Scroll down Chinmayi Sripaada’s Twitter profile and you’ll get a glimpse of the many things she’s thinking about. Over the past couple of days, the singer has tweeted multiple times about the just-released teaser of Manmadhudu 2, the Nagarjuna-starrer directed by her husband Rahul Ravindran. There are tweets calling out people who refuse to clean up after themselves in airport and theatre restrooms, criticism of the Modi government’s New Education Policy, fundraisers for people in need, raising awareness about plastic pollution and announcements about her concerts and movies.

But more than anything else, Chinmayi tweets about sexual harassment. Relentlessly.

These tweets range from sharing anonymous accounts by survivors speaking up about their abusers—though this has reduced considerably from the avalanche of the first few weeks after the #MeToo movement gathered strength in India last year—, sharing unsolicited sexual messages that flood her inbox and calling out sexual harassers. She engages with her followers too, not just the allies but also the trolls.     

“I don’t believe in ignoring them, I think that is a part of the problem. I call them out publicly and don’t take it personally. After all, at some point we will have to talk to them too,” she told HuffPost India.   

It is an exhausting mission, and sometimes she has no choice but to ignore and block the users, almost always men, hurling abuses at her. She has cut down her social media time to less than an hour per day and the personal and professional costs have been numerous. But she still keeps going, trying to translate her online activism offline as well.  

“The truth is, we have to be at it. I can’t afford to get tired,” she said.

The cost of speaking out

The credit of ‘discovering’ Chinmayi is often attributed to A.R. Rahman. She was barely out of her teens in 2002 when she sang the haunting ’Oru Deivam Thantha Poove’ in Mani Ratnam’s ’Kannathil Muthamittal’, winning the National Award for it. In the years that followed, she would sing hundreds of film songs across Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi. In between, she also made a name for herself as a dubbing artist for stars, including Samantha Akkineni and Trisha Krishnan.   

But since October 2018, the offers have dried up. That’s when Chinmayi joined hundreds of women sharing stories of being harassed and abused at their homes, offices and public places, and accused influential lyricist Vairamuthu of sexually harassing her. At that time, not many celebrities, especially those in the South, had broken their silence yet. Chinmayi’s allegations hit the headlines and marked the beginning of a long, lonely battle that would result in shaming, isolation and the loss of work.

The last Tamil song Chinmayi she sang was Lesa Lesa from the film Devarattam in May this year. And she last dubbed for the female lead in the nostalgic hit 96, way back in September 2018.

In November, the South Indian Cine Television Artistes and Dubbing Artistes Union ousted her, ostensibly for not paying subscription fees. The head of the organisation, Radha Ravi, is an influential actor and politician who has been accused of sexual misconduct himself—after being suspended by the DMK for making derogatory comments against superstar Nayanthara, he joined the AIADMK this week.

Seven months since then, Chinmayi hasn’t stopped fighting, in court and outside. Legally, she has got some relief, but the informal ban is still in place. “Radha Ravi still says I am not a member (of the dubbing association). I want to believe this is temporary,” she said.

Chinmayi wasn’t the only woman to accuse Vairamuthu—at least eight other women have alleged that he harassed him.

“These have been completely missing from discussion and reports in the vernacular media,” said Dhanya Rajendran, editor of The News Minute and a friend of the singer.

The classically trained singer, who used to record at least two Tamil songs a day, has sang for just a handful of films since September.  

“There are seasonal dry patches in cinema, but it’s hard to dismiss this as mere coincidence,” she said. “I am convinced nothing has changed in the Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi industries. But Tamil has always been my mainstay.”

But long ago, Chinmayi had discovered there was an entrepreneur inside her. She’s the CEO of a translation services firm called The Blue Elephant and recently started a skincare curatorial service called Isle of Skin, which plans to launch its own line of products in a couple of years.

“I am keeping myself afloat and I refuse to go in search of work in the industry. It’s something I have never done and they know what I am capable of,” she said.

Not many allies

“The Tamil film industry has hardly reacted except to shame her. There are very few like Varalaxmi Sarathkumar, Siddharth and PA Ranjith who keep voicing their support for survivors, but the numbers aren’t growing,” said Rajendran of  The News Minute. “It is a shame that someone as talented as her is out of work and no one is doing anything about this gross injustice,” she added.

It’s the loneliness of the fight that sometimes gets to Chinmayi. While no Indian film industry has gone to great lengths to investigate allegations or isolate abusers, the Tamil film fraternity immediately closed ranks around Vairamuthu. Apart from their film connections, many of the alleged harassers also have connections to major political parties.  

“This (Vairamuthu’s behaviour) has been an open secret in the industry, not new information. I don’t get how and why people say they believe in Vairamuthu,” said an exasperated Chinmayi.

While she knew she would lose some work, Chinmayi said it was the criticism levelled by some senior women actors, including Khushboo Sundar and Sowcar Janaki, which came as the bigger shock.  

“Most of my shaming has come from senior female members of the industry, even those who claim to be feminists. That isn’t something I expected and can’t seem to get my head around,” she said.  

There have been variations in responses from non-celebrities as well.

“People say I am brave and some salute me at traffic signals. Then again, there are women who come and tell me that they are proud of what I am doing but wouldn’t allow their daughters to do the same,” she said.

Going by the abuse that she encounters every day, Sripaada thinks that shaming her has also become a way of showing allegiance towards Vairamuthu and DMK.

“K Rajan of the Tamil Film Producers’ Council said at an audio launch that for accusing a revered figure like Vairamuthu, he would destroy me,” she says while also admitting that standing up against Vairamuthu isn’t an easy thing to do.

In a state where cinema and politics often overlap, it is no surprise that these open threats come from all quarters, including the influential regional media.

“The Tamil magazine Nakkheeran went as far as calling me a BJP stooge who was given a house in Bangalore in return for accusing Vairamuthu. It was a cover story, no less,” she said.

Rajendran believes the Tamil industry is acutely aware of the power centres, and few want to rock the boat, lest it opens up a Pandora’s box.

Solidarity across industries

One of the most shameful images that emerged from the #MeToo movement was that of Chinmayi at a press conference in October, standing with her hands folded, pleading with journalists to treat the survivors on the dais with sensitivity.

It was an unfortunate reminder of a similar press conference held by Kerala’s Women in Cinema Collective (WCC) a few weeks earlier, where raucous male reporters heckled the women who had gathered to speak about harassment, asking them to name their abusers to generate a sensationalist headline.

While superstars in the Malayalam film industry have refused to speak up against misogyny, the WCC is still a ray of hope for women film professionals, who suffer from an absence of support groups.

“We came out together after an incident as a collective (the abduction and assault of an actress, allegedly planned by influential actor Dileep) and that helped amplify our voices,” said Padmapriya, an actor and WCC member.

Similarly, 40 women in the Telugu film industry formed the Voice of Women in a (delayed) response to Sri Reddy’s protest aimed at highlighting the problem of casting couch.

“Fortunately, we had a listening ear when we reached out to the Film Chamber; there was no space for denial. ICCs were set up and VOW acts like a go-between the Film Chamber and women seeking redressal”, said a VOW member on condition of anonymity.

It is these networks from other industries that have offered more support to Chinmayi than her home industry.

“Hers is a unique case. In Kerala, film stars wear their political opinions on their sleeve but aren’t embedded in the system in the same way. The backlash and animosity we faced was from within the film industry,” said Padmapriya.

The South Indian Film Women’s Association (SIFWA), constituted in April 2018, is attempting to change the conversation through addressing some basic gaps, has on its manifesto basic tasks (among a few others) cut out for itself, like including a ‘selvi’ column in the application forms issued by the film directors’ association, toilets for women and encouraging more female technical staff.

Online to offline

Every so often, Chinmayi announces offline solidarity meetings through her social media channels. These Sisterhood Mentoring Meets usually bring together women who want to expand the discourse on safer workspaces for women across industries. The first such meeting included Chinmayi’s own lawyer, who answered questions on seeking legal recourse. In another meeting, members of a Chennai-based NGO called Prajnya led a discussion on what constitutes consent.

