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Thursday, April 23, 2026
TopicBritish India

Topic: British India

India must create more Sarvepalli Radhakrishnans. And move on from Macaulay

Macaulay had total contempt for Indian literature and for Middle Eastern writing in Persian or Arabic. He was supremely confident that English schoolgirls are better informed than Indian scholars.

How do postal stamps show adivasis? The same way the British did

Birsa Munda is on many stamp covers – 1988 to 2023. There are none of Jaipal Singh Munda, member of India’s Constituent Assembly, Olympic gold medalist, and writer.

Railways weren’t Britain’s ‘gift’ to India—we paid with blood, sweat & humiliation

Lancashire cotton mill owners were eager to get access to the inland cotton-producing regions of India. Railway tracks penetrating into rural India would ensure this.

‘Tirunelveli riots’ was a high point of the Swadeshi movement. A shipping rivalry caused it

In ‘Swadeshi Steam’, AR Venkatachalapathy traces the journey of India’s first indigenous shipping company Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company and its founder VO Chidambaram Pillai.

British Indian sepoys weren’t silent spectators to colonial brutality. They led quiet rebellions

Indian sepoys who left their homes and crossed oceans to witness a world being conquered and exploited by the British, sought to understand, interpret, and even profit from it all.

In Manipur govts have manufactured dystopia for decades, not peace. It’s showing now

Learning all the wrong lessons from the British empire, independent India chose to rule the northeast through cash and coercion.

Was India’s 1st Olympic medallist Indian? Story of Norman Pritchard, athlete & Hollywood star

Pritchard was first Asia-born athlete to earn an Olympic medal, the first Olympian to act in Hollywood, and the first to score a hat-trick in football match on Indian soil in 1897.  

‘Rothschild of Calcutta’, Mutty Lall Seal spent his wealth on education, health, uplifting women

Seal set up Motilal Seal Free College in 1842, donated land for the Calcutta Medical College, and established a guesthouse in Belgharia to feed 500-1,000 poor every day.

Tailor Kinthup, disguised as monk was sent by British govt to Tibet in 1880 to map Tsangpo

In 'Bells of Shangri-La, Parimal Bhattacharya explores the stories of British espionage into Tibet to trace the Brahmaputra.

How a photograph of a decked-up Parsi woman found its way to the Pope’s palace

Dosebai Cowasjee Jessawalla was one of the first women in India to receive a British education. She recounts her travels and adventures in ‘Story of My Life’

On Camera

Mumbai woman who shouted at minister spoke for many Indians, exposed BJP’s protest politics

Had it been a poor woman shouting at Maharashtra minister Girish Mahajan over the roadblock, the police would likely have arrested her, raided her home, and terrorised her family members.

India’s online gaming rules to take effect on 1 May; most games exempt from registration

The rules, which come into force on 1 May, establish an Online Gaming Authority which will determine whether a game is an online money game or online social game in only three situations.

Japan overhauls post-World War II pacifist military approach, lifts restrictions on defence exports

Since October last year, Japan PM Sanae Takaichi has planned to increase defence spending target to 2 percent of GDP.

Trump, Netanyahu’s Iran gamble: The regime change rebound

American objectives are unmet. They neither have muscle nor motivation to resume the war. As for Iran, the regime didn’t just survive, it’s now led by more radical individuals.