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New Lines Magazine •

India’s 'Freebie' Politics May Have Reached America

In a Trumpian world, shock value is a depreciating currency, even for the man at its center. This week, however, U.S. President Donald Trump managed to spend some anyway, pledging a $5,000 “Trump dividend” to every adult American citizen if Republicans retain control of Congress come November. The news expectedly drew outrage, with critics calling the stunt a “bribe” and pointing to the president’s earlier unfulfilled promises of similar dividends, but across large swaths of the developing democ...
New Lines Magazine •

Penguin India's About-Face on Sonia Gandhi's Memoir Fits a Pattern

Unlike their American counterparts, few Indian politicians have chronicled their own lives through memoirs. So when New York-based publisher Alfred A. Knopf announced it would publish Sonia Gandhi’s “Belonging: A Story of Love,” out on Nov. 10, the news created a stir in India. And when The Indian Express reported that Penguin Random House India, Knopf’s sister company, would not publish the Indian edition, it came as a rude shock to all.The dispute was over some “editorial changes and deletions...
New Lines Magazine •

Hindutva Ideologue Mohan Bhagwat Is Touring the US, but the Hindu Right Has Stalled

Mohan Bhagwat is neither an elected politician nor does he hold any office in India, yet he wields power that exceeds both. As the chief of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the fountainhead of Hindu nationalism, Bhagwat presides over an organization whose cadre populates the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leadership at every level. Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself rose through the RSS ranks before entering electoral politics. Beyond setting the tone for Indian politics as the BJP’s ma...
New Lines Magazine •

Why Christian Evangelicals Are Taking On India’s Foreign Funding Law

Since the second Donald Trump administration took office, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi became one of the first world leaders to meet the new American president in February 2025, U.S.-India relations have been dominated by a cluster of issues: illegal immigration, reciprocal tariffs, Washington’s role in mediating the India-Pakistan war, India’s oil purchases from Russia, billionaire Gautam Adani’s U.S. bribery indictment. The long-awaited U.S.-India trade deal has been unresolved for...
New Lines Magazine •

How India’s Gen Z Made Profanity Political

During the recent youth uprising in India, some profanities and slurs that most Indians would hesitate to repeat made their way into a handful of popular slogans aimed at Prime Minister Narendra Modi. They shocked not only the older generations, but also some millennials, as well as seasoned members of civil society, the independent media and leaders of progressive rights movements, accustomed to a certain decorum and seriousness in protest language.A popular slogan rhymed the Hindi word for “bi...
New Lines Magazine •

Rahul Gandhi’s Dramatic Arrest Has Boosted His Chances of Taking on Modi

His nose is bloodied, his eyes wide and fixed ahead, his face a mix of defiance and agitation. The image of Rahul Gandhi — the leader of the Indian National Congress and the opposition in the Indian Parliament — resisting his detention by the Delhi Police outside Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s residence has left a strong imprint on the Indian public imagination.Politics thrives on optics, and the visuals of security personnel physically grabbing Gandhi as he lay on the ground, speaking into the...
New Lines Magazine •

Mamdani’s ‘Mapgate’ Reveals New York’s Changing Immigrant Politics

Wake up, there is a new Mamdani controversy in town. This time, New York City is debating who gets to belong and how one gets represented in one of the world’s most diverse metropolises.The latest flash point is a map of immigrant enclaves dotting the city’s five boroughs. The image features a range of ethnicities — from Chinese, African, Latino and South Asian to Arab and Eastern European. Since it omitted Little Italy and some other ethnic hubs, the map ended up drawing the ire of the Italian-...
New Lines Magazine •

New York's Elections Were About More Than Mamdani

Kingmaker, power broker, Mamdani tsunami, Mamdani magic. National media outlets have used various descriptors to explain New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s impact on the recently concluded congressional primaries in his state. The candidates he endorsed pulled off some of the biggest upsets, triggering yet another political earthquake that has rattled the Democratic establishment.Brad Lander defeated the incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in New York’s 10th District. In the open 7th District seat, Cla...
New Lines Magazine •