“The idea is to start a conversation and consolidate support while building solidarity groups, a sisterhood of sorts. This, I hope will result in a ripple effect and better bystander intervention. Right now, a lot seems to be lost in conversation and comprehension,” said Chinmayi. “I don’t have a road map yet, but I know after the last meeting, all of us were a little more educated when we left,” she adds.

There haven’t been many active pay-offs for Chinmayi or her peers from the Tamil film industry. It has been a long, mostly thankless struggle, sometimes punctuated by developments such as the temporary suspension of Radha Ravi from his primary DMK membership in March.

But there are some glimmers of light: after Radha Ravi’s sexist remarks, Nayanthara, one of the biggest female stars in the Tamil industry, issued a strong statement, asking for an ICC to be set up.

In April, the South Indian Artistes’ Association (SIAA), commonly known as Nadigar Sangam, announced the institution of an ICC to “safeguard and protect the self-esteem of artistes”, but there hasn’t been much news about it since.

Chinmayi, who credits her husband and his family for supporting her through all the stress, doesn’t think there will be an overnight transformation, but is encouraged by the thought of changing mindsets, one at a time.  

“The conversations on social media are changing. Men have started asking questions. Just like rape jokes became unacceptable, the #MeToo jokes will stop too.”

Perennial political rivals India and Pakistan will face off on a Manchester cricket field on Sunday in one of the World Cup’s most hotly-anticipated and massively-watched games.

It’s the mini-title game of the World Cup group stage for more than 1 billion people in two cricket-crazed countries.

The sport British colonisers introduced to the subcontinent during the Raj, and which both India and Pakistan continued to embrace in the wake of the Partition, divides and unites the countries at the same time.

“It’s a marquee event all over the world,” India captain Virat Kohli told World Cup broadcasters. “The frenzy around it is a bit intimidating for the guys doing it for the first time, but for us it’s about being professional as always, do the basics right and look to get a result.”

Kohli never attempts to play down the significance of the contest, but he’s always at pains to assure cricket fans there’s no animosity between the players.

“We are quite ready to take that game on,” Kohli said in comments published by the BBC. “It’s an opportunity to create excitement.”

Pakistan’s Imam-ul-Haq, who scored a half-century in the team’s loss to Australia, said it’s now or never with semifinals spots at stake.

“It’s a huge pressure game — obviously Pakistan-India there’s lots of mysteries behind that,” Imam said. “But we want to focus on our strengths.

“Obviously, it’s great to be part of that Pakistan-India ... lots of Pakistan-India fans are going to be there. I’m really excited about it. 

The Subcontinent watches

Sunday’s venue at Old Trafford in Manchester, England, will be swamped with ex-pats, visitors and generations of people from families which migrated from the subcontinent. The television audience will be enormous.

Pakistan coach Mickey Arthur said there’d be 1.5 billion people watching on TV and he’s urging his players to embrace the occasion.

“It doesn’t get much bigger than that, more exciting,” he said, adding that he told his players that “careers could be defined by moments in the game.”

Some former players and fans urged India to boycott the match at Old Trafford in protest of the Pulwama terror attack in which least 40 police CRPF personnel were killed in February. Pakistan-based JeM had claimed the attack.

The India-Pak game was still the first World Cup fixture to sell out - hours after tickets went on sale for the 19,000-capacity stadium - and millions more will be watching at home.

Kohli and his Pakistani counterpart Sarfaraz Ahmed have played it cool, saying the players are only focussed on the game - despite obviously being aware of the hype.

While playing down its significance, players on both sides know that for volatile fans, they can become an instant hero with a century or an overnight villain with a dropped catch.

“It’s simple – if Pakistan want to stay in the tournament, they have to bring an ‘A plus’ performance and win that game,” Pakistan pace great Waqar Younis wrote in a column.

“The match has always meant so much to both countries.”

World Cup run

India, which won its first World Cup title in England in 1983 and its second on home soil in 2011, was the last team to get started at the 2019 edition of the tournament. India opened with wins over South Africa in Southampton and defending champion Australia at the Oval in London before its game against 2015 finalist New Zealand was washed out at Nottingham.

That left both India and New Zealand unbeaten heading into the weekend, but both needing a bit of extra time in the practice nets.

Pakistan’s form has been patchy, but it’s a team that can rise to the occasion. After losing a lopsided opening game to West Indies, Sarfaraz Ahmed’s team rebounded to beat top-ranked England, the host and pre-tournament title favourite.

But they followed that up with a loss to Australia, meaning the game against India takes on even more significance. Pakistan had to share points with Sri Lanka after a group game was washed out, and needs to start accumulating quickly to have any chance of finishing in the top four and earning a spot in the playoffs.

Head to Head

India has won all six times the countries have met at the World Cup, but Pakistan has won more of their one-day international meetings overall — 73-54. 

Pakistan PM Imran Khan, a former star cricketer, led the country’s team to its only World Cup title in 1992.

Pakistan caused an upset two years ago with a victory in the Champions Trophy final against its greatest rival.

India responded by comprehensively winning both head-to-head encounters at last year’s Asia Cup.

Kohli scored a century and was player of the match the last time India beat Pakistan at the World Cup, a game staged far away in the southern Australian city of Adelaide in 2015.

“Cringeworthy ads”

Crude television commercials have added to the raucous buildup to this match. An Indian one notes the unbeaten World Cup record against Pakistan and asks ‘who’s the daddy?’

A Pakistani station ran a spoof of Abhinandan Varthaman, the Indian pilot captured during recent hostilities, depicting him being interrogated wearing cricket colours.

“Cringeworthy ads on both sides of the border,” tweeted tennis star Sania Mirza, who is married to Pakistan cricketer Shoaib Malik.

“It’s only cricket for God’s sake, and if you think it’s anymore than that, then get a grip or get a life!”

Diplomatic relations have been strained between the countries, and Narendra Modi excluded Imran Khan from a list of regional leaders invited to the prime minister’s swearing-in ceremony last month.

Modi had invited then-Pakistani prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, for his swearing-in ceremony in 2014. But hostility between the two nations, which have fought three wars since winning independence from Britain in 1947, has not eased in the past five years.

Meanwhile, fans hope the inclement English weather, which has already wreaked havoc with the tournament, does not provide an anti-climax after so much anticipation.

It was raining Saturday in Manchester and areas around the covers were saturated. Rain was expected to clear overnight, with most dry, breezy conditions on Sunday with potential for showers.

(All inputs from AP and Reuters)

There is little that offends me. I like dark, even inappropriate, humor. So I guess it makes sense that I stood there laughing after I was sexually harassed for 80 minutes during a massage I gave during my one-night-a-week job as a massage therapist.

I learned the hard way that one of the funny things about sexual harassment is that you might not know it’s happened even after it’s happened. You might stand there laughing and thinking, I can’t wait to tell my husband about this creep, as if you had seen a new Netflix show that you weren’t the star of.

You may not know that there is a lag time between the lizard brain — the oldest part of the brain which is responsible for primitive survival instincts such as fear — and real time, and it can be one of the reasons you don’t flee an abusive situation like you thought you would. Or even realize the extent of what happened until days later.

This 6’4” man, who was so big his arms didn’t fit on the massage table, knew what he was doing. And in hindsight, after my lizard skin molted, I could see it too, strategically mapped out.

It started with friendly conversation about where we grew up, and a big career win he’d had earlier that day that I congratulated him on.

How open is this one? he was surely thinking, gauging his entry point. I usually prefer no talking when working on a client, as giving massages is a form of meditation for me ― a sacred, quiet space where children aren’t, where no one is asking me for snacks, and my mind and body simultaneously get to focus on just one task. But if a client is chatty, I go with it. I’m in the service industry, after all.

The man baited me with a question.

“Do you have any life dreams that you want to pursue?” This was after we had talked about his military background, his wife and kids, his knee surgeries, and his over-seven-figure salary.

