This week on Hafta, Manisha Pande and Anand Vardhan are joined by Pooja Prasanna of The News Minute and Sobhana K Nair, senior deputy editor of The Hindu. The panel focuses sharply on the assembly elections in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, and the contentious issue of delimitation.

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Sourav. Sound by Naresh

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This week on Hafta, Manisha Pande and Raman Kirpal are joined by Anuradha Nagaraj, founder of The Migration Story, and Arghya Sengupta, Founder and Research Director at the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. 

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Sourav and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Manisha Pande and Raman Kirpal are joined by Anuradha Nagaraj, founder of The Migration Story, and Arghya Sengupta, Founder and Research Director at the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy. 

The discussion begins with the labour protests in Noida, where nearly 40,000 workers took to the streets. Manisha observes a distinct shift in worker sentiment, noting, “I saw a very clear class kind of commentary – that we can't afford cycles, but these guys [are] in BMWs.”

Anuradha explains that the “trigger” for this unrest was a survival crisis fueled by inflation. She notes, “It's just becoming difficult to have one square meal.” This desperation, she adds, is compounded by the black-market prices of cooking gas, making daily life a relentless struggle.

The precarity of these workers’ lives is absolute. Anuradha highlights that for these labourers, “the idea of getting fired is a daily thing.” Whether it’s being a minute late, falling sick, or failing to meet high production targets, the threat of losing one’s livelihood is constant.

The conversation then shifts from the streets to the courtroom as the panel discusses Arvind Kejriwal’s request seeking the recusal of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma in the liquor policy case.

Arghya breaks down the principle of recusal, explaining, “The fundamental principle at play is a very old legal principle that no person can be a judge in their own cause.” While Arghya is sceptical about using a judge’s family connections or their past as sole grounds for recusal—warning it could open a “Pandora’s box”—he acknowledges a deeper issue.

Arghya notes that public perception of the courts has reached a breaking point: “The key issue, which is really the elephant in the room here... is that now politicisation of the judiciary is now in the open.” He argues the judiciary can no longer hide behind technicalities, as “that ship has sailed” regarding their public image.

All this and more.

Timecodes

00:00:00 - Introductions and announcements

00:04:25  - Headlines

00:11:07 - Noida labour protest

00:43:53  - Anuradha’s recommendation

00:46:01– Kejriwal seeking recusal

01:25:00  - Arghaya’s  Recommendation

01:26:51  - Letters

01:37:11 - Recommendations

Check out previous Hafta recommendations, references, songs and letters.

Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Sourav and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, and Anand Vardhan are joined by Bashir Ali Abbas, Research Associate at Council for Strategic and Defence Research (CSDR) and Amit Kumar, executive editor of East Mojo. 

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Sourav and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, and Shardool Katyayan are joined by senior journalist Sreenivasan Jain and Dhanya Rajendran, editor-in-chief of The News Minute. The panel dives into the high-stakes 2026 assembly elections across Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Puducherry.

 Check out previous Hafta recommendations, references, songs and letters.

Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Priyali Dhingra and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Jayashree Arunachalam, and Manisha Pande are joined by The New York Times journalist Mujib Mashal and Aishwaria Sonavane, research analyst for Pakistan studies at the Takshashila Institution.

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Priyali Dhingra and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Jayashree Arunachalam, and Shardool Katyayan are joined by independent journalist Nidhi Suresh and Mridul Dudeja, a freelance technologist who has been engaged with queer-trans community spaces in Mumbai and across India for over 15 years.

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Sourav Ranjan and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Anil Kumar

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This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, Jayashree Arunachalam, Raman Kirpal and Anand Vardhan discuss three big themes: Nitish Kumar’s succession politics in Bihar, religion creeping into sport, and the ethics of euthanasia.

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Produced by Amit Pandey with production assistance from Saif Ekram and Abhay Kumar. Sound by Naresh.

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This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri,  Manisha Pande, Jayashree Arunachalam, and Shardool Katyayan are joined by AFP’s chief US correspondent Shaun Tandon and Aditya Ramanathan, research fellow at Takshila Institution.

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Produced by Amit Pandey with Production assistant by Saif Ekram. Sound by Anil Kumar 

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This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Manisha Pande, Jayashree Arunachalam, and Anand Vardhan are joined by academic and columnist Fahad Zuberi and Kallol Bhattacherjee, the foreign affairs editor of The Hindu.

Check out previous Hafta recommendations, references, songs and subscriber letters.

Produced by Amit Pandey & Priyali Dhingra

Sound by Anil Kumar 

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