Anuparna Roy’s Songs of Forgotten Trees made history at the Venice Film Festival, where she became the first Indian filmmaker to win Best Director in the Orizzonti section. Without film school credentials or industry pedigree, Roy’s debut rejects clichés of Indian cinema abroad. Her intimate, feminist storytelling reframes women not as symbols or victims but as survivors who demand to be witnessed.

In Ammi’s Kitchen, Pernia Qureshi shares Rampur’s heirloom recipes and memories, celebrating food as family, history, and love.

Koel Puri’s piece is a dispatch from a time when fun wasn’t curated for Instagram and rebellion didn’t need a hashtag. She reminds us that the real anti-aging secret might not be SPF or a twelve-step skincare routine, but the soft chaos of staying out too late, falling for the wrong person, or saying yes to something you can’t quite explain in the morning.