Keya Sarkar

While artisans are in plenty, any other skill is scarce in a small town

In recent years the tourists, mainly from Kolkata, made this festival their own

'Not that I agree with all that she or her party prescribes but I am totally in awe of her personal stamina,' the author writes on Mamata Banerjee

When aspirational MBAs or CAs that I needed to handle in my career in Mumbai seemed like child's play

We realised how well he knew Santiniketan because the reticence to come out with Rs 50 was for real

Thanks to the Modi govt's grand plan of a four lane highway all the way to the sacred char dhams, the entire stretch from Haridwar to Rudraprayag was a driving hell filled with loaders, tractors

From a cultural festival, Basanta Utsav has become a merry making weekend jaunt hugely aided and abetted by the innumerable hotels and lodges selling weekend packages

This year, the administration of Burdwan district has barred farmers from sowing the winter paddy as it is dependent solely on ground water

Santiniketan is more a weekend getaway for merry making, drinking and binge buying of crass handicrafts

Where the administration and police failed, just demonetisation and GST did the trick, writes the author

The part of the monsoons that I like in Santiniketan are the bhuttas, writes the author

Only half a dozen sales tax consultants, service around 3,000 shops in Santiniketan and Bolpur

Two of the three women were French, who had come for a yoga retreat in Mysore

Bleaching powder is sprinkled in front of every entrance of the house to keep snakes at bay

It must surely match that of their tribal patients

Tagore paintings were cordoned off from visitors not by rope as is normal but by orange traffic cones

Of the many cities and small towns I have been to in India, Santiniketan, I feel, has a distinction of being surrounded by villages where several crafts are not only alive but are actually, also part