About me

I’m a journalist, writer and academic at Goldsmiths.

I’ve edited India’s largest English language weekend paper, presented a BBC World Service three-and-a-half-hour live news and current affairs programme and reported for The Economist and The Guardian from Haiti.

I’ve lived and worked in nearly a dozen countries and I have a PhD.

My newsletter This Week, Those Books, which links the week’s big news story with the world of books, has subscribers in nearly a hundred countries. Sign up here: https://thisweekthosebooks.substack.com/

My novel, Pomegranate Peace, published by Hachette, is based on the year I spent in Afghanistan.

I am a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufacture and Commerce, belong to the UK’s Higher Education Academy and am a member of the National Union of Journalists, UK and the Society of Professional Journalists in the US.

I have written for, among others:  Independent/ The Guardian/ The Economist/ Christian Science Monitor/ NY Times/ Foreign Policy/ Hindustan Times / The National/ The Arab Weekly

I’ve been Editor of The Sunday Times of India, based in Delhi; The Times of India’s Foreign Editor based in London; Deputy Global News Editor of Quartz, the New York business outlet;  Features Editor of openDemocracy; presenter of the BBC World Service’s World Today; Deputy Comment Editor of The National, UAE, based in Abu Dhabi and editor of Rupa and HarperCollins India.