‘Teen Takeovers’ in US Cities Are Becoming a Political Issue

On Thursday, former D.C. councilmember Kenyan McDuffie conceded to fellow member Janeese Lewis George, a democratic socialist, after she built a double-digit lead in Washington’s Democratic mayoral primary.One of the defining issues of the race was so-called “teen takeovers” — a term used to describe large gatherings of young people organized through social media.The issue exploded into the campaign after a video showing teenagers brawling inside a fast-casual restaurant went viral. McDuffie sei...
New Lines Magazine •

Knicks Remind the City: Everyone Is a New Yorker

Blue and orange have become the colors of New York City. They belong to the Knicks, the city’s basketball team, which has made it to the NBA Finals for the first time since 1999. The team is now one game away from bringing back the championship to the city. Meanwhile, Knicks mania has swept across New York. Through jerseys, T-shirts, shoelaces, handbags, hair accessories and makeup, fans are expressing their love in myriad ways. Strangers are greeting one another with “Go Knicks” or “Knicks in f...
New Lines Magazine •

The Surprising Reach of Pope Leo's New Doctrine on AI

In Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical (essentially a papal letter issued as guidance), the pontiff framed artificial intelligence as a moral test for humanity. “Magnifica Humanitas” (“Magnificent Humanity”) — with its subtitle, “Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence” — calls for a “measured and vigilant approach” to AI, which the pope warned could deepen inequality. Although he stressed that a technology built and governed by a small elite cannot serve the common good...
New Lines Magazine •

Why Indian Conductor Zubin Mehta’s Boycott Felt Like Betrayal in Israel

A mural of Zubin Mehta, the celebrated Indian conductor of Western classical music, was recently unveiled in New Delhi as part of the Lodhi Art District, the capital’s well-known street art initiative. Commissioned nearly a year ago by the Israeli Embassy, the mural marked Mehta’s 90th birthday on April 29 and honors one of the most celebrated cultural figures shared by India and Israel, famously dubbed “the world’s conductor.”Born in the city then known as Bombay, the Parsi conductor has been a...
New Lines Magazine •

Mamdani Wants the Koh-i-Noor Diamond Returned, but to Whom?

In 1839, after the demise of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the founder and ruler of the Sikh Empire, his successors were unable to sustain his opulent kingdom and left it to his youngest son, the 5-year-old Duleep Singh, in 1843. At its peak, the empire extended from the regions of Gilgit and Tibet in the north to Multan in the south, and included cities such as Lahore, Peshawar and Amritsar, now divided between the modern-day nations of India and Pakistan.After years of Anglo-Sikh wars, when the East...
New Lines Magazine •

The Protests Gripping India — and Rattling Modi

If the scenes emerging from Delhi reveal anything, it is that fear has begun to loosen its grip on a significant section of the Indian public — the fear of taking to the streets, of questioning the government, of demanding accountability and, above all, the fear of criticizing Prime Minister Narendra Modi. On Monday, tens of thousands of demonstrators filled the streets of the capital’s tightly controlled central district, home to the seat of India’s government, as chants of “Modi must resign,”...
New Lines Magazine •

How the World Cup Helped America See Itself Afresh

The owner of Parkwood Deli in Midland Park, New Jersey, Roger Schnorrbusch — known to his nearly 830,000 TikTok followers as “the deli guy” — has been serving sandwiches for over two decades. A viral personality due to his hyped-up, theatrical videos featuring him whipping up a chicken parmesan sandwich or an eggplant parm stacked with hot peppers, his videos rack up thousands of views, and customers come in from as far as California to grab a bite.Last month, however, he started drawing a diffe...
New Lines Magazine •

The Crisis Facing American Universities Is Bigger Than the MBA

In December 2023, Siddharth, who asked to be identified only by his first name, had applied to 10 American universities — including New York University, Columbia, Dartmouth, Stanford and UCLA — for graduate programs related to finance and business analytics. The Indian student eventually enrolled at Brandeis University, graduated last December and now works at a management consulting firm in Boston as part of Optional Practical Training (OPT), a program that allows graduates to work in the U.S....
New Lines Magazine •

