What is the story of Mysore silk? The story of Mysore silk begins in the 1780s, when Tipu Sultan brought silkworm rearing to his kingdom, and reaches its royal peak in 1912, when Maharaja Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV opened a silk … Read More
Author Archives: Madhusudan Narayanan
Varahamihira: Ancient Astronomer Who Mapped the Comets & Predicted Earthquakes
Who was Varahamihira?Varahamihira was a 6th-century Indian astronomer, mathematician and polymath who lived and worked in Ujjain in present-day Madhya Pradesh from approximately 505 to 587 CE. He was one of the nine gems of Emperor Vikramaditya’s court and authored … Read More
Pune Ganesh Festival: The Five Pandals That Helped Birth a Nation
In 1893, the British colonial administration was watching Pune carefully. Large public gatherings were viewed with suspicion. Political meetings were monitored. Any organised assembly that could give voice to the growing feeling of nationalism was a threat to the colonial … Read More
Sushruta: The World’s First Plastic Surgeon
Modern medicine credits plastic surgery to 20th-century European surgeons. There is a Varanasi physician who performed it in 600 BCE. His name was Sushruta. He lived and taught on the banks of the Ganges in the city now known as … Read More
Malpe Fishing Community: What It Actually Takes to Bring Fish
The boats leave before you are awake. By the time visitors arrive at Malpe harbour in the morning, the day’s work has already been underway for hours. The fishing families of Malpe do not operate on tourist time. They operate … Read More
Shankarapura Mallige: The Jasmine That Wakes Before Dawn
The flowers have to come off the plants before the heat of the day. This is not a preference. It is biology. Jasmine blossoms at its most fragrant in the cool hours before sunrise, and a flower left unpicked past … Read More
Udupi Cotton Weavers: The Last Families Keeping a 200-Year-Old Craft Alive
The cotton arrives as a simple cone of white thread. By the time it leaves the workshop at Talipady as a finished Udupi saree, it has passed through hands that know exactly how much tension a warp thread can bear … Read More
Tirupati Balaji Temple Tour: Why 100,000 Pilgrims Visit the World’s Richest Temple Every Single Day
Every single day, without exception, 100,000 people climb the Tirumala Hills in Andhra Pradesh to stand before Lord Venkateswara. Not during festivals. Not during special occasions. Every ordinary day of every ordinary week of every ordinary year, one hundred thousand … Read More
Aryabhata: The Ancient Indian Mathematician Who Calculated the Earth’s Rotation
In the year 499 CE, a twenty-three-year-old mathematician in Kusumapura, the ancient city that is now Patna in Bihar, finished writing a book. The book was called the Aryabhatiya. It was written in Sanskrit verse. It was 121 stanzas long. … Read More
Sariska Tiger Reserve: The Forest That Brought Tigers Back From Zero
Three thousand years ago, if you believe the Mahabharata, the Pandava brothers spent part of their twelve years of forest exile somewhere in the Aravalli Hills of what is now Rajasthan. Three hundred and fifty years ago, a Mughal emperor … Read More