Live Wire

LiveWire is a place for and by people of any and all age groups to share their views and imagination, opinion pieces on politics, feminism, LGBTQIA rights, pop culture, movies, books, TV, music, dating/relationships, sexuality and to debate issues you face at school, on campus, online or out in the world.

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Featured Writers

Ayushman Basu

I write for a living because I love it. Here are some of the words I have written till now.

Shanna Jain

Hello,My name is Shanna Jain (she/her) and I am a PhD scholar at the School of Liberal Arts at IIT Jodhpur. My interests lie in and around literary and cultural …

Aishwarya Shrivastav

Journalism and Mass Communication student with experience in Print and Digital Journalism. Enthusiastic researcher. Full Time Poet.

Nivedya P T

First-year Convergent Journalism student of AJK MCRC, Jamia Millia Islamia. Graduate of B. A (Hons) Multimedia and Mass Communication from Delhi University with a keen interest in the field of …

Ambalika Chaudhry

Varisha Tariq

Varisha Tariq is an Independent Journalist and writer working with the intersectionality of culture, travel, and gender.

Latest Articles

Movie Review: In Malayalam Film '19(1)(a)', the Personal Is the Political

The complexity of the idea of freedom of speech is generally not reflected in films tackling the subject that generally take the hackneyed form of a political courtroom drama or a crime thriller. 19(1)(a) is impactful because it puts the focus on how an ordinary person quietly taking agency over …

By Angela Therese Mathew
17th August 2022 • Live Wire

The Corporatisation of the JNU Campus Is Underway

On June 22, 2022, the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration issued another round of notice to the owners of dhabas, canteens and photocopy shops inside the campus, demanding hefty fines and asking them to vacate the campus by June 30. According to a statement by the varsity, the businesses have …

By Nivedya P T
5th August 2022 • Live Wire

Changing Intimacies

A friend recently explained how Snapchat works, and I remember feeling slightly disconcerted. I learned that streaks are an integral part of Snapchat — you and your online friend have to send each other a Snap at least three days in a row to maintain it. These Snapstreaks come to …

By Shanna Jain
26th August 2021 • Live Wire

Insanity

On another doom scroll run Found out, a close friend lost his mother Numb, tears incoming while I text him Some condolences along with my number Don’t know how I’ll help him, but still. A friend shares a funny video I see that right after my existential crisis I laugh …

By Ayushman Basu
23rd May 2021 • Live Wire

Radha Blank Defies Time, Embraces Vulnerability In 'The Forty-Year-Old Version'

“Dark, f***ed up, seedy-ass tenements The roof is where gangs rape old ladies just for sentiment, yeah Now this s**t is getting real ghetto prolific Ain’t no hipsters gentrifying Gotta keep this s**t authentic” The moment Radha put on her headphones, flipped open her notepad and blurted out the lines …

By Ayushman Basu
28th October 2020 • Live Wire

Memories Beyond Dusk

A poetic commentary on women's safety across the world.

By Ambalika Chaudhry
5th October 2020 • Live Wire

'Unjust and Unfair': DU Students Reject Online Semester Exams

Delhi University is a Central university with a diverse student body from all across the nation. More than 10,000 students attend college annually, leaving behind their homes, with the hope of building a secure future for themselves. However, COVID-19 has slowed down the education system owing to a nationwide lockdown …

By Saumya Rastogi
21st May 2020 • Live Wire

This is Not a Poem

This is not a poem and I’ll tell you why, because it lacks meaning, but you’ll still try. It follows a rhyme scheme and uses elaborate words – I used the thesaurus to identify and make myself feel heard. This is not a poem yet it has repetition to exaggerate …

By Saumya Rastogi
2nd May 2020 • Live Wire

The Relevance of Manto's 'Mottled Dawn' in Today's World

‘He is not dead. There is still life left in him.’ ‘O leave it, my friend, I am exhausted.’ Exhausted. That’s how many of us have been feeling lately. This isn’t something that only those part of the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protests are feeling, or those devastated by the recent …

By Ayushman Basu
12th March 2020 • Live Wire

What Growing up in an Indian Middle-Class Household Taught Me About Sustainability

I grew up in a Indian middle-class nuclear family – the kind where you squeeze the toothpaste get to the last little bit, use the soap until it’s so tiny it could evaporate and use the empty Bournvita jars for storing pulses and grains. In essence, we made sure wastage …

