No matter the time of day, the visitors in queue at Mumbai’s Tata Memorial Hospital (TMH) always have a discomfiting poise. Most have travelled long distances; but the group seems curated by one illness, cancer. An illness that can be manageable, like a chronic disease, but often isn’t. In 2012, the leadership at TMH, the … Read more
When it comes to antibiotics, an over 10% resistance is almost too high. Indians show resistance as high as 99.9% towards some antibiotics. This, as per a paper published in the Indian Journal of Medical Research (IJMR) on 3 June—the first paper that indisputably establishes that Indians are alarmingly antibiotic resistant. Not only are Indians … Read more
On 18 February at the World Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Congress in Mumbai, Soumitro Chakraborty, CEO of Innovative Financial Advisors Pvt Ltd (Fiinovation), was the toast of the town. The Congress focused on companies helping implement sustainable development goals in health, education and the social sector. That night, Chakraborty won the ‘CEO of the year’ … Read more
The global initiative to eradicate polio had big dreams for 2019. It was the latest deadline for the eradication of the polio virus in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Reports in July, however, indicate that 2019 can be added to a growing heap of missed deadlines. Not only is polio still rife in both countries, but … Read more
It was in early 2018, in the temperature-controlled Sleep Research Laboratory in the Life Sciences department of Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), that seven mice took us one step closer in the quest to unravel the mysteries of sleep. Shepherding them was Dr Sushil K Jha, a neurologist who’s devoted 20 years to mine whatever … Read more
“Delete Truecaller.” These two words threatened the very existence of Truecaller, after a user’s chance discovery went viral, last week. The app, which actively filters spam calls and messages for more than 100 million smartphone users in India—and tens of millions more worldwide—was found to enroll some users for UPI without their knowledge. UPI or … Read more
“If you have a math question, I’m 99% sure it exists in our database,” says Tanushree Nagori. We’re inside a giant boardroom, with off-white walls and rows of tables, which double up as writing surfaces. Nagori draws on the table between us, explaining where her fledgling online venture—Doubtnut—lies within India’s edtech landscape, which is projected … Read more
A perfect storm is gathering over the country’s most dominant digital platforms. Over the last decade in India, billions of dollars have been spent by startups, venture capitalists and tech multinationals as they seek to rewrite entire sectors. In the process, they’ve managed market shares that took their “offline” or “old economy” peers decades to … Read more