A sudden disturbance was observed in the city of Leicester in the month of September 2022. As per cops following India's win at the Asia Cup 20 tournament against Pakistan, clashes were observed in Hindu & Muslim communities. This led to arrest of people. In this episode of The Wire Talks joining our host Sidharth Bhatia is Rohit K Dasgupta, Senior Lecturer in Cultural Industries, School of Culture & Creative Arts, University of Glasgow. Rohit interacts with Sidharth decoding these...

​Tune in to the latest episode of The Wire Talks as our host Sidharth Bhatia talks to Australian author and researcher, John Zubrzycki. The duo talks about the latter's recent book, The Shortest History of India. The book covers a wide range of topics right from the earliest humans to Harappan civilisation to the invasion of the country by Mughals and Britishers. His book is also documentation of the 5000 years of Indian history including mentions of colonisation to the Independence...

The recently released movie, Brahmastra starring Alia Bhatt and Ranbir Kapoor in pivotal roles remained in the news for varied reasons. This week on The Wire Talks Sidharth Bhatia is joined by filmmaker Nikkhil Advani. The director who has carved his niche in the industry with the films such as D Day, Batla House and more, shares his thoughts on movies. He answers how the audience’s taste in the movie is now more specific, 3 must-do for Hindi filmmakers, how the industry remains unorganized...

An independent judiciary is a crucial pillar of democracy, however, over the period of time, the perception has grown that institutions lean more towards the political establishments. In this episode of The Wire Talks, our guest Chander Uday Singh, Senior Advocate of the Supreme Court, in conversation with our host Sidharth Bhatia, has spoken about it extensively. The duo discusses delay and procrastination being huge hurdles, and how they affected some of the prominent issues, and pending...

Indian National Congress formed in 1885, ruled the nation for several years. However, since 2014, they experienced a decline in power with BJP winning the elections. On this episode of The Wire Talks, Sidharth Bhatia talks to Indian academic and political scientist Zoya Hasan regarding her book, Growing Polarization and the Decline of the Congress Party. The duo discusses the current scenario in the congress party, crises and its ways ahead. Keep yourself updated with the world happening by...

It was noticeable of the right-wing outlet getting advertisements from the big companies and making a big moolah. Our guest today on The Wire Talks Nandini Jammi, co-founder of Sleeping Giants, studied this trend in the industry and came up with steps that left the advertisers stupefied. Her organisation led the advertisers to distance themselves from the Pro-Trump newsletters after the USA election of that particular year. Following her, Sleeping Giants venture, she now runs Check My Ads-...

One of pharmaceutical companies spending 1000 crore to promote its paracetamol, Dolo has currently hit the headline. However, the company claims spending nothing more than 6-10 crore in marketing. However, it is no secret that Pharma companies being aggressive in pushing their products to doctors. From providing incentives, freebies, trips and much more, these pharma companies don't leave any stone unturned to make their product the top selling one. Joining our host Sidharth Bhatia on The...

In this episode of The Wire Talks host, Sidharth Bhatia is joined by Seema Chishti, a journalist-writer for three decades. The duo discusses inter-religious marriage back in time and now, with the help of Seema's new book, Sumitra and Anees: Tales and Recipes from a Khichdi Family. Follow Sidharth Bhatia on Twitter and Instagram @bombaywallah and https://instagram.com/bombaywallah You can listen to this show on The Wire's website, the IVM Podcasts website, app on Android:...

Our National Flag came into existence keeping in mind the resemblance of courage and sacrifice (saffron), honesty, peace and purity (white) and faith & chivalry (green). But there were several controversies behind the emergence of our Indian National Flag. In this episode of The Wire Talks, let’s dive deep into the birth of our National Flag. Listen to our host Sidharth Bhatia in conversation with Professor Arundhati Virmani. Our guest Arundhati is an Indian historian and teaches at ...

On several instances, people in India are asked to submit their unique identification cards such as PAN cards and Aadhar cards. However, there have been occasions when this private information is leaked into the public domain, thus leading to some misuse of this information. In this episode of The Wire Talks, our host Sidharth Bhatia talks to Apar Gupta. Founder of Internet Freedom Foundation, lawyer, activist and writer on technology from India. Apar gives his take on it. The duo talks about...

On The Wire Talks this week in conversation with Sidharth Bhatia is the Lecturer in International Relations at University of Oxford, Kira Huju. She spoke about her recently released paper, Saffronizing diplomacy: the Indian Foreign Service under Hindu nationalist rule. Link to the article - https://academic.oup.com/ia/article/98/2/423/6522060 Follow Kira Huju on Twitter @KiraHuju Follow Sidharth Bhatia on Twitter and Instagram @bombaywallah and https://instagram.com/bombaywallah You can...

Recently when the Lok Sabha secretariat released a list of words to be banned in parliament, it created headlines in the political world. Words such as Jumlajeevi, drama, corrupt and more were banned from being used in the Parliament. The Indian politician and a member of the Indian Parliament, Rahul Gandhi took a dig at the current ruling party for the same. On The Wire Talks, our host Sidharth Bhatia talks to P. D. Thankappan Achary. An ex-officio administrative head of the Secretariat of...