I answered something pat like, “Other than going to Hawaii more often, I’m doing exactly what I want to be doing.” And then like a good conversationalist, I asked him the same question back. I now know that this was exactly what he wanted.

“How honest can I be?” he said.

“It’s up to you.”

When I said this, it didn’t cross my mind that he would use the most vulgar words, with such colorful detail and size comparison to Coke cans and forearms ― and with such specific intonation and emphasis ― to tell me all about his sexual desires.

“I really want to get my cock sucked by a man again.” He uttered all the details of his past aloud in the tiny, cozy room we both inhabited, spa music playing softly in the background, his naked body on the squishy table, covered by a sheet and my hands.

Once I reattached my jaw and subsequently found my voice, I told him he should stop telling me these stories. But he didn’t ever stop.

“You have to tell me yours because I told you mine,” he said playfully, like I was a horny high schooler in a closet, not a mother at her place of work.

“There are only five other people in the world that know this about me,” he revealed, purposefully setting me up to wonder if he was being vulnerable instead of violating, hoping I would think that maybe he was just pouring out his heart. Then he refused the eye pillow I offered him, “I want to be able to see you a little bit.” He asked me if I was going to tell my husband all the things he had said and then suggested, “How about you tell him right when you’re fucking him.”

The words shot out of his mouth like bullets from a gun. And I was his target.

What’s funny about sexual harassment is I can consider myself a strong feminist who rallies around other victimized women and strives to be a solid role model for my daughter and son, teaching them all about consent and body autonomy, and I can still lose my voice and agency when I’m the one in shock while being victimized. Just like in birth and parenting, what you thought you’d do in those intense, prepared-for moments and what you actually do can be two very different things.

I thought of myself as more of a dick-puncher/“Get the fuck out of here” type, but little did I know that when these sleazebags are good at what they do, I may not really know what’s happening until it’s escalated far past what I’m comfortable with. My own personality, conditioning, and fear of agitating someone three times my size might overtake the superhero identity that I thought would show up.

I also didn’t realize that every single person to hear my story would have the luxury of all the details laid out nicely in front of them, dots already connected, knowing from the get-go that this dude was in fact a creeper, and that I survived.

Right now, you as the reader know this man is human garbage because I did the legwork on that for you. But I didn’t know all of that while it was happening to me. I was chugging along, doing my job, trying to be professional, while a perpetrator lounged underneath my nurturing hands, purposefully orchestrating a slow, tactical build that caught me by surprise.

After sharing my story, some people have had the gall to say things like, “I would’ve told him to fuck off,” or “Why didn’t you leave?” What their tone-deaf responses fail to recognize is that they are problem-solving from the safety and comfort of having all the facts and without feeling the effects of the cortisol and lizard brain cocktail. I now fully understand why some women don’t tell their stories. Sometimes the insensitive reactions can be as traumatizing as the event itself.

And yes, leaving the room was an option, but it wasn’t what I chose. In those moments, I couldn’t have told you why I wasn’t fleeing. This analyzation is a gift of hindsight. While it was happening, I was operating off of my personal autopilot that was built from days as a latchkey kid who handled things herself. And I thought that tough chick would cut and run. But I found out that navigating a threatening situation is so complicated that only the person in the crosshairs can understand the internal flow chart happening inside them: 

This guy could snap me in half if I upset him, and we’re behind closed doors at the end of a deserted long hallway. I don’t know what he’s capable of, but it isn’t looking good. Better keep the rapport up. If I stop the massage and report him, how many uncomfortable meetings will I find myself in saying the word “cock” to Ron the awkward HR guy, and the rest of the management? Will they believe me? Will I wrongfully lose my job over this? Will this man lie about me? If I make this a thing, will he target me afterwards? My kids? Better just get through this and be done with him forever.

I never quite realized how sticking around for sexual harassment could feel like the safer option. Had he gotten physical with me, I’d like to think that I would’ve fought or bolted. I’ve taken safety classes where I crotch-throttled a man in riot gear, so I know I have it in me. But I can’t know what I would do in a violent situation because everything I thought I knew about how I would handle this was wrong.

I now viscerally get why many women don’t flee — especially at work. It has given me a newfound respect for every person who has been victimized by words, hands or worse. I now understand the nuances to why they run, why they don’t, why they tell, why they won’t. And how sometimes not exploding the situation is the safer choice.

I know we’re all supposed to be supporting women finding their voices and the #MeToo movement, but we can’t be expected to smash the patriarchy when we’re in the middle of being victimized ourselves by that patriarchy. It’s a fight-or-flight deal that none of us deserve to be in. And I didn’t know that sometimes fighting can look like allowing.

For the past decade, I worked as a birth doula and childbirth educator who also mentored women after traumatic births. And in the later part of those 80 minutes that night, as I questioned myself about how I would be affected by what was transpiring, I remembered something from my trauma training. I remembered that part of trauma comes from the feeling of being paralyzed or frozen in the moment, and not taking action ― later wishing you had done something or said something. So, in a moment of fleeting lucidity, I asked myself, What do you need to do in this moment to come out of this less scathed, Brandy? I was practicing actual self-care, not that bubble bath bullshit. I knew what I needed to do, and it wasn’t to run. The communicator in me needed to speak up in some way, no matter if it changed his behavior or not.

At the end of my massages, I sit at the client’s head, rubbing their temples, then ears, thinking healing thoughts for them and visualizing my well wishes integrating into their body which I have just tenderized. But this time, as I rubbed this man’s temples with a heavier hand than usual, I spoke up.

“You are lucky you got me tonight and not someone else. You could’ve gotten a woman who had been deeply victimized before, and your words might have triggered or paralyzed her,” I told him. “And I’m sure you don’t want to go through your life traumatizing women.” I made this news palatable to him so he wouldn’t choke me out.

“But I asked you?” he replied.

He was referring to his earlier question about how honest he should be. Like a professional predator, he had turned it on me. Never mind that I had told him to stop and he didn’t.

On my way home from work that night, I shared the whole story with a close friend. A woke, feminist friend.

“He won,” she scolded. “He asserted his dominance and power in the situation. And it sounds like you actually consented and then consoled him.” 

Her words also felt like bullets. Imagine being victimized and then hearing how you did it wrong, how your primal actions had done a grave disservice to all women. My friend was too focused on the greater #MeToo movement to see that I didn’t make it comfortable for his sake. I teetered that fine line between please don’t rape me and let me speak this truth for my own future well-being, and that was for my own damn survival. I can appreciate the internal fury that all women feel when watching other women seemingly become complacent, but I am a living, breathing person ― I’m someone’s mother ― not a movement with a hashtag. After some words, compassion emerged for my well-intentioned-but-grossly-missed-the-mark friend. I knew how it felt to act differently than you thought you would. I accepted her apology.

After the man got dressed, he met me outside the room. I was grateful he hadn’t masturbated and left it for me to clean up. I handed him a glass of refreshing citrus spa water. It was the first time in 80 minutes that my hands weren’t touching his body.

“I’m gonna give you a big tip,” he said, smiling, and then held out $100 cash. Taking it would feel disgusting, like I was endorsing his abuse. But also, he owed me something for blatantly exploiting the power dynamic between paying client and service provider, between his size and mine, and then blurring the lines between my job description and his intentions. And so I took the cash. I would deal with the shame later, likely at Nordstrom.

“Thank you for the therapy,” he said before he walked away. I struggled to make eye contact with him, feeling like an accomplice to my own attack. Halfway down the long hall, he stopped and turned around, put his finger to his mouth and said, “Shhhhh,” as I stood there holding my tip.

Hush money. 

Brandy Ferner is an author, podcaster, blogger, mother, and lover of dark humor. In addition to HuffPost, she has bylines in Romper, TodayParents and CafeMom. For LOLs and real talk about motherhood, check out her “Adult Conversation” podcast, Facebook page, blog and forthcoming novel of the same name (May 2020, She Writes Press).

