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That was my first brush with the word—what I’d later understand was the Bunt version of dowry. Since then, every time I’ve brought up the topic in conversations with people from Europe or America, I’ve noticed a similar reaction: a quick moral monologue, complete with a shake of the head and a “how could your country still do this?” tone. They’d launch into a takedown of the dowry system with the kind of conviction that made it hard to interrupt.

It began in 2020. The pandemic made everything foggy. I reached out to a friend in the mental health space and got myself a therapist. Let’s call them Therapist 001. We had a few sessions. Therapist 001 told me I had grown up in an environment that wasn’t entirely fair. It tracked. But after one session where I talked candidly about money, Therapist 001 increased their rates.

Panchaatige wasn’t just mediation—it was an institution. A person revered for their fairness, wisdom, and ability to weigh complex matters without bias would be called upon to resolve disputes outside the court system. Their final word was the paathera. It wasn’t notarised, stamped, or sealed. It simply had weight—because it came from them. Their word was their bond.

Sometimes, it’s a plan to reply later, a pause in the rush of digital life. Sometimes, my Instagram and TikTok therapists whisper in my ear that it’s okay to dwell beneath a rock, cocooned in solitude, and I take their advice to heart. Sometimes, I just don’t want to respond. Sometimes, I simply cannot. And sometimes, I need to breathe, to settle my heart before words spill out—especially when the text at hand tugs at something raw, a wound too tender for quick answers.

There are moments when we pause, caught between the practicalities of life and the whispers of something greater. In those moments, what drives us becomes clear—not always immediately, but in the quiet corners of our minds, we start to understand. For some, it’s the steady, reassuring rhythm of goals—tangible, practical, a checklist to be conquered. For others, it’s the fleeting, yet profound nature of aspirations—shifting, evolving, like the gentle pull of the tide, always m

There is an ache that rarely gets spoken of—the ache of failing quietly. Not the kind of failure that leads to a book deal or a redemption arc on a podcast, but the silent kind—the layoff you don’t share, the business that folded before it began, the days you couldn’t get out of bed and didn’t have a name for it. In those moments, what we long for is not a solution or a saviour, but something simpler: to be seen, and to not be left alone in the dark.

The saga of Bunt hoteliers is not merely a tale of migration or economic endurance—it is a choreography of inherited behaviour, etched into

We’re in a mentorship crisis—not the kind you chart in reports or dissect in board meetings, but the kind you feel in the quiet spaces of gr

Since I was little, I kept hearing the same thing: "You never show your work."  My teachers would raise their eyebrows at my homework—the...

Be aware of my struggle. But don’t repeat it. Don’t reset the clock. If you can ask for help and get it—do it. Being self-made doesn’t mean

There’s no lie anymore, which is the scariest part. I don’t tell myself I’m just taking a break or that I’ll stop after ten minutes.

There was a time when buying shampoo was simple. You had hair. You washed it. That was it.