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Sunday, April 12, 2026
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The FinePrint

Why is it fashionable to deride historians? The answer lies outside academia

The inaccessible, ideologically motivated historian is a straw man, a largely artificial construct used to discredit history writing itself.

The Great Indian Sanitation Scam. General castes bag govt jobs, Valmikis do the work

Across India, proxy, ‘badli’, or ‘ewaj’ work is rampant in sanitation jobs. ‘They want our jobs but they don’t want to do our jobs.’

Rajasthan’s elderly are victims of ‘digital murder’. eKYC gaps leave lakhs without pension

Digital verification issues are excluding Rajasthan’s elderly and disabled from pensions, with lakhs incorrectly declared ‘dead’ or missing. There’s an embarrassing KYC-shaped hole in Digital India.

Jharkhand’s Adivasis, beyond poll maths. A long struggle for land & identity, a ‘disappearing’ people

'There will soon be a day when tribals are found only in museums,' says an Adivasi youth. As polls near, anxieties over an existential threat to tribal identity rears its head again.

After UPSC, India’s coaching industry has found a new gold rush—judicial services

With law schools churning out more graduates than ever, the competition to become a judge in India’s lower courts and tribunals has heated up. The coaching industry is cashing in.

Violent Canadians beat up Indians in Brampton. India has a right to speak up

As the great power in the region, it is our duty to offer shelter to people of Indian origin when they are an oppressed minority in the countries where they live.

Darjeeling zoo showed the world how to save red pandas. Now it’s on a global award shortlist

The Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological Park’s red panda programme is the first Indian project to be shortlisted in October 2024 for the global conservation award by the WAZA.

Delhi’s five pollution hotspots

These five areas in Delhi see the worst air quality every winter.

India’s digital nomads fleeing big cities for work-bliss balance. New hubs want them, woo them

Instagram-friendly Goa and Dharamshala are the favourites of digital nomads. They are shaping the future of work, with a little help from Amazon, Nykaa and high-speed data.

Pet or Pashu—ancient India knew which animals to eat. Then Manu made vegetarianism ideal

Manu has said: ‘A man who eats the meat of a particular animal is called an eater of that animal’s meat, whereas a fish-eater is an eater of every animal’s meat’.

On Camera

How India’s Sparrows outsmarted Pakistan and conquered Siachen in 1984 Operation Meghdoot

The ‘Sparrows’—the signalmen of the Indian Army— were known for their swiftness and agility in establishing secure and reliable communication in battle zones.

Fuel shock hits Asia’s rice bowl as farmers cut planting

War-driven surge in fuel and fertilizer costs forces farmers across Southeast Asia to delay harvests, scale back sowing and risk lower output.

Iran’s Shahed vs US’s LUCAS—The drone arithmetic reshaping the West Asia war

From Kyiv to the Gulf, Iran’s Shahed rewrote the rules of aerial warfare. Now, the US has its own copy of the cheap drones, LUCAS.

The world’s in a flux. India must reform, consolidate & build a strong economy

We now live in a world order that will keep shifting. India must use this window. This also means we remain disciplined enough not to be knee-jerked into reacting to what Pakistan sees as its moment in the sun.