Imagine yourself touring the snow clad mountains of the Himalayas along with an extremely friendly five hundred foot tall Yeti! This whacky yet interesting idea has been turned into reality by tech giant Google’s latest offering – Verne: the Himalayas. The app uses Google Earth’s view of the Himalayas and presents it in a child-friendly format. One of the best features of the app is the tour guide Verne. He […]

Whenever you start striving to reach your goals or chase your dreams, that little voice turns up. The one that tells you you’re not good enough, or smart enough, or strong enough. It’s your fear of failure and those lies it whispers can become truths if you listen long enough. No matter how hard you try and ignore it, it can stop you powering forward. The bad news is that […]

Take it with a pinch of salt!”, is what historian Anita Rane-Kothare, head of the department of Ancient Indian Culture and Archaeology at St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai, told us, when we asked about whether Ashutosh Gowariker’s Mohenjo Daro would do justice to the historical story of the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation. From showing jumping crocodiles to women wearing feathery headgear, Gowariker is facing flak for showing distorted facts about the […]

Influential Indian writer and activist Mahasweta Devi has died aged 90, in the eastern city of Kolkata, her family has said. Devi, who was hospitalised earlier this month, died of cardiac arrest and multiple organ failure on Thursday. She wrote extensively about the oppression faced by lower caste and tribes people in India. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among several leaders who paid tribute to the writer. “Mahasweta Devi” has […]

Former President, Bharat Ratna recipient and the father of India’s nuclear programme, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam was all of this and much more. His was a life of selfless, humble living that exhibited an undying love for children and a never ending quest for knowledge and its dissemination. On his first death anniversary, we remember this great icon who inspired millions. Dr. Kalam once said that he began his tenure […]

Irom sharmila, the iconic activist who has been on a fast for the past 16 years demanding withdrawal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), today announced that she will break her fast and contest elections in Manipur. Reports said she could break her fast on August 9. “I will break my fast as the government has failed to give any positive response,” Irom told agencies, adding that she […]

After reports emerged that the use of pellet guns on protesters in Jammu and Kashmir injured many people, a website called ‘Never Forget Pakistan’ has posted some hard-hitting images of celebrities on Facebook, which have been photoshopped to show what they would look like if their faces had been injured by pellet guns. Some of the celebrities whose faces have been used in the pictures posted by the website on […]

How many times have you witnessed a situation that needed your intervention but you meekly walked away? Say for instance, an injured man on the road after an accident, a lost child in the streets or a neighbour being abused by her husband? While most of us are likely to have been in one of these situations for certain, only some of us would have actually gone ahead and helped […]

There have been numerous writeups on Natalie Portman’s directorial debut A Tale of Love and Darkness in which she also stars in a very important role. The most (in)famous one was the write up by The New York Times magazine where she “forgot” her pants for the photo shoot and where she talked about coming to terms with being an Israeli, and how it affects her identity in America. The […]

The mystery of the Monkey God La Ciudad Blanca, Spanish for ‘The White City’ is a legendary settlement said to be located in the Mosquitia region of eastern Honduras in Central America. Researcher Charles Lindberg, during one of his flights over the jungles of Mosquitia in Hondurus, claimed caught a glimpse of what he thought was the ‘Lost City of the Monkey God‘ where, legend says that local people worshipped […]