Fiction by Aditi Chandrasekar: ‘She rubs the soap over her arms, her legs, her chest, then squeezes a dollop of shampoo and conditioner onto her palms before rubbing and lathering it on her hair. She wonders if this is what makes Shruti’s hair so luscious. Then, she thinks about Gagan, and wonders how many times they’ve showered together in this bathroom.’

Poetry by Tabish Nawaz: ‘I breath to fluidize the gravels / but they fall back / like the debris in a city / bombed for months.’

Ronald Ross was once immortalized in Amitav Ghosh’s historical novel. Nivedita Dey rediscovers a memorial dedicated to Kolkata’s forgotten, Nobel laureate physician.

Set against a backdrop of religious abuse and suffocating intolerance, Sohali Rauf’s Blasphear is a sharp commentary on the ideas of nationhood, and how its intangible forces act as blind shepherds, leading the masses down paths they cannot question. By Amritesh Mukherjee

The ecopoems in Gopal Lahiri’s Anemone Morning delve into a kind of exploratory myth that engages readers with creative potential, stressing that there could be no division between who we are and where we are. By Dustin Pickering

Poetry by Sambhu R.: ‘Our reflections walk out of mirrors, / ashamed to take on / the semblance of our sinister shapes’

Flash Fiction by Rachel Buttigieg: ‘Memories don’t simply fade after grass burns away; shadows remain like the beautiful hibiscus from childhood memories shared in the gardens of destiny, where our mothers were to be friends.’

With a major national robotics win, two Mumbai teenagers take their creation to the World Robotics Olympiad. Their accomplishment could pave the way for more future leaders from India in the fields of science and technology. By Bushra Satkhed

Nishant Injam’s debut story collection The Best Possible Experience (2024) features a cast of characters between India and the United States who are often homesick for another world: a world that could be a physical or a metaphorical distance away, a world they aspire to with the burdens of a life unfulfilled. By Karan Madhok

Poetry by Ankush Banerjee: ‘Before anaesthesia shatters / the bough of your body, before the / moon overhead is a mouth of darkness, you / pray they fill the space between dislocated hip / & future with what you heard but / could never hold’

A city rooted in colonial legend, Nivedita Dey examines the linguistics of place, names, food, and culture that keep the “Calcutta” in Kolkata.

Poetry by Mrittika Chatterjee: ‘Windows cradle the world’s weight— / concerns, french braided, / but strands, a newly freed tribe. / Steering wheel clutched, / as if holding an inner child’