The good news is podcast listenership is growing in India. The better news: We’re not just listening to that one chatty interviewer and their tech-bro guest. Shows about food science (Gastropod) and history-comedy (You’re Dead to Me) are now close to 200 episodes old. Listeners are jumping in midway, loving what they hear, and scrolling all the way back to the start. What else is new? Here are four recent releases you shouldn’t miss.
* Uncharted with Hannah Fry
The 40-year-old mathematician is my new favourite geek. When I discovered her BBC show earlier this year, there were only five episodes out. I devoured them all, taking in how graphs and data presentation changed the world. She follows the mystery of a rogue bug in Singapore’s metro system; the first time we collated global-warming data across centuries; and why some years see more male births. Data is fascinating. She makes it more so. And now there are more episodes to chomp on.
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* Beak Capitalism: The Chickenization of Everything
This three-part show by Bloomberg’s Odd Lots team breaks down the state of the US economy via everyone’s favourite white meat. It’s a telling lens. The show looks at the poultry industry, the restaurant market, changing public diets, the climate crisis, and agri-politics — and ends up decoding a lot about how America works. Brace for some awful chicken and egg puns. Leave with nuggets of insight.
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*Stealing the Past
The NPR podcasts aren’t new. But they’re on top of all the cool science developments and explain them in short, crisp episodes. The one I haven’t been able to get out of my head is Stealing the Past, which was released in May. It’s about a common phenomenon among twins: each has a first-person memory of an event (a first kiss, for instance), and each is convinced that it happened to them and not their twin sibling. It makes you wonder where identity resides, and how fragile it is.
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* 1947: Road to Indian Independence
I would listen to Hindustan Times journalist Prashant Jha talk about anything. But his HT Smartcast show marking 75 years of Indian Independence is a special treat. The 12 episodes rush past like a story half-remembered, but they’re also packed with beautiful detail and fresh research. The episode I can’t forget is the one on the massacre at Jallianwala Bagh. Listen in as Cornell University historian Durba Ghosh explains how a single brutal day became a turning point in Indian nationalism.
(To reach Rachel Lopez, email rachel.lopez@htlive.com)
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