Broad Brush

blogs from author

  • Of the commons and their undoing

    April 21, 2025, 3:31 PM IST

    “That which is common to the greatest number gets the least amount of care. Men pay most attention to what is their own; they care less for what is common,” wrote Aristotle, describing the tragedy…

    April 21, 2025, 3:31 PM IST

  • The public library

    January 29, 2023, 11:24 PM IST

    A friend who now lives abroad and whom I had last met over a decade ago was in town, and we decided to meet. “At Lalaji’s stall tomorrow?” he suggested. I promptly agreed. This was…

    January 29, 2023, 11:24 PM IST

  • The flight from Tokyo

    February 13, 2022, 10:53 PM IST

    I took a last look at the city below, as the airplane lifted itself off the wet runway. It had been raining all morning in Tokyo. Capillaries of rainwater madly raced backwards across the windowpane,…

    February 13, 2022, 10:53 PM IST

  • Scientific attitude and us

    January 24, 2022, 11:10 AM IST

    It was a slow-moving Sunday afternoon, which I had chosen to spend cracking peanut shells and munching the nuts. My nephew, a teenager devoted to the pursuit of a seat in the IITs, lay spread…

    January 24, 2022, 11:10 AM IST

  • Of strange taxes

    November 23, 2021, 3:18 PM IST

    “You taxmen have left no avenue unexplored to seize people’s hard-earned money”, my wife grumbled. It was March, and I could guess she had suffered heavy income-tax deduction from her last month’s paycheck. “We pay…

    November 23, 2021, 3:18 PM IST

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