Rajendra Pandharpure

An inquiry into Pune’s civic works lifts the veil on a sprawling nexus and a familiar political silence Pune: The Supreme Court’s directive to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to investigate the assets of a retired City Engineer from the Pune Municipal Corporation has sent shockwaves through the city. For the residents of Pune, the inner workings of the Construction Department and the illicit gains amassed by some of its shrewd officials are nothing new; however, this investigation has thrust...

As a gas shortage ripples through the city, its vast informal food economy has begun to unravel AI generated image Pune: The global energy shock triggered by disruptions to gas supplies from West Asia has begun to empty commercial LPG cylinders across India. But its effects are being felt most starkly in Pune, known for its student bustle and middle-class industriousness. The crisis has begun to choke Pune’s famed informal food industry as the severe shortage of commercial gas cylinders...

The death of Ajit Pawar has unsettled western Maharashtra, leaving the BJP cautiously biding its time Pune: Western Maharashtra has long been Indian politics in miniature: dense with sugar cooperatives, caste arithmetic, money and muscle power. For decades it was shaped by one extended family – the Pawars - whose writ ran from district banks to dairy unions and from assembly halls to village panchayats. The sudden death of Ajit Pawar, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) strongman and...