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Need help? Visit RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Online Hotline or the National Sexual Violence Resource Center’s website.

We really “like” this concept, Selena Gomez.

The 26-year-old singer revealed Wednesday she no longer has Instagram on her phone. Gomez, who is one of the most followed people on the app, explained her reasoning during an appearance on “Live with Kelly and Ryan.”

“It’s just become really unhealthy, I think personally for young people, including myself, to spend all of their time fixating on all these comments and letting this stuff in,” she said. “And it was affecting me. It would make me depressed, it would make me feel not good about myself and look at my body differently and all kinds of stuff.”

These feelings might sound all too familiar to people who spend time using the app. Research shows social media can poorly influence our mental health. Despite our awareness that what we see on social media is only part of the story, countless studies point out that the pressure and comparison that comes with only seeing the sparkliest part of one’s life can be dangerous. A recent survey from the American Psychology Association found that increased symptoms like depression and anxiety in young people started around 2011 ― right around the time social media started to gain popularity. 

When Gomez does feel compelled to share something with her massive following, she does so using someone else’s phone. “When I feel like I want to share something with my fans or just mess around with it I do it then,” she said.

Instagram has awareness of the way it messes with users’ mental health, and is taking some strides to be better. Case in point: it recently began testing a like-less version of the app, which could do wonders to alleviate the constant comparison and pressure to rack up a high number.

Regardless, we applaud Gomez not only for taking control of her consumption but for her candidness regarding the way something we all use ― sometimes recklessly ― can have a deeply negative impact. 

A six-year-old girl from India died of heat stroke in an Arizona desert after her mother left her with other migrants to go in search of water, a medical examiner and U.S. Border Patrol said on Friday.

The girl, Gurupreet Kaur, soon to celebrate her seventh birthday, was found by U.S. Border Patrol west of Lukeville, Arizona on Wednesday, when temperatures reached a high of 108 degrees Fahrenheit (42 Celsius), U.S. Border Patrol and the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner (PCOME) said.

The girl’s death, the second recorded fatality of a migrant child this year in Arizona’s southern deserts, highlighted the danger of summer heat as a surge of migrant families, mainly from Central America, cross the U.S.-Mexico border to seek asylum.

An increasing number of Indian nationals are entering the United States from Mexico, according to immigration officials. They are among thousands of Africans and Asian migrants making the arduous journey, led by smuggling cartels.

The girl and her mother were among a group of five Indian nationals dropped off by smugglers in a remote border area at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, 17 miles (27 km) west of Lukeville, a U.S. border town 50 miles (80 km) southwest of Tucson.

After walking some way, the girl’s mother and another woman went in search of water, leaving her daughter with another woman and her child.

“Once they went to look for water they never saw them again,” said U.S. Border Patrol Agent Jesus Vasavilbaso.

The mother and the other woman wandered in the rugged Sonoran desert wilderness for 22 hours before being found by a U.S. Border Patrol agent who tracked their footprints.

Four hours later, Border Patrol agents found the body of the deceased girl a mile (1.6 km) from the border.

Agents tracked the remaining woman and her 8-year-old daughter into Mexico, before the mother and child re-entered the United States and surrendered to Border Patrol.

The deceased girl died of hyperthermia and her death was ruled an accident, said Greg Hess, PCOME chief medical officer.

Up to May 30, PCOME recorded 58 migrant deaths in southern Arizona, most heat related. It recorded 127 deaths in 2018.

Border Patrol blamed Kaur’s death on the smugglers.

“This is a senseless death driven by cartels who are profiting from putting lives at risk,” Tucson Chief Patrol Agent Roy Villareal said.

Human rights activist Juanita Molina said U.S. border security measures were also partly to blame, along with the exhausted state of Indian child migrants once they reach the border.

“They’re trying to unload people in places where they can avoid detection themselves,” Molina, director of Tucson-based Border Action Network, said of smugglers.

“For a young child, death can come very quickly,” she added.

Dami Olonisakin wrote her first blogpost in 2008. That morning she’d been to church with her mum and younger sister, where the sermon had focused on abortion and why worshippers shouldn’t terminate a pregnancy – and the 18 year old was angry. So she went to her bedroom and took to her keyboard.

Today, she shares her views with 110,000 Twitter followers, 58,000 Instagram fans, and 50,000 podcast listeners, who know her better as Oloni. She tries to create a safe space in which women can feel comfortable talking about their sexuality; a digital version of the women’s toilets. “Where one girl is crying her eyes out because she doesn’t know what to do about her ex and strangers are giving her compliments and telling her she’s great.”

Her digital ambitions have also caught the attention of producers keen to bring them to television – earlier this year, she was rumoured to be in touch with the Love Island team. But she won’t be heading to the villa: “Love Island is a great show,” she says. ”[But] if I went on Love Island it’d be to be an expert not a contestant as that role would suit me more.”

Does she think the criticisms of the show’s diversity are valid? ”[It] is doing what it needs to do in terms of love for young singles. I think they have a great mix of diversity this year and hope it remains so.”

Opinions are what make Oloni a brand, rather than another social media star: she estimates she spends between five and six hours a day updating her social platforms – from the kind of threads about dating apps and oral sex, cheating, and ‘situationships’ that have made her name, to thoughts on Greggs pasties, skincare, and who is the greater pop princess - Britney or Rihanna? (Oloni’s backing Britney).  

Her advice is so trusted, that fans now pay £90 for an hour-long phone consultation to help fix their problems, and are helping crowdfund her first book: a relationships bible. Sexual health charity Brook this year chose her as an ambassador for their work. She seems the perfect modern agony aunt. 

But she also regularly gets trolled. “My platform is dedicated to women [but] I’ve come across a lot of guys who don’t like me in their girlfriend’s ears telling her: ‘Sis you can do better. Sis break up with him’. Straight men can’t stand me.” She doesn’t back down in the face of their aggression because she wants the women these men are dating to think about why their partner is so enraged. “They hate that I celebrate my sexuality,” she says.

Oloni was doing a work experience stint at Cosmopolitan when she first realised that black women were underserved in coverage of sex and relationships. “I felt the culture of dating and hook-up culture for a black woman and a white woman were different. Black women were being quiet about sex but it didn’t mean we weren’t having it,” she says.

So she decided to fill the gap in the market. “People started sending me emails every day presuming I had the answers to their problems when I was just as clueless as they were,” she laughs. Whether she felt qualified or not – she has no formal counselling qualifications – the numbers following and listening to her started growing, and didn’t stop. 

Oloni’s background didn’t point towards a future as figurehead for the female sex positivity movement – her family didn’t even speak openly about the female anatomy, let alone sex. Aged eight, she asked her mum about sanitary towels after seeing an advert; her mum said she would work it out herself when she was older. When, as a teenager, Oloni came home with condoms after sexual health workers visited her school, her mum, a Christian, confiscated the packet because “she wouldn’t need to use them”.

Now it’s Oloni that works in schools, where she talks to students about consent. The sexual landscape has changed since she wrote her first blogpost, but many of the same issues persist, she argues – women are still fighting for abortion rights, and there remains a lack of understanding about the importance of consent, where #MeToo has helped, but the problem is far from solved.

In school she tells students: “A girl doesn’t want you to be pulling on her bra strap in the playground. That same culture moves into nightclubs where men are touching women. They need to know as kids.”

Children are now more ‘woke’ than her generation, she notes – “Even if they’re learning this from a meme page they see the stories of Harvey Weinstein, R Kelly, Bill Cosby, they know what’s right.” – but they’re also living in a more sexualised world.  “To watch porn [in the nineties] you’d have to go downstairs, use the family computer, use a dial up landline connection that would cut out, download something from LimeWire,” she says. “Now they have a laptop in their bedroom and can watch anything.” For the first time in our conversation she sounds worried.