This week on The Wire Talks hosted by Sidharth Bhatia, we have Manish Tewari, MP Sri Anandpur Sahib-Punjab, former Union Minister of Information & Broadcasting Government of India and former MP Ludhiana Punjab. In this episode, we have our guest Manish Tewari giving us a round-up of what's happening in his own party (Indian National Congress), his stand on certain things which are distinctive and his take on the current political scenario. Following his opinion on Agnipath Scheme, when...

Tune in to listen to our The Wire Talks host Sidharth Bhatia in conversation with professor of History at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, R. Mahalakshmi. The duo decodes and talks about the ongoing Kaali movie poster controversy that has arrested the attention of the nation. Our guest speaks about the what lies behind this outrage and shares the mythological aspect of the deity of the Hindu culture. For the uninitiated ones, Leena Manimekalai's documentary Kaali's poster has a character...

Is India inching closer to dictatorship in the current times? or is the country in an emergency without any declaration? This week on The Wire Talks, listen to our host Sidharth Bhatia in conversation with French political scientist and Indologist, Christophe Jaffrelot. Our guest has penned books such as MODIS INDIA: Hindu Nationalism and the Rise of Ethnic Democracy and India's First Dictatorship: The Emergency, 1975 -1977 and more. During their conversation, they discuss Christophe's...

Is the economics of the film industry changing? Has the audience become pickier when it comes to consuming films in theatres? Are OTT platforms like Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and others proving to be game-changing factors in the film business. In this episode of The Wire Talks our host Sidharth Bhatia decodes all these during his conversation with international award-winning film director and screenwriter Alankrita Shrivastava. She has written and directed three feature films - Dolly Kitty...

This week on The Wire Talks our host Sidharth Bhatia talks to writer, columnist, public speaker and educator, Aparna Piramal Raje. The former chats with her about her book, Chemical Khichdi- How I Hacked My Mental Health, where she spilled the beans about suffering from bipolar disorder. When asked why did she write the book and didn't she feel inhibited to let it out in the open she replied, "I wrote because we all want to tell our stories." She adds in today's time opening about your...

This week on The Wire Talks listen to our host Sidharth Bhatia in conversation with American Indologist Wendy Doniger. The episode unfolds her keen interest in the Indian tradition and the motto behind her book, An American Girl in India: Letters and Recollections 1963–64. During the interaction, Wendy Doniger shares that her mother gave her a book, A passage to India by E. M. Forster when she was 10-11 years old, which led to her developing interest in India and its tradition. In the ...

Our guest on The Wire Talks is Ashok Vajpeyi, a Hindi-language poet, essayist,, who published over 20 books of poetries. A Sahitya Akademi Award winner; he was the former chairman of Lalit Kala Akademi India's National Academy of Arts, Ministry of Culture, Govt of India, 2008–2011. In this episode of The Wire Talks in conversation with our host Sidharth Bhatia, he spoke the Hindi language, and the challenges and victories of this language. He says, “Hindi is one of the most hospitable...

Sri Lanka is in a bad state, as the country is suffering from severe inflation, scarcity of fuel, with things turning worse as the country also defaults with its international debts. Thus, causing turmoil in the social and political arena as well. It has resulted in countrymen protesting against the government and the Prime Minister of the country, stepping down from designation. In this episode of The Wire Talks, our guest Sasanka Perera who teaches sociology at South Asian University, New...

This week’s guest on The Wire Talks is Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, Navdeep Suri. In conversation with our host Sidharth Bhatia, he speaks about his passion for translation, especially of the novels penned by his grandfather Nanak Singh. During the podcast, Navdeep shares his grandfather being the eyewitness of the dark chapter of Indian history, the Jallianwala Bagh massacre. Further, he shares how his mother motivated him to translate his grandfather’s novel so...

Taj Mahal or TejoMahalaya? Recently there was a stormy debate about whether the Taj Mahal is a Hindu Temple, Rajput Palace or mausoleum. In The Wire Talks, our host Sidharth Bhatia interacts with Rana Safvi to get more insights on it. Rana Safvi is a writer, blogger and translator. She has published eight books so far on the culture, history, and monuments of India. She has penned books- Tales from the Quran and Hadith, the Delhi Trilogy : Where Stones Speak, The Forgotten Cities of Delhi and...

Why did India drop from 142nd rank to 150th rank on the World Press Freedom Index produced Reporters Without Borders? Today in The Wire Talks episode our host Sidharth Bhatia talks to the journalist and a media freedom activist, Daniel Bastard, Asia-Pacific Desk at Paris-based global press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders and understands the same. Our guest shares about the freedom and limitations of the journalism world; and also states India is a deadly country for...

In this episode of The Wire Talks our host Sidharth Bhatia talks about the rise in communal violence in the story. He speaks about violence against minorities, especially Muslims, residing in the states ruled by the political party in power currently. Joining him in this conversation is Ashutosh Varshney, a Sol Goldman Professor of International Studies and the Social Sciences and Professor of Political Science at Brown University. He also directs the Center for Contemporary South Asia. He...

This episode of The Wire Talks hosted by Sidharth Bhatia is graced by Joseph Sassoon, Professor of History and Political Economy and Director of the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University. The episode unveils the secret of the Sassoon dynasty's rise and fall. They were one of the greatest commercial dynasties of the 19th century. The guest talks about Sassoon spreading their wings in the trade and political arena and more. Our guest Joseph Sassoon also speaks about his...