Category: Notes
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Notes on policymaking
Some stray observations on the policy process spurred by arm-chair wannabe-activists who can string together all the right words (and sentiments) to stoke people’s emotions, but clearly lacking the perseverance required to participate in a process where all shades of actors (whether we like them or not) have their (un)equal influences.
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Of scorpion stings and antivenoms
I was quite puzzled by the general lack of information and clarity over treatment of scorpion stings. A phone call from a friend requesting urgent help from a remote forested area triggered me to put together this blog on scorpion sting response.
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The emperor of all maladies: a review
This is one of the best books I have read. Depressing, intense, detailed, thorough, free-flowing and reflective. The book pulls the people from the history of medicine (or sceince itself) into a living narrative putting together pieces of apparently disjunct and inconspicuous and serendipitous events in the lives of cancer patients, researchers, doctors, surgeons, scientists…
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Review of Confessions of an economic hitman
A fast-paced and often repetetive ramble on the experiences of an EHM – economic hit man – working in a “firm” that the author suggests had direct links with NSA. The book blends the author’s recollection of events with detailed history of the fall of several democratically elected governments
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the nehrus and the gandhis – review
An unexpectedly riveting book giving a much better account of post-independence India than I have been able to gather from most other sources. He tries to separate the “legend” behind Nehru and Indira from the people they were. Good supplementary reading to India after Gandhi by Guha, which sorta seemed to completely neglect these people’s personal lives.