It’s not just children who worry her. Two days ago, a woman posted an anecdote on a Twitter thread of lighthearted tales of dating mishaps, which sounded a lot like sexual assault. When Oloni messaged her privately, she explained that she knew a man had spiked her drink when she went to the loo – it tasted weird and she’d seen the pills in his bag – but that she’d still had sex with him because she felt compelled to do so. Other women have shared stories of men ‘stealthing’ (taking off a condom mid-way through sex); men pulling up their skirts and trying to and touch their vagina; even rape.

The easy familiarity, and impression of closeness, the ‘girl’s toilets’ atmosphere means women offload on Oloni in a way she’s not always be prepared for. People trust she will offer sincere advice because they’ve seen thousands of others going to her with problems. That longevity is part of what makes her brand so successful. But also, she is just nice. In a world of hot takes, Twitter takedowns and people being cancelled, this is important. 

Does she feel overwhelmed? “I do have to be careful. It opens my eyes to these experiences, I hear a lot more than the average joe. But the fact people are able to trust me and continue trusting me - it makes me feel special.” Special indeed.

PATNA/ MUZAFFARPUR —  With one more child dying of suspected AES in Muzaffarpur on Sunday morning, the death toll of children in the district rose to 83 this month, even as Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar announced an ex-gratia of Rs four lakh each.

Kumar expressed grief over the children’s death in Muzaffarpur and ordered payment of Rs four lakh as ex-gratia to the next of the kin of the deceased, an official release said.

The state health department’s advisory said the disease spread because of excessive heat and humidity, the Hindustan Times reported.

The intense heat wave in Bihar has claimed over 45 lives in the last 24 hours and over a 100 have been hospitalised, The Hindu said. All schools in Patna have been ordered shut till 19 June.

Nitish Kumar has directed officials of the Health department and the district administration as well as doctors to take all possible measures to tackle the disease, PTI reported.

A press release issued by the Muzaffarpur district administration said till Sunday 9 am, 83 children had died at the state-run Sri Krishna Medical College and Hospital (SKMCH) and the Kejriwal Hospital, which was run by a trust. According to the release, 69 children had died at the SKMCH, while 14 died at the Kejriwal Hospital due to suspected cases of AES.

Officials, however, maintained that a majority of the victims, most of whom were below 10 years of age, had fallen prey to hypoglycemia, a condition caused by a very low level of blood sugar and electrolyte imbalance.

Since 1 June, 197 children were admitted to the SKMCH while 91 were taken to Kejriwal Hospital with suspected AES, but most of them were found to be victims of hypoglycemia.

Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan is scheduled to visit Muzaffarpur on Sunday to take stock of the situation. He will hold meetings with doctors and officials of both the central and state governments.

Vardhan is also scheduled to hold a review meeting with the officials of the Health and other departments concerned of the state government in Patna later in the day.

(With inputs from PTI)

ISLAMABAD — Pakistani prime minister and cricket great Imran Khan on Sunday urged his country’s cricket team to be mentally strong and take calculated risks to triumph in a crucial World Cup clash with arch-rivals India.

Khan, who led Pakistan to their only World Cup triumph in 1992, is considered one of the sport’s greatest all-rounders and his enduring popularity from his cricketing success with Pakistan helped propel into power in last year’s elections.

Khan said mental strength will be vital on Sunday.

“Given the intensity of the match, both teams will come under great mental pressure and the power of the mind will decide the outcome of the match today,” Khan said on Twitter.

“All fears of losing should be banished from the mind as the mind can only process one thought at a time. Fear of losing leads to a negative and defensive strategy.”

Cricket matches between the two countries are among the most intense sporting rivalries on the planet, and the game on Sunday has an added bite following a military clash between the two nations earlier this year, which included their warplanes battling a dogfight over the Kashmir region’s skies.

The South Asian neighbours have already fought three wars since gaining independence in 1947, and former Pakistan cricket captain Waqar Younis once memorably said matches between the two nations were neither sport nor war, but “somewhere in between”.

Pakistan boast a superior head-to-head record against India in one-day internationals overall but has lost all six of their World Cup matches.

Pakistan have lost two of their four games and are ninth in the 10-team standings. The country’s only win came against hosts and pre-tournament favourites England while their match against Sri Lanka was washed out.

India are also among the favourites to lift the trophy on 14 July and are widely expected to triumph in Sunday’s encounter, although there is a strong chance the match could be impacted by rain.

Two years ago Pakistan shocked India in the final of the Champions Trophy tournament, for their first win against their bitter rivals in a global tournament.

Afterwards, celebratory gunfire echoed around major Pakistani cities as people thronged the streets to celebrate.

Khan said the right attitude could be the key to the team’s success once again.

“Even though India may be the favourites, banish all fear of losing. Just give your best and fight till the last ball,” he said.

KOLKATA — The impasse at the state-run medical colleges and hospitals in West Bengal entered the sixth day on Sunday, even as the agitating doctors asserted that they were open to talks with the government, the venue for which would be decided by a governing body of medical practitioners.

Earlier, the agitators had insisted that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee visit the city’s NRS Medical College and Hospital, the epicentre of the agitation.

After an internal meeting late on Saturday, the doctors, who had turned down an invite for a closed-door meeting with Banerjee at the state secretariat, mellowed down and stated that they were ready to hold a dialogue in any form, but the venue of the meeting would be decided later.

“We will be deciding on our next step during a governing body meeting today. We are open to any dialogue as always. The venue for the meeting will be decided soon,” a spokesperson of a joint forum of junior doctors told reporters here.

During a press conference at the state secretariat on Saturday, Banerjee urged the agitators to resume work and said her government had accepted all of their demands.

She also stressed that a group of doctors had met her and expressed their willingness to join duty, a claim vehemently refuted by the striking doctors.

During the meet, the chief minister emphasised that her government had not invoked the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) to get the doctors to resume work.

“We have laws, but we do not want to use them.... We are not going to take any stringent action against any of the agitating junior doctors and hamper their career,” she said after the agitators did not turn up for a meeting at 5 pm.

The Ministry of Home Affairs has issued an advisory, seeking a report on the ongoing stir and stating that it had received a number of representations from the medical fraternity from different parts of the country for their safety and security in view of the strike in West Bengal.

Bengal Governor K N Tripathi has written to Banerjee, advising her to take immediate steps to provide security to the medicos and find out a solution to the impasse.

The chief minister said she had spoken to the governor and apprised him of the steps taken by her government to resolve the matter.

Doctors across the state called for a strike after two of their colleagues were brutally assaulted at the NRS Medical College and Hospital by the family members of a patient, who died on Monday night.

The services continue to remain affected in the emergency wards, outdoor facilities and pathological units of many state-run hospitals and private medical facilities in the state, leaving several patients in the lurch.

The Calcutta High Court had, on Friday, refused to pass any interim order on the strike by the junior doctors.

It had also asked the state government to persuade the doctors to resume work.

The stars of “Stranger Things” have hinted at what fans should expect when the hit sci-fi series returns to Netflix on July 4.

Millie Bobby Brown, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp and Sadie Sink on Friday each told “The Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon a word they believed best summed up the next installment of the show.

Their cryptic terms ranged from “classic” to “spreading” and “fun” to “bigger.”

The cast also dished on what it was like filming in an operational mall and taught Fallon their “Chicken Noodle Soup” song.

The trailer for the third season dropped in March and prompted plenty of reaction on social media.

Check out the Fallon interview above and the trailer here:

A Bradley Cooper break up looks good on Irina Shayk.

Days after her split with the “A Star Is Born” director, the Russian supermodel jetted off to Iceland for an Insta-ready vacation ― even Lady Gaga’s ex-fiance Christian Carino took notice when he liked her pics on the social media ― and now Shayk’s stomping down the runways in Italy. 

The 33-year-old served hair, body and face at the CR Runway x LuisaViaRoma 90th anniversary fashion show in Florence, Italy, on Thursday alongside models Bella Hadid, Gigi Hadid and Stella Maxwell.

Shayk sported to two eye-catching, all-black ensembles on the runway. The first look was a striking strapless leather dress with matching gloves, which was only outdone by a pin-striped Mugler blazer and skirt with a sky-high slit. 

