India’s caste system is unique. Nowhere else in the world does this system of thousands of graded endogamous groups exist.

At the top of the pyramid are the dwija savarna castes: Brahmins, Baniyas and Kshatriyas.

Nearly two millennia of caste privilege mean that Savarnas dominate Indian society. Culture, politics, and the economy in India are Savarna-controlled. Yet, there exists very little study of them as a distinct group.

Enter Ravikant Kisana, whose new book, Meet the Savarnas, intends to fill the gap.

We spoke to him on Scroll Adda’s third episode to try and understand why he wants to study upper castes.

Producer: Aryan Mahtta

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Few things seem more contested today than history. From politics to Bollywood, this once sleepy school subject dominates headlines.

In an extensive chat with Shoaib Daniyal on the Scroll Adda podcast, however, historian Manu Pillai contextualises this. People of every age think they are living through unique circumstances. But maybe it’s not so different today as it was earlier.

That said, Pillai is clear that “Hindutva has understood and weaponised how Indians deal with history” in a way that the left has not. “Secular forces are fixated on a footnoted version of history,” he says. This makes it quite unappealing to people looking to history to construct an identity.

Where does that leave the historian? Pillai agrees that he never thought he’d be in such a contentious field when he first started. But in the end, he sees it as the price of being in the public eye. Historians are people too. The idea that a pure or virtuous history is possible, he suggests, may itself be an idealised position.

Producers: Aryan Mahtta, Raghav Kakkar

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India is drowning in fake news. And much of it is produced by its own political parties.

Dedicated so-called IT cells supported by highly paid consultants push disinformation on social media with the aim of converting voters to their point of view.

This isn’t limited to elections. Disinformation is warping Indian society itself. The past decade has seen an explosion of hate, a significant part of which has been powered by fake news.

The first line of defence against this tsunami? Fact checkers. To understand how they battle this scourge, Scroll's political editor, Shoaib Daniyal, speaks to Alt News co-founder Pratik Sinha on the first episode of Scroll Adda.

In a wide-ranging conversation, Sinha explains the toll disinformation has taken on India — and on his own mental health.

Producers: Kritika Pant, Raghav Kakkar

Have any thoughts, ideas or criticism? Email us at adda@scroll.in

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