekhar Gupta - May 1, 2016

Reading the realigning colours of political India.

Gen gana mana of youth

SGIN - November 7, 2015

Aspiration screams out of every billboard in Bihar, and could well decide who gets to rule the state, come 8 November.

East to west, money defines politics in India’s double-income, no ideology city of ‘freedom fighters’

SGIN - January 30, 2015

Delhi is driven by greed, ambition and arrogant, freebooting cynicism as no other city in the country. AAP has figured out the havenots, BJP its old, pushy made-gooders, and Congress none at all.

Hi-Fi, Wi-Fi, Modi in Mhara state

Shekhar Gupta - October 9, 2014

Let me begin this ride with an opening gambit that only a pukka native of my home state could get away with in our...

Before the Secular Dip, Hold Your Nose

SGIN - May 12, 2014

Having made only four really short visits as a reporter to Varanasi, spread over almost four decades, I can't be so pretentious as to...

Huggies diapers in Vaishali, Muslim-Dalit IIT-Jee coalition

Shekhar Gupta - May 7, 2014

Bihar is the cradle of India's post-1975 politics. The JP movement that provoked the Emergency and started the process of the Congress party's decline,...

The rich and the ostrich

Shekhar Gupta - April 30, 2014

Absolute truths do not matter. Which is why, even in landslide election verdicts in India, voter swings are rarely in double digits.

Mere pass space hai

SGIN - April 23, 2014

Space is the currency of Mumbai and in such short, finite supply, it occupies the minds of everyone — the rich, the poor, and the powerful.

Navi Calcutta

Shekhar Gupta - April 23, 2014

Wasseypur, immortalised in Anurag Kashyap's violent two-part epic, is now more or less subsumed by the expanding coal town of Dhanbad, and located in...

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SG Writings On The Wall

Bihar isn’t ‘ruined’ by agri reform. This ‘branded underwear theory’ from 2010 shows why

Punjab’s frustration & anger is rooted in its steep decline, now visible in farmers’ protests

Aspiration and desperation in UP’s East

In Uttar Pradesh, the campaign’s back to being old trench warfare

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