Today my guest is Pranav Radhakrishnan. Pranav is a terrific science communicator and the man behind the popular YouTube channel Science is Dope, where he talks about pseudoscience and analyzes some popular conspiracy theorists. Pranav is an engineering graduate from the National Institute of Technology Calicut. I found out that he also grew up in Kozhikode, the city where I did a lot of my schooling. I talk to Pranav about atheism, debunking pseudoscience, alternative medicine, and of course Sadhguru Pranav's channel Main Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/ScienceIsDope Support Pranav here One-time support: UPI: scienceisdope@icici https://buymeacoffee.com/scienceisdope Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scienceisdope_ To join his WhatsApp community: https://nas.io/scienceisdope Discord: https://discord.gg/BQrBAUkA33 Subbreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/scienceisdope/ Pranav and Abby https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUKl63cSSSg --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Salaam-e- Krish Ashok! Ashok has been a part of the show earlier where we spoke at length about food homeopathy veganism and Carnatic music and I highly recommend you check the episodes out . I’ll link them in the show notes. Ashok recently made a food trip to Lucknow and I thought I need to ask him in detail about the Mughal and the awadhi dishes he tried there. So here we are. Like most of my episodes we do digress quite a bit but I hope the episode is engaging and entertaining as we talk about Lucknow the city and how the Mughals influenced Indian cooking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUdZxrU5HDA&ab_channel=ShortcastoverCoffee https://youtu.be/74Q41P37ReA https://youtu.be/UUdZxrU5HDA Support me here https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shortcastovercoffee 📈 Get FREE Stocks in US https://a.webull.com/hMq1FXwqDxNxXGto77 https://a.webull.com/NcH1FXwqDxNxXGtk2b I use WeBull & RobinHood for stock trading which are legal. Link subject to change depending on the expiry of the offer Use Fiverr to Hire Top Talent : https://tinyurl.com/mxsyw37y https://tinyurl.com/3scu66p9 Enjoy 75% off + 3 Extra months with PureVPN. Limited time offer, act now! https://tinyurl.com/ymwc4ttj Contact the host and leave feedback : https://instagram.com/bala.deva06 Masala Lab on Amazon : https://www.amazon.com/Masala-Lab-Science-Indian-Cooking/dp/0143451375 --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Today my guest is Parth MN. Parth is an independent journalist based in Mumbai, India. He mainly covers rural India for multiple publications. His work has appeared in the LA Times, The Washington Post, Al Jazeera, People's Archive of Rural India, Times of India Digital, among other outlets. He is the recipient of the Indian Express group's Ramnath Goenka Award, as well as the European Commission's Lorenzo Natali Media Prize. Quoting the legendary P. Sainath, "National daily five-year average gives 0.67 percent of its Front Page News to news of rural origin. 69 percent of the country's population gets 0.67 percent." This pretty much sums up the state of rural reporting in India. So, in this episode I thought I will talk to Parth about his experience reporting in Vidharbha and Manipur, lessons he learned and also about the state of press freedom in India among many other things. More about Parth MN https://ruralindiaonline.org/en/authors/parth-mn/ https://x.com/parthpunter?s=20 (0:00) Introduction (01:31) Growing up and Cricket days (12:00) Shiv Sena and Press (14:55) Learning from sport (21:33) Education and early days in Journalism (27:30) Freelancing and Reporting Rural India (30:52) Deep dive into Rural Reporting (40:38) Farmer Suicide and Climate change (45:20) Mental Health programs in rural India (51:47) Reporting from Manipur (1:01:07) Freedom of the Press (1:08:00) Parth and I talk about reliable media sources (1:13:00) Conclusion --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

📈 Get FREE Stocks in US https://a.webull.com/hMq1FXwqDxNxXGto77 https://a.webull.com/NcH1FXwqDxNxXGtk2b I use WeBull & RobinHood for stock trading which are legal. Link subject to change depending on the expiry of the offer Use Fiverr to Hire Top Talent : https://tinyurl.com/mxsyw37y https://tinyurl.com/3scu66p9 Today my guest is Ankit Agarwal. Ankit is the co-founder of Topmate.io, a promising startup based in Bengaluru, along with his friend and colleague Dinesh Singh. Topmate empowers professionals to seamlessly manage requests for advice or guidance by letting others reach out for a personalized interaction while keeping complete control over every aspect of it. Check out the link in the description for more. In this episode, we will unveil Ankit's fascinating journey from a small town in Rajasthan to IIT Bombay, working in Iraq during civil unrest, traveling 650 km everyday for work in Saudi Arabia, leaving everything to prepare for UPSC, and all the way to co-founding Topmate. His is a story of resilience, clarity of thought, and hard work, and I can't wait to present this episode to you guys. More about Topmate.io https://www.linkedin.com/in/ankitagarwal6/ https://topmate.io/ https://www.linkedin.com/posts/ankitagarwal6_startup-entrepreneur-topmate-activity-7051083982096003072-dMn-?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop 00:00 Introduction 4:33 Growing up 10:20 Choosing IIT Bombay 12:35 Civil Engineering 15:50 Learning through Events and Leadership at IIT-B 23:00 Iraq Life, Civil Unrest and ISIS 30:00 Saudi Arabia 37:34 UPSC Prep 40:00 First startup idea 45:30 IIT Bombay- The brand the safety net 47:56 Second startup and lessons learned 53:05 Family Support System 56:21 Topmate.io deepdive 1:00:19 What makes Topmate unique 1:03:27 First Customers 1:14:00 Conclusion --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Today my guest is Dr Shruti Rajagopalan. She is a Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, where she leads the Indian Political Economy Program and Emergent Ventures India. In this episode I talk to Shruti about the initiatives she works on at Mercatus, economics research in India and the US and we dive deep into the good and the bad aspects of the goods and services tax in India also known as GST More about Shruti https://www.mercatus.org/scholars/shruti-rajagopalan https://www.mercatus.org/emergent-ventures https://www.linkedin.com/in/shruti-rajagopalan-3b9228202/ https://substack.com/@srajagopalan https://srajagopalan.substack.com/about https://twitter.com/srajagopalan?lang=en https://www.mercatus.org/ideasofindia --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Today my guest is Nitin Sundar. Nitin was a sub-editor with Cricinfo and has been an avid follower of the game since the mid 90s. I will talk to Nitin about his career at Cricinfo and everything cricket pretty much… from stadium experience to commentators to the 2023 World Cup More about Nitin https://linktr.ee/knittins Reach out to the host https://www.instagram.com/bala.deva06/ --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

