Atanu Biswas

Ritwik Ghatak, rebel auteur who drew upon his life and times for his art

November 4 marked the centenary of Ghatak, Indian cinema's rebel auteur. Along with Satyajit Ray and Mrinal Sen, he is often hailed as one of Bengali cinema's three maestros

Lights, camera, Diwali: How global TV shows spotlight the festival

Numerous Indian films and television series have featured Diwali over the years, many of which have also gained popularity outside India

A handshake before a game is a show of respect, but what if there is none?

Refusing to shake hands in public by top sportspersons - not for Covid-like precautions, but for other reasons - is a big statement and can cause a lot of social uproar

Beyond a fairytale engagement: Swift-Kelce spark social media frenzy

The engagement announcement came a few weeks after Swift's most in-depth interviews in years on Kelce's "New Heights" podcast, co-hosted by his brother, Jason

How about Sholay 2? Half a century on, Sholay still dominates pop culture

Bollywood has an obsession with remakes of cult films and blockbusters

Satyajit Ray's timeless AI conundrum still echoes in today's world

From loyalty to murder - how Ray's stories foresaw the moral mess of AI long before it began to permeate our daily lives

The comic red line: What defines boundaries of comedians' free expression?

Jesters of the past enjoyed immunity. Today's comedians navigate power, backlash, and blurred lines

Imperator of Mars: Should humanity prioritise space or saving Earth?

Mr Musk is aware that the process of colonising Mars would involve a fleet of reusable spaceships, a substantial financial outlay that might never be recovered

A pitcher of humanity: The evolving significance of the Kumbh Mela

Through history, the Mela has held different meanings for ascetics, the colonised, colonisers, and tourists-but all have been moved by its grandeur

25 years after the Matrix: Simulation theory more relevant than ever

Regardless of The Matrix, Nick Bostrom, Elon Musk, or the peculiarities of quantum physics, we might still be living in "base reality."

AI edition of books

In any case, AIs are known to be biased, to have hallucinations, and to lack a sense of reality. A shade of uncertainty thus remains

Are you not entertained by Bazball?

It's evolved into cricket's new identity, a philosophy and mindset where it hardly matters who wins or loses

Kolkata's very own Hogwarts

While the reading culture erodes and many books go unread, the passion for buying them remains unabated at fairs

Funflation: A Taylor-made show?

The willingness to splurge on live entertainment is reshaping consumer behaviour

AI and the global job market

The AI-driven world may align more with the Keynesian hypothesis than Elon Musk's gloomy prophecy of no jobs

Economics through mysteries

Can detective stories be a clever gateway to learning complex subjects? Two American professor show the way

When will Doctor AI treat me?

The rapid evolution of AI in health care, resembling science fiction scenarios, presents new transformative potential and challenges

Adam Smith's enduring legacy

In the tercentenary of the father of economics, it is worth exploring the impact and relevance of his ideas on economics in today's world

Ever evolving Sherlock Holmes

One drawback of detective stories is that they could easily become period pieces when their style and underlying technologies become antiquated

The dark side of AI art

Generative AI can create eye-catching images but also blur the line between what is true and what is not