I still remember him. We were not from the same university, but we were friends. Because both of us loved discussing philosophy. Sometimes, he preferred writing long letters to me and used to post them at my address.
His personal life became full of complications because of strained relations with his father, who wanted him to run his home business, which my friend refused. It ended in a trace of bitterness with his father, who disavowed him one day. It caused severe depression in his life, which continued for a year.

One day, I came to know that he was…

Two of my friends are Netflix terminators. Their phones brim with the notifications of new series or the new season of shows the all day long. Sometimes, I suspect they eagerly wait for them.

Because I know they never want to miss any.

I have been addicted to Netflix and have watched shows in a row like sitting for almost 6 hours. But I am not a person that can compete with my friends.

I always wonder what goes in our mind while watching a screen for hours, and how our neurons manage our brain chemicals during screen time.

I…

When Coronavirus started affecting habits of sociality during lockdowns, humans turned toward their smartphones’ screens.

Within March alone, Twitter was topped up with the stories of shock and amazement. People were posting picture grabs of their increased screen time. Although some excused themselves saying that it is an unprecedented time, many were horrified that smartphones had eaten up more than seven days of a month of their life.

Those were the days when people were anxiously looking for every bit of news created and fed by the coronavirus pandemic. These bits and bytes of anxieties fueled their loneliness more and…

When I trek in the Himalayas, I find my smartphone almost useless. It can get me nowhere, and it is of virtually no use because there is no signal and no internet above a certain altitude. But I’ve to carry it because when I descend, I need my phone to reconnect with the world I left behind.

The days I spend in mountains are natural digital detox to me, not by force but after an informed decision to trek in an area out of reach of the noise.

I think altitude is the key. Where all kind of digital cacophony…

Sometimes I wonder what the world would have been like if we all knew our future?

Perhaps that would be a boring world whether you are in heaven or hell. As if you are a program and some programmer has written out a code for you. You will not even have free will. Why would you want that when you don’t need to make a decision?

When everything has already been decided, what fun would it be to live such a life? …

Dean Mahomed was only ten years old when his father died in battle fighting for East India Company in Bengal. Dean became an orphan. An Anglo-Irish officer in the Company, Captain Godfrey Evan Baker, took him into his guardianship. Later, Baker got him appointed in the Company army when he was in his teens.

In an unexpected turn of events, Baker had to resign from the Company service in 1782 on the charge of embezzlement of funds. Now his close associate Dean Mahomed followed him. He also resigned from the Company service the same year. Baker decided to leave India…

When coronavirus started spreading in February this year, religious congregations all over the world were became the reason of anxiety spots. Governments banned the public meetings though hesitatingly. Religious activities were soon under lockdowns. They were asked to vacate their buildings and follow social distancing norms. But this was not an easy task.

The core of the religions has been the promotion of togetherness and physical closeness. Religious leaders had to accept and comply with these norms half-heartedly. In many countries of Asia and Africa, they resisted. …

I was around 13 years old when on a cold February night, my friends and I brought a film on rent from a video store. The film was — The Evil Dead, supernatural horror flick of 1981. The store manager had convinced us that it was the scariest film ever made. I don’t know about my friends but I had a prior experience of watching horror films. We were all excited by the thought of watching it together.

In the 1990s, if you wanted to watch a movie at home, VHS tapes and video cassette players were the only options…