Shayk and Cooper, who share 2-year-old daughter Lea De Seine, reportedly split after four years together earlier this month because “the romance changed to more of a partnership,” an unnamed source told People. 

“For Lea’s sake, they keep spending time together as a family,” another source told the outlet. “Bradley is a great dad. He has always been very involved with his daughter.”

The couple has yet to make a public announcement after calling it quits, but that hasn’t stopped fans from speculating about how each party is handling the breakup. 

Cooper was spotted for the first time after the news broke on Monday night for a “boys night” with a group of friends at the Sunset Tower Hotel in West Hollywood.

The actor reportedly caught up with friends and shared drinks for few hours and “looked really upbeat and chill” during the outing, according to an E! News source. 

Don’t expect to hear much from the famously private duo in the next couple weeks, as they’ve kept their relationship under wraps since they first sparked romance rumors in 2015. 

But we’ll always remember them this way... 

President Donald Trump on Saturday accused The New York Times of a  “virtual act of treason” for publishing a story about American digital incursions into Russia’s electrical power grid as a strategy to battle cyber warfare.

Then he tweeted that the story wasn’t true.

He wrapped up by calling the media “cowards” and the “enemy of the people.”

Current and former U.S. officials told the Times about the deployment of American computer code into Russia’s electrical power grid and other targets both as a warning to the Kremlin and as a readied strike in case of a Russian cyberattack.  

The Times responded to Trump’s attack charging that “accusing the press of treason is dangerous.” It cited his own officials as saying they had “no national security concerns” about the story, which was “perhaps an indication” that some of the intrusions were “intended to be noticed by the Russians.”

Ironically, the Times story said that intelligence officials hadn’t thoroughly briefed Trump on actions against Russia because they indicated it could get back to the Kremlin, according to sources. Shortly after Trump took office he shared highly classified information in the Oval Office with visiting Russian officials, which compromised the safety of a key source of intelligence on the Islamic state.

The newspaper described “broad hesitation to go into detail” with Trump about operations against Russia “for concern over his reaction — and the possibility that he might countermand it or discuss it with foreign officials.”

The Times’ story was based on three months of interviews.

Last year Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger said Trump’s continued attacks on the press were “increasingly dangerous.” He added that the president’s “inflammatory language is contributing to a rise in threats against journalists and will lead to violence.”

If you’re living under a rock or don’t care about cricket, allow us to inform you that India is currently playing against Pakistan in the 2019 Cricket World Cup.

Predictably, people are having a lot of feelings about the match.

About the match commentators:

And the rain:

In the midst of all this, fans did not miss the conspicuous presence of former cricketer, now BJP politician, Gautam Gambhir in the commentary panel for Star Sports.

If you’re wondering why Gambhir’s presence drew particular notice, allow us to take you back a few months, riiiiiggght before the Lok Sabha elections, 

Back in March, Gambhir had some, pardon the pun, very gambhir feelings about India playing Pakistan in the World Cup.

The former cricketer brought up the Pulwama terror attack as an argument against India’s cricket team playing Pakistan. Speaking to Sportstar, he said, “Either you don’t play them anywhere or open doors for them. What happened in Pulwama is absolutely not acceptable. I am sure it’s going to be difficult to boycott Pakistan in World Cup but they are not playing in bilaterals. The best they can do is to stop playing in Asia Cup as well, that’s what I believe”.

His comments came three days before he joined the BJP and was fielded as the party’s candidate from East Delhi constituency, a seat he won after acrimonious fight against AAP’s Atishi.

So, erm.

Dude.

What are you doing commentating and getting paid for a match you opposed? 

Twitter was quick to point out the Delhi MP’s hypocrisy.

Some saw it as the mark of a true politician.

It was not all fun and games, though. People pulled up Gambhir for using nationalism for personal gain.

Now they want answers and they are tweeting questions right at him.

Gambhir?

The Parliament’s first session after the Lok Sabha elections begins on Monday.

HYDERABAD, Telangana — When the first session of the 17th Session of the Lok Sabha opens for business on June 17, the All India Majis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) will be represented by two members of parliament for the first time in a storied history dating back to 1927.

One face, that of Asaduddin Owaisi the AIMIM president and four time MP from Hyderabad, shall be no surprise. The other face, Syed Imtiaz Jaleel from Aurangabad who won by a narrow margin of 4,492 votes thanks to an alliance with Prakash Ambedkar’s Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, is the first measurable victory in Owaisi’s attempt to broaden his party’s appeal beyond the Muslim community in Telangana.

Earlier this month, the AIMIM which has seven MLAs had become the de facto opposition party in the Telangana state legislature after 12 of the Congress’s 18 MLAs defected to the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).

These developments were the first concrete steps in Owaisi’s ambitious plan to chart a national course for the AIMIM — one that leverages the party’s following in the Muslim community to build alliances with other socially marginalised groups like the Dalit and Bahujan communities.

The AIMIM’s gains come at a time when the Muslim community is amidst a crisis of political representation. With national and regional parties wilting in the face of the BJP’s orchestrated politics of religious polarisation, only 22 of 543 members of Parliament were Muslim; five years later their numbers have increased marginally to 27.

In this crisis, Owaisi, a London-educated Barrister of Law, sees an opportunity for the community to evolve a broad-based politics of its own.

“The Muslim community will have to actively participate in making alliances with socially disadvantageous groups whether they are the Dalits or Other Backward Classes,” Owaisi said in a recent interview with HuffPost India. “That is the only way forward because we must realise and come out of this comfort zone that the so called secular parties are there. They are not.”

Owaisi’s Quotable Quotes

On any given day, a phalanx of reporters and television cameras park themselves outside the sprawling AIMIM party office at Darussalam, Hyderabad, eager to ask Owaisi his views as the go-to man on all things Muslim: lynchings; the gruesome rape and murder of a Muslim child in Kathua, Kashmir; the Triple Talaq Bill, and sundry religious diktats prescribed by any Ulema on any given subject anywhere in country.

One reason is that Owaisi gives wonderful quotes; the other is that, almost without anyone noticing, he has become the country’s most recognised Muslim politician — a characterisation he disputes.

“The question of me being a national leader for the Muslims—I am not interested. That is not going to happen,” Owaisi said. Muslims are not a homogenous community, he said. “There are so many differences in terms of culture and language. The only common factor is marginalisation.”

As a consequence, Owaisi frequently asks journalists to seek his comments on matters that have larger implications including constitutionality, secularism, and freedom of speech. Yet, reporters on the Owaisi beat have tricks of their own. As one old hand put it, “Owaisi should first be asked the question he may enjoy answering before you try to elicit a statement you need from him.”

The Biking Politician

The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen was set up by Abdul Wahed Owaisi, Asaduddin’s grand-father, who built the party from the splinters of the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, a pre-independence socio-political front.

The Owaisis have long been a powerful, wealthy and well-connected clan with a flair for public spectacle. Abdul Wahed Owaisi’s son and six time MP of Hyderabad, Sultan Salahuddin Owaisi often rode through the Old City’s narrow lanes on a motorcycle, until his age caught up with him — a practice that his son Asaduddin has continued. The drama around his bike rides and his distinctive style of making an entry have often appealed to people. 

In January 2016, Owaisi rode his motorcyle to the Velivada, a site of protest, at University of Hyderabad where hundreds of students had gathered to protest caste discrimination in modern academic spaces after Rohith Vemula, the 26-year-old research scholar committed suicide on January 17 that year.

More recently, he rode down to caretaker Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s official residence a few days after Telangana’s Legislative Assembly polls on December 7, 2018. The ride was an elaborate joke on the BJP’s Goshamahal (Old city) MLA Raja Singh, who had threatened to kill Owaisi if he dared to travel without security personnel.  

On December 10, Owaisi gave his MP’s security cover a miss to reach the CM’s camp office, Pragathi Bhawan.

