Pack a 'State of Wonder' for your holidays

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 12/9/2012 1:39:00 PM

'I recently read this book for a book club meeting and thought I'd post this short summary here as suggested reading while you lie on a beach somewhere on your December break. The women of the Lakashi tribe living deep in the Amazon forests are having babies even in their 70’s. If this miracle of science can be cracked and marketed in a little pill, the pharmaceutical company bankrolling the'

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Pakistan must seize the day and educate its children

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 11/18/2012 9:01:00 PM

'15-year old Malala Yousafzai is recovering in a UK hospital. When a Taliban fanatic’s bullet wounded 15-year old Malala Yousafzai, Pakistan was forced to make a choice. It could continue it’s dangerous drift towards the bigotry and ignorance of her attackers or decide to invest in a future where education can dispel them. Thankfully, this last week, Pakistan has shown that it is ready to'

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In Mamata Banerjee's Bengal - don't ask, don't yell

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 8/16/2012 12:51:00 AM

'Shiladitya Chowdhury, arrested for asking questions. Tilak Chowdhury has just had his worst Indian Independence Day.  His brother Shiladitya Chowdhury was arrested last week for asking West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee a few uncomfortable questions about the rise in fertiliser prices at a public rally. In Mamata’s version of democracy that is unacceptable and the poor man is now'

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Women’s boxing makes its breakthrough at London 2012

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 8/6/2012 1:11:00 AM

'India's M. C. Mary Kom in action at the Olympics Another all-male bastion was broken into today with the start of the first ever women’s boxing competition at the Olympics and it was a lucky last-minute internet search that revealed two tickets for a place at this historic ringside. My interest in women’s boxing was really due to the belated discovery that an Indian woman from Manipur,'

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London boys, keep your hands to yourself

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 5/26/2012 12:50:00 PM

'Courtesy: The Guardian At the Charing Cross station last night, a tall gangly teenager had the audacity to squeeze my bum on a crowded platform and walk on calmly. He probably looked like a hero to his friends because the girl in the group was giggling. I glowered at her and she quickly said, “It wasn’t me, it was him.” Since she confirmed that and since a police officer descended the'

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TIME magazine should pull Narendra Modi off the list

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 4/3/2012 6:51:00 PM

'Reuters' Arko Dutta's iconic image of Qutubuddin Ansari begging for mercy during the riots. TIME magazine has shown extremely poor editorial judgement by including Narendra Modi in a voting list of 2012’s “influential” people who are “leaders, artists, innovators, icons and heroes.” As Chief Minister of the state of Gujarat, Narendra Modi is an elected leader - a sad outcome of India’s flawed'

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Book Review: 'The Snow People' by Marie Herbert

Author : Alaphia Zoyab      Blog : Reporter's diary      Date : 12/10/2011 12:25:00 AM

'I suppose we will all promise anything in the first flush of romance. So it was with British Polar explorer Wally Herbert, who offered to take his newly wedded wife, Marie Herbert and their 10-month old daughter to live 800 miles within the Arctic Circle with one of the most isolated people on Earth – the Inughuit or ‘real people’. The young family came to live on Herbert Island, just off the'

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