Rush Mukherjee

Kolkata

Journalist at Freelance

Consultant, BBC Monitoring | ex-Reuters | bylines @vogueindia @openly @bbcindia @mint_lounge @scroll_in etc

Articles

Love All - Open The Magazine

1 week ago | openthemagazine.com | Rush Mukherjee

Space: the final frontier, says the introductory narrator of Star Trek. In similar fashion, the writer of All Our Loves: Journeys with Polyamory in India, Arundhati Ghosh, considers the normalisation of monoamory (the practice of being in a romantic or sexual relationship with a single partner at a time) to be the final frontier in the struggle for queer and feminist liberation, both globally and in India.
‘Soumitra Chatterjee and His World’: A moving tribute to a beloved Bengali icon

2 months ago | scroll.in | Rush Mukherjee

Soumitra Chatterjee. The name itself evokes a million emotions for Bengalis and film-lovers. The man himself is a bundle of contradictions; from Apur Sansar to Bela Seshe, from Kony to Atanka: he is associated with the best of Bengali cinema, but also some of the worst. Cinephiles the world over know his name, and yet he remains largely unknown in his own country beyond the borders of West Bengal.
Inside the complex rooms of queer kinksters in India

Dec 19, 2024 | queerbeat.org | Rush Mukherjee

Standing at 5’10” with close-cropped grey hair and tattoos, 50-year-old Bawaal*, a cis queer woman, hesitated under the spotlight but found encouragement in the audience’s cheers. “Kink made me open up literally and figuratively,” she told the audience. Bawaal was participating in an open mic session. The theme was ‘The Right to Pleasure,’ and the occasion, Kink Con 2024—a gathering of kink enthusiasts in a city on the west coast of India.
How A Facebook Group Became An Underground Library For Indian Students

Oct 31, 2024 | boomlive.in | Rush Mukherjee

The world of academic publishing has long been a battleground. Scholars have criticised the system as broken, and many now see themselves as modern-day Robin Hoods, fighting to free their own research from expensive paywalls. Online piracy has been a major thorn in the side of the publishing industry. In the United States alone, publishers lose about $300 million yearly to e-book piracy.
Priyanka Mattoo - ‘It was like going from being a rock to a rubber ball’

Aug 30, 2024 | hindustantimes.com | Rush Mukherjee

What gave you the idea for the book? It felt like a compulsion at some point. I had always been a big reader, and it had never occurred to me that I too, could someday write a book. But I started writing these essays after I left producing, and once I started to write down all the stories (in) the essay form, (that) made it more manageable... if I could go down into the moments of my life. That was a format that I could wrap the story around. So that’s where I started – with my core memories.
The Indian alcohol industry is “desifying” right in front of your eyes

Mar 15, 2024 | vogue.in | Rush Mukherjee

The General Manager at Little Bit Sober, a cocktail bar in Kolkata, places a glass of clear liquid in front of me. I take a sip. It’s tangy, savoury, delicious—and dangerous. I could easily knock back several of these without blinking. “It’s our take on the Bloody Mary,” says Md Shabaz. “But we use fresh tomato water, blended and strained celery soda with an injection of carbon dioxide, peri peri spice around the rim… and kasundi.”This last ingredient, kasundi, is a staple in Bengali homes.
The Indian alcohol industry is “desifying” right in front of your eyes

Mar 14, 2024 | flipboard.com | Rush Mukherjee

3:142 hours agoMan loses 64kg and becomes personal trainer after girlfriend left him due to weight gainSWNS • 2hA man depressed when a girlfriend left him due to his weight gain has lost 64kg - and now works as a personal trainer. Nithun Puvirajasingam, 27, gained 44kg during lockdown and went from 100kg to 144kg. He says his girlfriend couldn't bear to see him "eat himself to death" and left him and he decided to get his life back on track.
How Durga Puja became one of the world's largest unofficial public arts festivals

Feb 12, 2024 | architecturaldigest.in | Rush Mukherjee

Pintu, a member of artist Anirban Das's team, took a paintbrush and drew a slow, careful, deliberate line. It stood out in black on white – in fact, the entire lane, situated in a prominent part of North Kolkata, stood out in black and white, painted from the mouth all the way down to the marquee, known as a pandal, at the far end. The whole lane – all the house facades along it, even the lamp posts – had been painted to give it the appearance of a page from a comic book.
Easing the path to love and friendship for neurodivergent individuals

Feb 11, 2024 | lifestyle.livemint.com | Rush Mukherjee

Home > Relationships> It's Complicated > LAST PUBLISHED 12.02.2024 | 01:00 PM IST When Putul Tiwari started to experience extreme bouts of depression in 2014, followed by equally extreme bouts of hyperactivity, she knew something was wrong. “I was losing grip on reality,” says the 33-year-old, speaking from her car for privacy in her hometown of Bhilai, Chhattisgarh.
Makeover in Manipur: Trans-run beauty salons brave bloodshed

Nov 5, 2023 | openlynews.com | Rush Mukherjee

Manipur is home to many trans-owned beauty parlours, which are in deep economic trouble due to violent clashes in the Indian state Transgender-owned beauty parlours thrived in eastern India Now months of violence threaten commerce in Imphal Trans women face limited alternate work options By Rush Mukherjee KOLKATA, Nov 6 (Openly) - It's hard to style hair, pluck brows and do makeovers when armed troops are on the streets suppressing months of deadly clashes. Harder still if you're a...