“Hyderabad is a safe city,” he told reporters, as he dismounted. In the same breath Owaisi predicted heavy losses for the BJP in the state polls. When the results were declared the next day, the BJP’s strength in the state legislature had fallen from five to one.   

Part of Owaisi’s appeal is his refusal to read from the script expected of most Muslim leaders. In 2015, for instance, he told author Patrick French that the Haj subsidy should be scrapped and the money spent on educating Muslim girls. In a profile for the Hindustan Times, he also spoke out against the influential Muslim clergy.

“There’s nothing extraordinary about an imam, as if he fell from the sky,” Owaisi said. “In Islam we don’t have priests, or the brahmin system. It is high time someone says the bitter truth: there’s a problem with the ulema all over India.”

Apart from bold statements and grand entries, Owaisi’s persona also harbours an element of the mundane; a quality which grabs eyeballs.

On the last Friday before Eid-Ul-Fitr this year, he was spotted directing traffic at Fateh Darwaza, one of the junctions near the historic Charminar.

Caught in the mad rush of thousands wrapping up their Eid shopping, Owaisi stepped out of his car and did what many motorists — especially the elderly — do in the Old City: try their hand at clearing traffic bottlenecks.

Predictably, a video of the incident soon went viral.

AIMIM’s Expansion Plan

For Owaisi, the 2019 general elections mark a watershed moment for Indian democracy.

“As a journalist have you witnessed any election in which the words secularism and minorities were not uttered by leaders of any political party?” he said. “This elections neither the Congress nor the BJP uttered these words. Why?”

As some commentators have noted, the opposition restricted itself to vague allusions like the “Idea of India.”

Going forward, Owaisi said, national political parties will not fight elections in the name of minorities or any socially disadvantaged groups — opening a space for his party’s expansion.

“In Maharashtra a start has been made,” he said. “We will now try to strengthen that in Maharashtra and win more Assembly seats.” AIMIM in 2014 had won two Assembly seats in Maharashtra. Syed Imtiaz Jaleel who won the Aurangabad Lok Sabha seat was AIMIM’s incumbent MLA from Aurangabad Central. AIMIM also has good presence in municipal corporation in the state. In Bihar it fielded candidates in 2015 Assembly elections and 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The party now hopes to strengthen its base in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, parts of Karnataka apart from trying for an entry in West Bengal, Owaisi said. 

Back in Hyderabad, as he prepared himself for yet another session in Parliament, Owaisi turned his attention to his constituents who had arrived at his sprawling office in Darussalam.

A middle aged married couple whose daughter had failed a state board examination by merely two marks wanted Owaisi’s help —a matter dismissed as the problem fell beyond the purview of his duties as an MP. A young man stranded at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad with a few extra pieces of luggage above the usual weight limit got relief—a phone call from Owaisi sorted things out.

As ever, the road to national prominence winds through the narrow lanes of his home turf. The 50-year-old Owaisi seemed aware of the odds.

“Of all the Muslim leaders of various political parties who contested elections in country only two won because of everyone’s votes. One is Mukhtar Ansari (BSP) in Mau (Uttar Pradesh-2017) and the other is the Indian Union Muslim League MP K Navaskani (Ramanathapuram) in Tamil Nadu,” he said. “All other elected Muslim leaders including Asaduddin Owaisi have more than 30 per cent Muslims in their constituencies. Then what is the great thing which anyone has achieved?” His observation was partly accurate. With the exception of states like Kerala and Tamil Nadu Muslim politicians were mostly limited to constituencies that are thickly populated by Muslim.

Owaisi, however, is on the right track, political observers  maintained. “The party’s calculations have been prescient. For a party like AIMIM it is better to forge alliances with regional forces than national parties as the latter ones have their own equations of sharing power which may not benefit AIMIM. Since Salahuddin Owaisi’s time the party always did pragmatic politics to expand its base. Alliances like the ones in Maharashtra and Telangana (with TRS) could be the way forward to emerge stronger in the national scene,” said Shefali Jha, a Hyderabad based anthropologist who studies AIMIM’s history and politics.

Asad Owaisi who has been lampooning both the Congress and the BJP to emerge as a national leader, might be in for the long haul. “Over the past few years I have grown a thick skin. I take accusations against me as accolades,” he told Huffpost India.

“Game of Thrones” star Lena Headey said she hasn’t debriefed with the series’ creators since the HBO hit ended last month. But when she does, she has a clear message for showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss.

“I will say I wanted a better death,” the star said in an interview with The Guardian published Sunday. 

“You could go in any way on that show,” she added. “So I was kind of gutted.”

Headey’s Cersei Lannister, the show’s ultimate villain whose vileness grew deeper with each season, experienced a lackluster death in the series’ penultimate episode. For Cersei, who ordered the beheading, murder and torture of so many characters, to die quietly in the arms of her incestuous lover as her palace crumbled above her head was, to say the least, disappointing for viewers who anticipated the queen would experience a karmic-like demise in the end. 

The star previously said she had “mixed” feelings about Cersei’s death, suggesting she had hoped for a better ending but ultimately grew to accept her character’s final moments as the “perfect” conclusion. 

“I wanted her to have some big piece or fight with somebody,” Headey told Entertainment Weekly in May. She said she changed her mind after discussing the scene with co-star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who plays Cersei’s twin brother and lover, Jaime.

“The more we talked about it the more it seemed like the perfect end for her,” Headey said. “They came into the world together and now they leave together.”

But it seems Headey would have still preferred a better ending for the character she played for nearly a decade, though she admitted the demands on Weiss and Benioff were tremendous. 

“I just think they couldn’t have pleased everyone,” she told The Guardian. “No matter what they did, I think there was going to be some big comedown from the climb.”

Regardless, Headey’s role on the series was one she said she’s forever grateful for in an interview with HuffPost published earlier this year. 

“Nobody wants to play a character who’s really fucking dull and has no history,” she said.

It’s the first Father’s Day in this new era where Prince Harry is now a dad, and naturally, there’s an Instagram post to mark it. And it’s a darn cute one, royals fans. 

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle updated their Sussex Royal Instagram account on Sunday with a new photo of their infant son, Archie, who is shown cradled in his dad’s arms (presumably, whose else would they be?!) and is holding on to his dad’s finger with all his adorable might. 

“Happy Father’s Day! And wishing a very special first Father’s Day to The Duke of Sussex,” the photo caption says. 

Archie’s big eyes peeking out from behind his dad’s hand almost dare you not to let out a huge ‘Awwwwww.’ (We failed.)

As any self-respecting royal fan knows, Harry became a dad for the first time on May 6 this year, and was a gushing, hilarious dad right out of the gates. He sang the praises of his wife, Meghan Markle, and thanked the horses when he announced the birth of Archie Harrison.

WATCH: Prince Harry thanks the horses. Story continues below.

We last saw wee Archie on Mother’s Day, when the Sussexes posted a photo of his teeny, tiny feet cradled in Meghan’s hands. So naturally, fans ate up the new baby picture instantly. 

“The gasp we all had at seeing this! I love it so much and I’m so happy Harry is finally a dad and not just the fun uncle! Congrats!” said one commenter on the Instagram post.   

Happy Father’s Day, Prince Harry! And happy Father’s Day to all the dads, grandpas, father figures and fun uncles out there.

Check out these adorable royal baby pics through the years:

NEW DELHI — The first session of the 17th Lok Sabha will commence from Monday during which the passage of the Union Budget and other key legislations such as triple talaq will be on top of the agenda for the government.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, chairing an all-party meeting on the eve of the first session of the new Lok Sabha, invited heads of all parties to a meeting on 19 June to discuss the “one nation, one election” issue and other important matters.

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Noting that there are many new faces in this Lok Sabha, Modi said the first session of the Lower House of Parliament should begin with “fresh zeal and new thinking.”

At the all-party meeting, the Congress raised with the government issues of unemployment, farmers distress, drought, and press freedom, while also calling for early conduct of assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir.

The opposition parties demanded discussion on all such issues in Parliament, with the Congress asserting that it is still a “fight of ideologies.”

