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Dispatches from Kolkata
Wednesdays at 7:35am and 4:45pm

Every week NPR contributor (and former San Franciscian) Sandip Roy brings you a little taste of the 'new India' – a letter home from his other home.

Latest Episodes
  • When Sandip came to America on his student visa his biggest concern was weather or not to bring a pressure cooker. Today the concern is a bit more than that.
  • In a world preoccupied with exerting our rights over a patch of land, Sandip remembers he once I had a patch of sky as well and a clothesline strung across it where his stories could hang out to dry.
  • Trump’s tariff war has left a very sweet and sought after casualty on the docks. Mangos.
  • As Indians celebrate the 140th birth anniversary of Satyajit Ray another story is coming to light. How a humble business man became his most ardent fan and producer.
  • In a world where we communicate more than ever across time zones and borders Sandip Roy considers the value of a handwritten letter.
  • We have become a country of food pop-ups and one where everyone’s food sticks in someone else’s craw. As the political row over the Chittaranjan Park fish market shows when someone is ready to fish in troubled waters even a red herring will do.
  • Happy New Year! April 15th was the Bengali New Year, but the LAST day of the year means the Charak Mela!
  • A group trying to save Kolkatas historic trams makes a case that the old streetcars actually benefit the mangroves of the Sundarbans.
  • Freedom fries, the Gulf of America and Cafe Canadiano. Sandip Roy explains.
  • A new approach at the Indian Museum in Kolkata is blending up some interesting pairings. Sandip Roy goes for a visit.