India

Women voters expected to play significant role in India’s general election

Politics

A multiweek general election is underway in India and more women are taking part in it than ever before. Nearly half of the electorate is expected to be female. The country’s political parties are now running campaign ads targeted toward women to win over this crucial voting bloc.

The largest election in the world begins in India

Elections
Large group of Indian farmers sitting on a green ground outside

‘We are helpless’: Protesting farmers in India pose challenges — and demands — to Modi

Striped red-and-white flags adorn a sacred grove in a quiet neighborhood in Ranchi in India. The ubiquitous flags are an assertion of tribal identity.

Adherents of Sarnaism try to preserve their identity and culture by pushing for more recognition of their faith in India

Sacred Nation
Two girls in casual attire at home

How a US education is already paying off for some

A busy lunchtime at the Daryaganj restaurant, which claims to own the recipe for the original butter chicken and has been sued for copyright infringement by a rival Delhi restaurant.

Who invented butter chicken? Dueling claims battle it out in an Indian high court.

Food

The grandsons of two now-deceased business partners are fighting over claims of whose grandfather invented the beloved Indian dish, butter chicken.

A construction crew works on Ram Mandir, a Hindu temple dedicated to Lord Ram in Ayodhya, India, Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2024.

‘Religious triumphalism’: A grand Hindu temple opens on a controversial site in India 

Sacred Nation

On Jan. 22, a temple of Lord Ram will open its doors in Ayodhya, in northern India. The temple stands where the Babri mosque once existed, before it was torn down by a Hindu mob. The occasion marks a victory for Hindus and a sorrowful reminder for Muslims of the ongoing tensions between the two groups in a Hindu-majority country.

Sikh separatist leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun is pictured in his office in New York, Nov. 29, 2023.

Assassination plot in the US allegedly traces back to Indian govt

On Wednesday, a US federal indictment was unsealed, charging Indian national Nikhil Gupta in a murder-for-hire plot ordered up by an official inside the Indian government for targeting Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a dual American and Canadian citizen, in New York.

Intricate carvings adorn the marble pillars inside a Jain temple in Ahmedabad, western India. Jainism is an ancient religion whose followers often renounce the world to lead a life of extreme austerity. Most of them are women, some as young as 8.

‘Happiness is in your hands’: Young Jain women continue to renounce the world

Sacred Nation

The Jain religious community in India makes up less than than 1% of the population. A steady number of them — even children — are renouncing the material world to join Jain monasteries.

Bharatiya Jain Sanghatana campus is currently home to about 400 students affected by natural disasters and other crises.

30 years after a devastating earthquake, this school in India continues a legacy of support for survivors

Bharatiya Jain Sanghatana’s educational rehabilitation school in Pune, India, was founded to support the complex needs of students who have experienced natural disasters and other traumatic crises. The school hopes to be a model for disaster relief around the world.