A Progressive Hindu Bloc Emerges in American Politics

The first door didn’t go well. David Orkin was campaigning in South Richmond Hill, a neighborhood in New York’s Queens borough, when he met with a familiar piece of political wisdom. The man who answered said he had worked on Democratic campaigns for years, and in a neighborhood that is overwhelmingly South Asian, voters would back the candidate who looked like them. In his view, identity was paramount.But the next door told a different story. It was a multigenerational Bangladeshi Muslim family...
New Lines Magazine •

Pakistani Nationals Allege Arbitrary Detention and Deportation From the UAE

For Sarah Ali, the first sign of trouble came when stories about men from her village in Pakistan and neighboring Shiite-majority areas disappearing or being deported without explanation began to crop up in her social media feeds and WhatsApp groups, as well as in conversations with relatives back home. Her husband, Taha, had worked for Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority for over a decade, so at first she didn’t think much of it.Then, on April 12, just as he began an overnight shift, the offi...
New Lines Magazine •

Pakistan Is Taking on a New Role in the Middle East

On April 11, as negotiations between the United States and Iran were underway in Islamabad, Pakistan deployed fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, in the first visible move under their mutual defense pact. In the week following the talks, Pakistan’s Field Marshal Asim Munir made a trip to Tehran, while Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif set off on a four-day tour to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey. In addition, Saudi Arabia and Qatar extended a $5 billion loan to Pakistan, while the United Arab Emirates soug...
New Lines Magazine •

Pakistan’s Balancing Act in the Iran War

Since the Iran war began in late February, Pakistan has been walking a tightrope, balancing its ties with the neighboring country, with its economic and defense partners among the Gulf states, and with the United States.On Tuesday, when Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced a ceasefire in the war and stepped forward to host talks between Washington and Tehran, he provided an off-ramp for the warring parties. Pakistan’s role as a mediator also represented a rare diplomatic win for th...
New Lines Magazine •

A New Generation Is Redefining Pakistani Cuisine in the US

When my friends and I crave Pakistani food, we no longer have to trek all the way to Jackson Heights — the desi immigrant neighborhood in New York City — for late-night kebabs (even though the city’s first South Asian mayor, Zohran Mamdani, thoroughly spotlighted the neighborhood and its iconic Kabab King restaurant during his campaign). If we’re in the East Village, we often end up at Kolachi after a film or a show, unwrapping paratha rolls slick with oil and spices on the sidewalk. Bearing the...
sg's newsletter •

The Mira Nair–Mahmood Mamdani Discovery Route No One Predicted

On June 23, a day before the Democratic primary in New York City — when the race had essentially narrowed to two frontrunners, Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo — there was a film screening in the city. Mira Nair’s Monsoon Wedding, followed by a conversation with the filmmaker. Initially, I had decided against going. I’d seen the film before, including the adapted musical directed by Nair in 2023. But then I was curious. I wanted to see what the vibe of the room would be like on the eve of the pri...
The Indian Express •

‘It’s cool to see that a brown person can be in City Hall’: In Mamdani’s win, many communities that rallied behind him find a voice

It is midnight in Astoria, the Queens neighbourhood Zohran Mamdani represents in the New York State Assembly, and hundreds of New Yorkers have poured into the streets to celebrate his historic win as New York City’s first South Asian, Indian-origin, and Muslim mayor.People in cars honk their horns as Arab and Bollywood music blares from Moka & Co., a popular Yemeni café in Astoria — one of New York’s most diverse enclaves and a hub for growing immigrant communities from South Asia, the Middle Ea...
New Lines Magazine •

Writers Explore the Long Shadow of Partition in South Asia

The first time I learned about the Partition, it must have been through school textbooks. But they didn’t delve into the mass displacement, violence and trauma caused by one of the largest forced migrations and tragedies of the 20th century, which occurred when British India was divided into India and Pakistan in 1947 as the countries gained independence from colonial rule. Over 14 million people migrated and over a million were killed in the communal riots that engulfed the region. It was perha...
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