Food as Festive Markers: Nobo Borsho 2026

Probashi Pangs of Noboborsho.

Kalchaar is archived and marked on days of note, and celebrated through food. A good payesh is a reminder that culture is mobilised through the plate and palate. It is also a reminder that thanks to mobility, access to authentic Bengali fare (Kolkata variant) is also easier.

There is no bohiragoto, as my father is an ethnic Bihari from Shantiniketan and my Ma is a Bangal from Chembur, and I grew up in Oman.

Payesh/ Mishti Doi

Post War Sustainability Imperative

The value of sustainability spend is in the capacity one builds while doing your human rights due diligence training, POSH workshops, sustainability reports and your CSDDD preparation for next year. One report at a time, we curate the culture of safety in an era of war. Do good, by updating that human rights policy or HSE policy that no one bothers after probation, or by understanding that corporate reputation can be dented, irrespective of which crisis communication rockstar agency that you can hire which could have killed a bad story in a previous generation.

We are all worried regarding blockages of the maritime and the cardiac sort. And it is not good for our health, the financial kind. Lender and Sustainable finance towards electro states building (channelling Tooze) will be on the uptake as energy security will dominate the loan books.

The green transition is an ethical way of building the solar grids and transmission lines we need, without the accidents and violence.

Sustainability measures accumulate over time, create culture of psychological safety and resilience, the practice of it and not the definition.

Sustainability for the post war will mean less hype, more substance.

On BFM FM Malaysia

How Late-Stage Capitalism Produces a World of Permanent Crisis

Today, we’re living through what often feels like a constant stream of disruptions, from wars, economic instability, the climate change, and even loneliness and a loss of meaning and purpose in life.

In an article for For Pol India, political analyst Manishankar Prasad argues that these crises are not isolated but intertwined and due to late-stage capitalism. In this episode of BFM’s Beyond the Ballot Box podcast, Dashran Yohan speaks to Manishankar about how these overlapping crises may be a structural feature of neoliberal capitalism, driven by inequality, financialization, and the concentration of power in the hands of the elites. They also examine how automation and AI, rather than liberating people, often displace workers and deepen insecurity, contributing to a broader loss of meaning, and so much more.

Listen here 🎧👇🏾
BFM Website: https://www.bfm.my/content/podcast/how-late-stage-capitalism-produces-a-world-of-permanent-crisis

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6NmMUAdHA41KXCYOnEPRra?si=MrqPVjUlTdmT-Tz_zfjHWg

Malabari Biryani as Memory

A plate of Thalassery Biryani is a trip back to Muscat, where we used to have this at Al Bawader Restaurant, an old school hole in the wall eatery in Al Khuwair near the now famous Turkish House after Jumma Solat. The place opened after prayers and ran out of biryani after ten minutes. We used to make a line to buy the Friday special. Those were simpler times, where joy used to be a plate of malabari biryani. The real Kerala story is read in malabari biryani or motta set, often in the Gelf.

The Geopolitics Era

‘We live in an era of geopolitics’

If one hears what Marco Rubio says about climate red tape at his address at the Munich Security Conference, with AI and Data Centres, energy is back to the table. Even EVs need energy to be charged which is not necessarily renewable.

Sustainability needs to speak to this reality, rather than through a stack of frameworks at every mention of anything remotely green or any shade of green.

A lot of communities still don’t have steady power access in the borderlands in SE Asia, hence plenary politics needs to be in conversation with local needs.