In Focus by The Hindu

Nearly all of us have seen an instance of it: a child working at a streetside tea shop, begging at a traffic light or perhaps even as a domestic help at some homes. Not many of us realise perhaps that a large number of these children are trafficked: taken away from their families and forced into exploitative, abusive labour.

July 30 is observed as the World Day Against Trafficking in Persons. In today’s podcast, we are joined by Bhuwan Ribhu, founder of the organisation Just Rights for Children and a child rights activist to talk about the scope of the problem in India, the government’s response and most importantly, what more needs to be done, to protect every child in our land.

Guest: Bhuwan Ribhu, Founder of Just Rights for Children and Child Rights Activist

Host: Zubeda Hamid

Edited by Jude Francis Weston

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

More than a year ago, on options expiry days, which are trading sessions when bets are settled, Mayank Bansal began to notice something odd. Prices were moving just before the close in ways that felt too precise. Someone was winning too perfectly.

Mayank, a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based hedge fund manager, had spent years studying options — cheap, high-risk contracts that let you bet on where markets will go. If you're right, the profits can be huge. If you're wrong, which is what most retail investors are, you lose everything.

A U.S. court case would later point to Jane Street — one of the world’s most powerful proprietary trading firms, which means it trades using its own money, not clients’. Known for its lightning-fast algorithms and puzzle-solving traders, Jane Street had made over $4 billion in India in just two years.

India’s market regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) says Jane Street placed large trades in a few key stocks just before the market closed. These trades pushed the index in just the right direction to make their options bets pay off, a tactic that SEBI calls a “well-planned and sinister” scheme. Jane Street denies any wrongdoing.

In this episode, Mayank tells us what he saw and why it raises serious questions about who really wins in India’s booming options market.

Guest: Mayank Bansal, a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based hedge fund manager

Host: Anupama Chandrasekaran

Produced by Jude Francis Weston

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On July 11, the upcoming 2025–26 season of the Indian Super League was abruptly put on hold by its organiser, Football Sports Development Limited (FSDL), citing uncertainty over the Master Rights Agreement with the AIFF.

This unprecedented move has left players, clubs and fans in limbo, and raises fresh questions about the governance and sustainability of Indian football’s top-tier league.

What exactly is behind this standoff? Does it signal deeper structural issues in Indian football? And how is the Indian football ecosystem affected by this?

Guest: Amitabha Das Sharma from The Hindu's sports bureau

Host: Reuben Joe Joseph

Edited by Sharmada Venkatasubramanian

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Back in 2016, Tesla began taking preorders from Indian customers with no timeline for delivery. Now, nine years later, it’s officially arrived — but much has changed. The Indian EV space is more competitive, homegrown players like Tata and global brands like BYD have made inroads and import duties remain steep.

And in the premium segment that Tesla is targeting, it’s not the first mover. German brands like Mercedes, BMW and Audi have been here for years.

What took Tesla so long? Why did early adopters like Vishal Gondal cancel their bookings? And is India ready — in terms of infrastructure, pricing and policy — for what Tesla offers?

Guest: Vishal Gondal, tech entrepreneur and early Tesla hopeful

Host: Anupama Chandrasekaran

Produced and edited by Sharmada Venkatasubramanian

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The buzzword of late, has been wellness. Wellness in mind and body is something all of us strive for. But wellness has also become an entire industry in itself – with products, services and clinics all claiming to offer it in different forms. The nutraceuticals industry for instance, is growing rapidly, projected to be worth 64 billion dollars by 2030, while aesthetic medicine is projected to triple its value by 2029. From protein powders to supplements, anti-ageing lotions to treatments at wellness lounges, there is no dearth of offerings and advertisements. But how safe are these products and procedures? Do what they claim in their advertisements match what offer in reality? What goes into these products and who regulates them?

Guest: Prashant Reddy Co-author, Truth Pill: Myth of Drug Regulation

Host: Zubeda Hamid

Edited by Sharmada Venkatasubramanian

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

According to the Union Education Ministry, Indian universities have achieved their best-ever performance in the World University Rankings 2026. The rankings are done by a British company, Quacquarelli Symonds, also known as QS. 

The new QS rankings feature a total of 54 Indian universities, which makes India the 4th most represented country, with only the US (192), the UK (90) and China (72) having more universities ranked than India. Among Indian universities, 48% have also 

improved their rankings compared to the previous year, with six featuring in the top 250. IIT, Delhi is the highest ranked Indian university in the list, coming in at #123. 

