Keya Sarkar

Gone with the Covid

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

The holi virus

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

NPR anyone?

'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

Not a child's play

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

The fear of Rs 50

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

Are you a 'voluntourist'?

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

Return to tradition

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

Waste not, want not

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

Winds of change

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

How GST, note ban curbed festival noise

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

Joys and travails of monsoon

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

When you get the GST blues

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

Taking foreign tourists for a ride

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

A timely and useful gift

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

Keya Sarkar: The patience of doctors

It must surely match that of their tribal patients

Keya Sarkar: When an MP "developed" Tagore

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

Keya Sarkar: Perplexed by my own code

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

Keya Sarkar: The breed of WhatsApping retailers

Keya Sarkar: The joys of growing your own food

Keya Sarkar: Doctor 'Do-littles'