Prime Minister Modi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad, Congress lawmakers Adhir Ranjan Choudhary, K Suresh, National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah and TMC leader Derek O’Brien were present at the meeting.

The BJP also held its parliamentary party meet here Sunday with Prime Minister Modi assuring Indians that his government will be at the forefront of facilitating legislation that manifests the spirit of “sabka saath, sabka vikas, sabka vishwas.”

A day before the first session of the newly-constituted 17th Lok Sabha, a meeting of the NDA was also held in New Delhi. 

The government had promulgated as many as 10 ordinances for the session which ends on 26 July and will have 30 sittings.

The first two days of the session will be used for administering oath of office to all Lok Sabha MPs. The oath will be administered by protem speaker Virender Kumar. The speaker will be elected on June 19 and the next day the president will address a joint sitting of both Houses.

The budget will be introduced on 5 July. 

Among the bills that will be introduced, the one on triple talaq could be a contentious one between the government and the opposition.

Addressing the media after the all-party meeting, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Prahlad Joshi said the prime minister urged leaders of all parties to “introspect whether members of Parliament are able to fulfil people’s aspirations as their representatives and the manner in which last two years of the 16th Lok Sabha were wasted.”

An all-party meeting is a customary procedure before the beginning of every session of Parliament to ensure its smooth functioning.

Joshi said the government has requested all parties, especially the opposition, for their cooperation for the smooth functioning of both Houses of Parliament.

In order to build esprit de corps, Modi has invited presidents of all those parties who have an MP either in Lok Sabha or Rajya Sabha for a meeting on 19 June.

The meeting has been called to discuss “one nation, one election” issue, celebrations of 75 years of India’s Independence in 2022 and 150 years of Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary this year, he said

It will be followed by a dinner meeting with all MPs of both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha on June 20 to freely interact and exchange views with the government, Joshi said, adding that these two novel initiatives would go a long way in building team spirit among all parliamentarians.

Becoming a dad touches every element of your life: your stairs acquire gates, your eyes acquire bags and you learn new, jaw-hurting ways of yawning.

But it changes your brain as well. World-renowned neuroscientist and father-of-three Dr Michael Merzenich – who, among loads of extraordinary achievements in his career, co-invented the cochlear implant and discovered lifelong brain plasticity – knows more about the brain than most, and has been investigating how dadhood rewires the ol’ grey matter.

“The brain changes rapidly when important and challenging new things are happening for us,” Dr Michael Merzenich tells HuffPost. “In parallel with child development, a father goes through an equally long period of daddy development that is life-changing and brain-changing on a major scale.”

Even before an infant arrives in the world, an attachment to the child has already begun to grow in the dad’s brain, he explains. And once the baby arrives “that baby literally grows into and becomes part of the self-referenced personhood of the father”. 

[Read More: This is what I, a dad, actually want for Father’s Day]

As fathers don’t give birth, it’s easy to assume any changes taking place are purely behavioural or emotional, rather than biological – but Dr Merzenich insists that is not the case. “The attachment of father to child is biological,” he says. “The synaptic connections in the brain that support this positive association elaborate and grow in their power and reliability, in a happy father-child progression.”

Early attachment to children comes quicker from mothers, given the stronger biological element involved. The release of oxytocin around birth creates an immediate strong reaction that, in turn, leads to a strong feeling of attachment. “From day one, by this hormonal amplification, that baby is just about the most important thing that ever happened, for mum,” says Dr Merzenich.

“Fathers grow their attachment to the child on a slower pace than mothers, but it doesn’t take very long before most dads would literally sacrifice their own lives to protect their babies.”

What about typical “dad traits”, then? Can a passion for rubbish jokes, a deep love of napping and bad taste in jeans be explained by neuroscience? Possibly, says Dr Merzenich. “Males have neurological distinctions that contribute to the differences between mothers’ and fathers’ approaches to parenting,” he says.

“I like to think that one of my roles has been to help my three daughters understand how the wider world actually works, and how they can survive, thrive and be happy within it. 

“For me, being a father has been an assignment, for life, that has been the source of innumerable moments of happiness, and delight—which I know has been very good for my brain. And I hardly ever tell rubbish jokes.”

President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign team has reportedly severed ties with some of its pollsters after leaks of some dismal internal polling data, which showed him trailing former Vice President Joe Biden in several key states.

Trump had called the polling numbers taken back in March “fake polls” after they were reported by the press last week and insisted that he is winning “very big” in several key states.

The pollsters’ removal was reported by The New York Times and NBC News on Sunday, with the outlets citing a presidential adviser and someone close to the campaign, respectively.

The decision to cut ties with three of its five pollsters is meant to prevent further disclosures of survey data, the Times reported.

According to the Times, Trump had instructed his aides to deny that there was any internal polling that showed him trailing Biden after news broke about its existence. They were also told to say that they had contrasting data that showed Trump doing well.

“We are winning in every single state that we’ve polled. We’re winning in Texas very big. We’re winning in Ohio very big. We’re winning in Florida very big,” Trump said during an Oval Office meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda on Wednesday.

He also tweeted out that his numbers are “the best numbers WE have ever had.”

This denial came despite public polls that showed Trump trailing Biden, including a recent Fox News poll that put him behind both Biden and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.).

A spokesperson for Trump’s reelection campaign declined to comment when reached by HuffPost on Sunday.

MANCHESTER — Pakistan captain Sarfaraz Ahmed has reconciled to the fact that they “were a better team than India in the 90′s” and now the tables have turned.

The soft-spoken Pakistan captain was literally hounded by his country’s media with a host of uncomfortable questions following the team’s heavy defeat against India here on Sunday.

Asked if the India-Pakistan rivalry has fizzled out over the years, Sarfaraz said: “We are not handling pressure well. The team that handles pressure in these games win. The Pakistan teams of the 90s, used to enjoy upper hand but now India is better than Pakistan. That’s why they win matches.”

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Prime Minister Imran Khan’s advice was “bat first even if the pitch is damp” but Sarfaraz Khan doggedly defended his decision, saying the reason for defeat was “failure in all three departments”.

The Pakistan Prime Minister and an iconic World Cup winning captain, in a series of tweets on the marquee clash, had spoken about the right approach for the high-pressure game.

“The whole team is not performing well in all three departments. If you talk about fielding, even Virat Kohli had said that he would have fielded. We haven’t seen the pitch for two days. There was some moisture and hence I decided on fielding. We won a good toss but didn’t hit the right length,” said Sarfaraz.

A defeat against India inevitably gives rise to conspiracy theories and the post match media interaction was no different.

“Why is it that the players’ body language is so negative?” asked one of the scribes. The manner in which Sarfaraz kept his counsel was remarkable.

“May be you guys have seen something in the body language but players are trying their best. There has been fielding lapses. Rohit could have been run-out twice and had we availed those chances, it could have been a different result.”

Another one asked, “Have all players been physically and mentally fit to take on India?”

“There are no issues with anyone. Imad Wasim (gastric problem) had an issue but everyone had passed the fitness test. Now that we have lost, you can raise the issue.”

The third person’s query was about what happened to agitated Mohammed Amir gesticulating to media manager Raza Kitchlew.

“I didn’t see anything. May be he was angry because he was trying to get wickets which he didn’t get,” Sarfaraz reasoned.

He also clarified on the alleged rift in the dressing room with seniors like Mohammed Hafeez and Shoaib Malik being unhappy with his leadership.

“There are no ill-feelings in the dressing room. The boys are backing each other. As far as why I didn’t give Hafeez and Shoaib more than an over, it is because I felt there was no need for that. The batsmen were set and they went for runs (11 each) in the only over that they bowled.”

Although it’s a Herculean task for a team placed ninth among the 10 competing nations but he said that the endeavour is to win the remaining four games, said Sarfaraz.

“We should try to be positive and think like, okay we didn’t play good cricket but let’s try and win four games in order to bounce back,” he added.