The government has claimed that the numbers indicate a revolutionary transformation of India’s educational landscape. 

How exactly are the QS rankings arrived at? What idea of the university is being evaluated in these rankings? Are the metrics relevant to the Indian context and Indian students? 

Guest: Professor Anita Rampal, former Dean, Faculty of Education, at Delhi University. Anita, welcome to the pod. 

Host: G. Sampath, Social Affairs Editor, The Hindu 

Edited by Sharmada Venkatasubramanian 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nipah virus is not new to Kerala: the State is experiencing it’s eighth outbreak since 2018 this July. So far, there have been four confirmed cases: of these, two persons have died, while the other two remain hospitalised. A total of 675 people across the State are currently under observation, with 38 classified as being in the highest risk category.One question that many have wondered about is: why Kerala? Why is it that this one State has seen multiple outbreaks of the deadly virus? What do we know about how it spills over from fruit bats to humans? And what can be done to contain it?

Guest: Dr. Anoop Kumar A.S., director of critical care medicine at Aster North Kerala Cluster, who played a pivotal role in detecting the Nipah virus outbreak in the State in 2018

Host: Zubeda Hamid

Edited by Sharmada Venkatasubramanian

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On a June morning, Air India flight AI171 lifted off from Ahmedabad, bound for London. The aircraft was a Boeing 787 Dreamliner — among the most advanced long-haul jets in service. But less than a minute after takeoff, the plane crashed. Two hundred and sixty people were killed. Only one survived. It was India’s deadliest air disaster in nearly three decades.

Now, a preliminary investigation points to a chilling cause: fuel to both engines was cut off just after takeoff. The engines lost thrust. The plane had neither the altitude nor the time to recover.

What happened in those final seconds? Was it a technical failure or human error?

Guest: Jagriti Chandra, Special Correspondent at The Hindu covering aviation

Host: Anupama Chandrasekaran

Produced and edited by Jude Francis Weston

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nimisha Priya, a nurse from Kerala, was scheduled to be executed in Yemen today on July 16, as per reports, but the execution has now been postponed after multiple levels of talks and negotiations got underway. Nimisha Priya has been on death row in Yemen since 2018 for the murder of her former business partner, a Yemeni citizen Talal Abdo Mehdi . Efforts to have her released have included raising funds for ‘blood money’ or money that is paid to the victim’s family as compensation. The case has presented complications because of the internal breakdown in Yemen, Yemeni capital Sanaa is controlled by Ansar Ullah (Houthi) while the Internationally Recognised Government of Yemen operates out of Aden.

We do a deep dive into the case of Nimisha Priya, the rights of Indian citizens who get enmeshed in criminal judicial systems in other countries, India’s obligations to these citizens and the death penalty laws in India with Shreya Rastogi, Director of Death Penalty Litigation and Forensics, The Square Circle Clinic, NALSAR University of Law, Delhi

Host: Zubeda Hamid

Guest: Shreya Rastogi

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There’s been a lot of action in the world of footwear fashion – especially legal action involving claims and counter-claims about cheap fakes of expensive originals, and also expensive rip-offs of cheaper originals.

First it was the crocs, the uniquely shaped perforated sandals. The American company which makes them, Crocs Inc., is pursuing legal action against several Indian companies, including the likes of Bata and Liberty, for copying their visual design and “passing off” their product as crocs.

Then we have the case of Italian luxury fashion brand Prada, which has been facing heat in India after it showcased men’s ‘Toe-ring Sandals’ that looked a lot like Kolhapuri chappals.

And now we have the German sandal brand Birkenstock getting court approval to inspect factories in India and seize counterfeit Birkenstock sandals.

Are these three cases comparable? How exactly does the copyright regime work in the fashion world? And why are Indians crazy for Birkenstocks?

In Part 2, we shift focus to the cultural and fashion dimensions of the sandal scandal, examining how Crocs, Birkenstocks, and even Kolhapuris became trend statements.

Host: G Sampath

Guests: Rosella Stephen, editor of The Hindu’s Sunday Magazine, and Shantanu Sood, a lawyer who specialises in intellectual property-related issues.

Produced and edited by Jude Francis Weston

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices