Minakshi Thakur’s Grief Burns Like Fever is emerging as a reflective cultural touchstone, not for spectacle but for its disciplined attention to what loss does to ordinary lives. Framed through five lessons, the work argues that grief is not only an ending; it is also a test of compassion, endurance and the small acts of care that keep people connected.
Abhishek’s timely contribution in Kerala colours has given the side a valuable lift in the Ranji Trophy, underlining both his adaptability and the depth of the state’s batting resources. In a competition where early runs often shape the tone of an entire campaign, the innings stood out for its composure, context and significance.
Reliance Jio’s Rs 30,000 crore initial public offering is set to close on October 23, the same day Akash and Isha Ambani mark their birthday, underscoring a symbolic moment for the telecom and digital group they helped shape from its formative years. The listing is being watched as a major milestone for Reliance Industries’ consumer technology ambitions and a significant test of investor appetite for one of India’s most influential businesses.
Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited posted a sharp improvement in second-quarter earnings, with net profit rising 120.1% year-on-year to Rs 810 crore from Rs 368 crore a year earlier. Revenue from operations also strengthened 23.8% to Rs 9,300 crore, underscoring a broad-based recovery in execution and demand momentum.
HDFC Bank has appointed Anup Bagchi as its next managing director and chief executive officer, with the Reserve Bank of India approving the move ahead of his October 27, 2026 start date. Bagchi, a seasoned banker with deep experience across retail, corporate and investment banking, returns to the sector after a three-year stint at ICICI Prudential Life Insurance.
Manufacturing and supply-chain platform Zetwerk has raised ₹2,251.2 crore from anchor investors ahead of the opening of its initial public offering, signalling strong institutional interest in one of India’s closely watched startup listings. The anchor book is expected to provide early validation for the company as it seeks to tap public markets amid renewed investor attention on profitable growth and industrial technology.
India’s wholesale inflation jumped sharply to 11.4% in September, marking a broad-based surge driven by food, fuel and other commodity prices. Core inflation, which strips out volatile food and fuel items, climbed to a record 9.8%, underscoring persistent underlying price pressures across the economy.
Mobile gaming studio Spill Games has raised $10.5 million, or about ₹100 crore, in a Series A round led by Elevation Capital, underscoring continued investor interest in AI-enabled consumer entertainment. The funding is expected to help the company expand its product pipeline and deepen its use of artificial intelligence across game development and live operations.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin has launched a ₹3,108-crore ring main pipeline project designed to strengthen drinking water distribution across the Greater Chennai Corporation area. The project will connect all nine water treatment facilities through 91.2 kilometres of interlinked pipelines, with monitoring systems to track pressure, flow and water quality in real time.
Under the guidance of veteran Balinese scholar and choreographer I Wayan Dibia, Kecak turns the human voice into a percussive orchestra, giving the Ramayana a distinctly Balinese dramatic form. The performance tradition remains one of the island’s most recognizable cultural exports, blending ritual, movement and narrative into a collective stage language.
Police in Vellore have arrested two people in connection with a cheating case involving imitation jewellery, recovering around 1,080 grams of fake ornaments from their possession. The arrests point to a broader pattern of deception in the local jewellery trade, where counterfeit items can be passed off as genuine with significant financial harm to buyers.
Jio Platforms has moved closer to what could become India’s largest-ever initial public offering, setting a price band of ₹1,065-₹1,119 per share and implying a valuation of about ₹10.3 lakh crore. The offering would mark a defining capital-markets moment for Reliance Industries’ digital and telecom arm, with implications for India’s IPO pipeline, investor appetite, and the country’s technology valuation benchmarks.
Andhra moved within sight of an outright Ranji Trophy victory, but their push was checked by a resilient batting effort led by Karun, whose composure under pressure kept the contest alive. With the match entering its decisive phase, Andhra remain in control, though the final outcome still hinges on whether they can break through a stubborn resistance.
India’s Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has approved the strategic sale of IDBI Bank to an arm of Fairfax Group, marking what Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw described as the country’s largest financial-sector foreign direct investment. The government and Life Insurance Corporation of India will together retain a 34% stake in the restructured bank, underscoring a calibrated exit that preserves a significant public-sector footprint while transferring control to a private investor.
Agentic AI startup RevRag.AI has raised $2.5 million, or about ₹24 crore, in a seed round led by Accion Ventures, as it targets financial institutions with AI systems designed to act as relationship managers. The funding underscores investor interest in enterprise AI tools that can automate customer engagement, improve underwriting workflows, and deepen distribution in lending and insurance.
Eight years after Sohum Shah’s folk-horror landmark 'Tumbbad' reached Indian screens, Danish composer Jesper Kyd is reflecting on the score that helped define its eerie, mythic atmosphere. In a wider conversation about his career, Kyd also points to the emotional and cultural durability of the 'Assassin’s Creed' Ezio trilogy, which remains one of gaming’s most recognisable musical signatures.
Singer Anjana’s debut EP draws from Carnatic violin, konnakol, Kannada lyrics and even the kazoo to build a distinctive musical language rooted in South Indian tradition. The release frames love, identity and self-acceptance not as abstract themes, but as lived emotional tensions shaped by personal memory and cultural inheritance.
Canada’s foreign minister met India’s prime minister in New Delhi in a fresh sign of cautious diplomatic engagement between the two countries. The meeting comes at a sensitive moment for bilateral ties, with both sides seeking to stabilize relations while managing deep political and security mistrust that has weighed on the relationship for months.
GIFT Nifty is being closely watched by investors for clues on how Indian equities may open, especially after overnight moves in global markets. The futures contract can provide an early directional signal for the Nifty 50, but analysts caution that it should be treated as an indicator rather than a prediction of the day’s final market outcome.
Mobile gaming studio Spill Games has raised $10.5 million, or about ₹100 crore, in a Series A round led by Elevation Capital, underscoring investor appetite for AI-native consumer entertainment startups in India. The company plans to use the capital to expand its product and engineering teams, accelerate game development, and deepen its AI-led production workflow.
Kazi Nazrul Islam’s Agomoni songs, a vital but often overlooked strand of Nazrulgeeti, continue to shape the cultural grammar of Durga Puja in Bengal. Far beyond devotional music, these autumn compositions fuse reverence, rebellion, and social conscience, reflecting the poet’s enduring vision of pluralism and human dignity.
The National Commission for Indian System of Medicine (NCISM) has launched CCRAS SPARK 5.0 and CCRAS Ayushshodh 2026, a dual initiative aimed at strengthening Ayurveda research, innovation, and academic engagement. The move signals a broader policy push to deepen evidence-based work in traditional medicine and expand the research pipeline for young scholars.
Speciality chemical manufacturing startup Scimplify has raised $25 million, or about ₹238 crore, in a fresh funding round led by Hitachi Ventures as it accelerates its move into semiconductor chemicals. The capital is expected to support manufacturing scale-up, product development, and the company’s broader effort to serve advanced industrial supply chains in India and beyond.
As Navaratri approaches, Syama Sastri’s three surviving swarajatis stand out not merely as masterpieces of Carnatic composition but as deeply personal acts of worship addressed to Kamakshi. Their enduring power lies in the rare union of musical architecture, emotional restraint, and devotional intensity that continues to define Sastri’s legacy.
New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner said the bowlers are still trying to catch up in the contest, underscoring how quickly conditions and match demands can shift in modern cricket. His assessment reflects a broader tactical reality: bowlers must adapt faster, execute more precisely, and find ways to regain control when batters seize momentum.
Reliance Jio Platforms has set out five core strengths in its red herring prospectus ahead of its Rs 30,213 crore initial public offering, framing the listing as a vote of confidence in its scale, profitability and technology stack. The company is positioning itself not just as India’s largest digital connectivity player, but as a platform with room to expand into fixed broadband, AI-led services, digital subscriptions and overseas monetisation.
The digital storytelling platform bridges classical Indian literary depth with fast-paced mobile reading, creating a vibrant cultural haven for the smartphone generation.
A UNESCO team is scheduled to visit Hampi on October 24 to conduct an inspection focused on the conservation and management of its heritage monuments. The visit is expected to assess preservation practices at one of India’s most significant World Heritage sites, where tourism pressure and long-term upkeep remain central policy concerns.
India will need an estimated ₹15 lakh crore in investment to add 91 GW of nuclear power capacity by 2047, Central Electricity Authority Chairman Ghanshyam Prasad said, underscoring the scale of financing required to meet the country’s long-term atomic energy ambitions. He said the target cannot be achieved without deep private-sector participation, signalling a major policy and capital-market challenge for the power sector.
The Archery Premier League is preparing for its second season, underscoring the rapid rise of franchise-style archery in India and the growing commercial confidence around the sport. With renewed attention on elite compound archers and a format designed for television and fan engagement, the league is positioning itself as a key platform in India’s expanding Olympic-sport ecosystem.
India and Mauritius have amended their tax treaty to introduce a Principal Purpose Test, a treaty-level safeguard designed to prevent abuse of tax benefits through structures lacking genuine commercial substance. The change preserves certainty for legacy investments, with investments made before April 1, 2017, remaining outside the test’s scope.
India’s manufacturing strategy is entering a more demanding phase as the Make in India programme completes 12 years, with industry body CII saying the focus is moving from expanding capacity to building deeper capabilities. The emphasis is increasingly on domestic supply chains, technology development and stronger integration with global markets, especially in sectors such as automotive, EVs and mobility.
A Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute-led initiative is helping women in Kerala’s coastal districts move from informal livelihoods into organised micro-enterprises, with 84 ventures now operating across eight districts. The programme has lifted household incomes by an estimated 30% to 35%, underscoring the economic value of targeted women-led enterprise support in the fisheries sector.
As Navaratri gatherings gather pace, the kolu tradition is being accompanied by a widening musical palette that stretches from classical kritis to popular devotional songs and familiar film numbers. The trend reflects how households are blending inherited ritual with contemporary listening habits while keeping the festival’s devotional core intact.
The Department of Expenditure has pressed states to accelerate utilisation of interest-free loans tied to capital investment, warning that only about a quarter of the allocated funds have been used so far. With the Centre having released roughly ₹51,000 crore under the scheme by October 1, officials are now working with states to clear bottlenecks and identify projects that can absorb the remaining outlay quickly. The push is aimed at lifting public investment momentum and ensuring states meet spending targets in time.
External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said negotiations on the India-U.S. trade deal are moving toward a conclusion, describing the remaining issues as limited and manageable. His remarks signal that both sides may be close to resolving a package that has drawn close scrutiny from exporters, policymakers and investors amid a broader push to deepen economic ties.
Anti-SIR protests continued to roil Delhi for a fifth consecutive day, with police detaining hundreds as demonstrators pressed their case against the disputed voter-roll revision process. The unrest has sharpened political fault lines in the capital, especially after Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke called for a "Lehra Do Tiranga" gathering at Central Park in Connaught Place on October 16.
HDFC Bank and Kotak Mahindra Bank have each chosen a new chief executive in a closely watched leadership transition that reshapes the top tier of Indian banking. Anup Bagchi will take over as MD and CEO of HDFC Bank on October 26, while Anup Saha will assume the same role at Kotak Mahindra Bank from January 1.
The Saudi Pro League has postponed three matchweek nine fixtures after Houthi attacks disrupted conditions around the competition schedule, with the league citing logistical considerations and the mandatory minimum rest period between matches. The decision underscores how security developments in the region can quickly spill into elite sport, forcing calendar adjustments even in a heavily resourced league.
The Indian rupee rose for a third straight session on Wednesday, supported by recent regulatory changes from the Reserve Bank of India, but it could not sustain momentum below the psychologically important 95-per-dollar mark. Persistent importer hedging and continued dollar demand from outflows kept the currency under pressure, even after it touched an intraday high of 94.77. Traders are now focused on upcoming US consumer inflation data for clues on the Federal Reserve’s next move.
Apple Pay has officially launched in India, enabling Axis Bank credit card holders to add Visa and Mastercard cards to Apple’s digital wallet for contactless payments. The rollout broadens the country’s fast-growing digital payments market by giving consumers a secure, private alternative that does not require PINs or one-time passwords for in-store transactions.
Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures Entertainment will distribute The Apothecary Diaries: The Late Lady's Treasure in theatres across North America and international markets, including India, after its Japanese premiere in December. The acquisition extends one of the most closely watched recent anime franchises into the global theatrical arena, underscoring the continued commercial rise of anime cinema outside Japan.
A growing number of young startup employees believe their employer-provided cover and early-career savings are enough to protect their families. But the arithmetic often tells a different story: once outstanding loans, living costs, and future obligations are added up, many are underinsured by well over Rs 1 crore. The gap is widening as compensation structures, stock-linked wealth, and aggressive borrowing reshape financial risk in India’s startup workforce.
Larsen & Toubro has joined hands with TuTr Hyperloop, an IIT Madras-incubated mobility venture, to evaluate commercially viable advanced transport infrastructure opportunities across India. The collaboration brings together L&T’s engineering and construction scale with TuTr’s indigenous technology development, underscoring growing interest in next-generation mobility solutions.
The Centre is preparing a dedicated policy for data centres, Minister of State for IT Jitin Prasada said, as policymakers confront rising concerns over power costs, infrastructure readiness and the sector’s rapid expansion. The move signals an attempt to create a clearer regulatory and investment framework for a capital-intensive industry that is becoming central to India’s digital economy.
India’s wholesale price inflation accelerated sharply to 11.39% in September, underscoring persistent cost pressures across food, fuel and manufactured goods. The reading reflects an economy still absorbing the impact of elevated global commodity prices, with the West Asia conflict and disruption risks around the Strait of Hormuz adding to the inflationary backdrop.
Delhi Police have registered an FIR against a journalist on the complaint of Assistant Commissioner of Police Vivek Bhagat, who alleged caste-based humiliation and obstruction of duty. The case escalates a separate dispute in which the journalist had earlier accused the officer of sexual harassment, a complaint that remains under inquiry by the Crime Branch.
The Saudi Pro League has postponed three Matchweek 9 fixtures after a series of Houthi attacks, saying the decision was driven by logistical considerations and the need to preserve the mandatory minimum rest period between matches. The move underscores how regional security shocks can quickly ripple into elite sport scheduling, forcing organisers to balance player welfare, travel disruption and operational continuity.
The Indian government has selected 13 alternative investment funds, including Blume Ventures, Speciale Invest and Chiratae Ventures, to deploy capital under the Rs 7,131 crore Research, Development and Innovation Fund. The move marks a significant step in channeling long-term domestic capital into deep-tech, strategic innovation and startup-led research in India.
Indian credit card issuers are leaning harder on EMI conversions, personal loan-on-card products and fee income as a growing share of customers use cards for payments rather than revolving debt. The shift reflects a structural change in consumer behaviour: transaction volumes are rising, but interest-bearing receivables are not keeping pace, pressuring the traditional revolver-led profit model.
