From Bandarpunch and Nanda Devi to the Annapurna and more, Zachary Conrad recommends five must-read books for a better understanding of the mountains we seek to scale—beyond us, and within us.

The lockdown has worsened systematic failures in the Indian police, rooting from implicit biases and leading to more violence. Sadaf Vidha takes stock of the American movement against police brutality to frame against the glaring issues back home in India.

Short story by Karan Madhok: ‘In the chaos of the pre-lunch Sunday crowd at the mall, in their continuing hum, their smells, their colours, their everything… all that Shalu and Abhimanyu now shared was a small absence of sound, an envelope without its contents.’

From Water and Lagaa Chunari Mein Daag to Masaan and Mukti Bhawan, Ankur Choudhary examines films about the holy city of Varanasi to uncover the uneasy intersection of culture, gender politics, modernity, and more.

In a deconstruction of Anurag Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur (2012), Ishan Mukherjee revisits the history, soundtrack, and the work of an inspired auteur director that truly made this saga a cinematic classic.

A cyclone. A phone call. A two-dimensional time-machine. Barnali Ray Shukla shares the tug of emotions after storms of the past and the present in this poetic photo-essay.

Photo Essay: Deep in the mountains, the seeds of mutual loneliness evolved into an unlikely camaraderie. Aman Panwar writes about his friend Shyama—a cattle-herder and shepherd—in the Har Ki Dun valley.

To provide a glimpse of India’s metal scene, Nidhi Lodaya interviewed some of the country’s top bands, shared personal experiences, and expressed hope for a genre beyond its traditional stereotypes and misconceptions.

Four poems by Amit Shankar Saha: ‘The city awakes / / from the depths of sleep / and beyond the walls / their minds are released / from quarantine.

The nihilistic poetry collection Black Verses (2018) by Sarvesh Wahie offers a call for pure meditation, of accepting oneself in a vacuum. Review by Karan Madhok.

An existential homage to the Coen brothers, the Indian web-series Afsos emerged as surprising, surreal, and - despite its flaws - a must-watch. Review by Prateek Santram

India’s economy has failed the most-vulnerable half of the population. Shefali Saldanha argues that the pandemic could be an opportunity to change the system.