My guest today is Sreedhar Pillai. Sreedhar is a trade analyst and film critic and has been a journalist in the movie industry for over 35 years. I will talk to Sreedhar about the economics of the South Indian movie industry today - from ticket pricing to film distribution to OTT and satellite rights. We'll discuss the changes that have occurred in the business side of South Indian cinema over the past few decades. Sreedhar's depth of knowledge and experience covering the entertainment industry will provide insightful perspective on the financial landscape and strategies of South Indian movie studios and distributors. I look forward to an interesting conversation about the numbers, deals, and dollars behind Kollywood and the other regional film industries in South India. More on Sreedhar https://x.com/sri50?s=20 https://www.instagram.com/sreedharpillai/ --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Meghnad or meghnerd on YouTube is one of India’s most recognized political analyst and commentator. Now an independent content creator, previously Meghnad was a writer and a journalist for Newslaundry. His show for them called Consti-tution is filled with wacky humor along with a lucid explanation of things you missed in your civics class. Before Newslaundry, Meghnad was a part of PRS Legislative Research where he worked as the legislative aide for many members of parliament across various states in India. Please do check out part 1 before moving onto part 2. In this part I talk to Meghnad about the merits and demerits of democracy, how we can make it better, reservations, looking back at the last 10 years of the government and all the different aspects related to propaganda or as Meghnand loves to call it Fluffoganda I get to grow a lot as a person doing this podcast but it also involves a lot of research behind the scenes so it would lovely if you could support this podcast with a cup of coffee on https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shortcastovercoffee More about Meghnad https://x.com/Memeghnad?s=20 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPFaO_qIQDIVXCatr63vpvQ https://substack.com/@memeghnad Consti-tution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKSaIE11x9Q&ab_channel=newslaundry Reach out to the host https://www.instagram.com/bala.deva06/ Check out my other content here https://linktr.ee/shortcastovercoffee?utm_source --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Meghnad or meghnerd on YouTube is one of India’s most recognized political analyst and commentator. Now an independent content creator, previously Meghnad was a writer and a journalist for Newslaundry. His show for them called Consti-tution is filled with wacky humor along with a lucid explanation of things you missed in your civics class. Before Newslaundry, Meghnad was a part of PRS Legislative Research where he worked as the legislative aide for many members of parliament across various states in India. This is a two part episode and in this part we will talk to Meghnad about his journey to be an independent creator and important happenings that led him here. I get to grow a lot as a person doing this podcast but it also involves a lot of research behind the scenes so it would lovely if you could support this podcast with a cup of coffee on https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shortcastovercoffee More about Meghnad https://x.com/Memeghnad?s=20 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPFaO_qIQDIVXCatr63vpvQ https://substack.com/@memeghnad Consti-tution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKSaIE11x9Q&ab_channel=newslaundry Reach out to the host https://www.instagram.com/bala.deva06/ Check out my other content here https://linktr.ee/shortcastovercoffee?utm_source --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support

Donate to this podcast at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shortcastovercoffee Check out my material at https://linktr.ee/shortcastovercoffee?utm_source Our guest today is Shruti Jahagirdar, a passionate fitness trainer, entrepreneur, and nutritionist. Shruti was a competitive national level volleyball player and holds an MBA from ESMT Berlin. She specializes in low-carb, high-fat diets. Shruti and I planned this episode to be a workout 101. She is really passionate about exercising and nutrition, and she has happily agreed to do another episode on nutrition which I am really looking forward to. But in this episode, I will learn from her how to motivate oneself to work out and why we even work out, what are the right breathing techniques, and why even do staple moves like deadlifts and squats, and so on. So stay tuned for all of this and more. Oh yeah, I recently found out that Shruti’s mom was a Marathi actress, and we will ask her about that too! So let's now get into it. More on Shruti https://www.instagram.com/shrutijahagirdar/ https://twitter.com/Shruti_my_voice --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/balakrishnan-devarajan/support