‘Saddam Beach’— the signboard with the executed Iraqi dictator’s picture greets visitors to Kavarathi, the headquarters of the Union Territory of Lakshadweep. Similar nomenclature on the other side of the Arabian Sea - in Kozhikode in Kerala - had hogged news space. The island doesn’t come under media radars but for its tourism potential. Despite familiar signposts, Lakshadweep has little in common with Kerala as far as politics is concerned. Elections to the lone parliamentary seat and ten panchayats are keenly contested by the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party, allies at national level. A poster in red letters, pasted by the nascent branch committee of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), blames the Congress-led Union government for everything from Israel’s attack on Gaza to erratic ship services to anomalies in granting Scheduled Tribe status to ... read more

The ship is still swaying. A green line of land is visible through the cabin window. Clockwork flashes from the light house illuminate the pre-dawn grey sea. A public address system tells the passengers to be ready to disembark at Kalpeni. There are no ladders leading to the jetty, there is no jetty to land, and there is no land. MV Kavarathi is anchored a mile or so off the coast, from where mechanized boats dart towards the ship. For freshers, the adventure is about to begin. For islanders it’s homecoming. The 2.79-square kilometre atoll is surrounded by a 25.60-square kilometre shallow lagoon which keeps big vessels at bay. Watertight doors at deck 1 are opened. We get ready to disembark - to a boat bobbing with the waves. Asif Azad and M P Masood, our ... read more

The snow on the distant mountains has melted. It was a picture post-card at noon when we checked into the hotel by the narrow Beas River in New Manali. Now the mountains look as if sprinkled with bleaching powder. Tomorrow we would discover that snow is neither like bleaching powder nor like cotton pieces hung around the crib on Christmas Eve. Only two categories of tourists seem to ascend to Kullu-Manali: honeymooners in search of the snowy heights and hippieish foreigners high on hashish. At daybreak, at a roadside eatery a few kilometers short of Kullu valley, the driver of our bus had told me that we were supposed to reach Manali by 10. “But then, it’s the mountain road,” he added, scalding his throat with a cup of steaming coffee. The pessimism is justified on ... read more

It was drizzling at Tawang lamasery as in Bomdila. The 400-year-old gompa, surpassed in antiquity only by the temple of Llasa, the heartland of Tibetan Buddhism, is still in slumber. The monks are yet to gather for prayers. The sonorous tune from the gyaling pervades the lamasery. Two young monks shrouded in morning mist blow the short trumpets from a small temple atop an unfinished building in the compound. Neighbourhood Monpa women help monks with their daily chores. The monastic musicians enter the gompa past ferocious chimandas who guard the pantheon of Vajrayana deities. They stow away their gyalings inside a box between the rows of cushions. Presiding over the pantheon of deities and fairies is a mammoth idol of the Buddha in a yellow robe. The gompa is huge compared to the one in Bomdila. ... read more

By the time the beautiful Barna Borat, our hostess in the air, smiled her customary goodbye at the drenched Guwahati airport, we had had enough of the clouds. The ATR from Kolkata was a bit scarier than the usual air journeys. Turbulence, the captain had said as I was reliving childhood fantasies where clouds shaped into snow castles, prancing unicorns, landing eagles and fighting demons. Then we proceeded to the house of clouds - Meghalaya. Guwahati is the sole gateway to the north-eastern states, linked to the rest of India by the 20-kilometre-wide Siliguri Corridor sandwiched by Nepal and Bangladesh. Rhinos, yaks and platoons of armed men march here. The threat of foreign aggression and internal insurgency keep this land a hot spot. To cross the Assam border to most of the other north-eastern states, you ... read more