By Sonia Singha
5th February 2020 • Live Wire

An Unforgettable Trek to the Swamimalai Temple

It took truly agonising words spoken by the person I loved heartily to start an inconceivable journey – a journey to recover debris of lost esteem and self-love. My mind had been abuzz with bitter thoughts when he yelled at me: “I had the pleasure of knowing the most toxic …

By Aatreyee Dhar
28th November 2019 • Live Wire

Musings of an Anti-National

I live in a country which was founded on love and faith But now I’m being taught to fear and hate Come share with me this collective fate Where the people are prisoners by the will of the state. I feel numb, succumbed by these insecurities Where the roads are …

By Ayushman Basu
25th November 2019 • Live Wire

My Body Is My Permanent Home – And I Must Embrace it

I have often searched for home, in places and people. I have felt rooms, rooftops, the arms of my friend, or the side of the bed – which are only temporary – to be my home. But it took me several years to recognise that I also looked at my …

By Varisha Tariq
1st August 2019 • Live Wire

Why Don't We Talk About Muslim Dalit Women?

I don’t know what it means to live as a Muslim woman in Modi’s India. I’m terrified most of the time. All my life decisions – including the career I want to pursue or the place I want to live – are determined by the ruling dispensation’s expectations, and not …

By Varisha Tariq
21st June 2019 • Live Wire

Love In The Time of ‘What Will People Say’

The haunting synth music grows louder and louder to match the panic of a brown teenage girl running back home in the cold Norwegian night. As her hoop earrings jangle, my heart hammers. The scene switches between shots of the girl’s father, checking on each of his sleeping children in …

By Angela Therese Mathew
19th June 2019 • Live Wire

My First All-Women Iftar Party at a Slum in Bhopal

Even though I have been brought up in Bhopal for almost all my life, the streets of Old Bhopal are still alien for me. So when I came to know about an all-women iftar party, I decided to jump on the opportunity. My Jumma (Friday) at Junta Quarters began with …

By Aishwarya Shrivastav
1st June 2019 • Live Wire

'Education is Supposed to Enlighten, Not Frighten'

One upside of working at a school is to get an insider’s view of how cruelly and easily, over a period of time, the education system hardwires children into believing that they’re nothing more than educational assets. Their sense of worth solely rests on a certain percentage, and everyone around …

By Ambalika Chaudhry
15th May 2019 • Live Wire

Night-long Protest at RIE Bhopal After College Expels Student Suffering From Depression

Just a few months after a huge protest against regressive hostel rules for women at Bhopal’s Regional Institute of Education (RIE), students are gearing up for their next battle against the administration. On Tuesday, April 9, over 200 students gathered on the campus to demand justice for the student who …

By Aishwarya Shrivastav
10th April 2019 • Live Wire

Debate: 'Gully Boy' is Not About Identity – And That's Okay

These pieces are in response to the piece”‘Gully Boy’ Strips Hip-Hop of Its Crucial Link With Identity”, published on The Wire on February 23, 2019. While I strongly appreciate the value of identity-based representations, Pranav Kuttaiah’s article fails to explain why identity formation cannot take place on economic lines, a …

By Ayushman Basu
7th March 2019 • Live Wire

Bhopal Paints a Rainbow Again: Scenes from the City's Second Pride March

“Kaunsa kanoon sabse battar? Teen sau sattatar, teen sau sattatar!” (Which law is the worst? 377, 377!) On Sunday, July 15, Bhopal celebrated its second annual pride parade. People gathered to raise slogans like “We are here and we are queer” and “I am gay and that’s okay”. Organisers of …

By Aishwarya Shrivastav
16th July 2018 • Live Wire

Debate: In Defence of Sanjay Dutt and 'Sanju'

Since June 29, Indian theatres have been filling up with people – all there to watch Raj Kumar Hirani’s biopic of the controversial Sanjay Dutt, starring Ranbir Kapoor. This is not a review, instead, I want to talk about something I read recently – an article, titled ‘Sanju is no …

By Ayushman Basu
6th July 2018 • Live Wire

Death by Saffron Ink

A poem about the government's censorship of the freedom of press.

By Ambalika Chaudhry
3rd July 2018 • Live Wire