Journal
Thoughts on cinema, learning & the planet.
Essays on why classrooms stopped working, what cinema can teach education, and the climate emergency already in our streets.
Media & Society
The Invisible Wall: How the Attention Economy Is Quietly Rewriting What We Believe
You didn’t choose what you believe today. Something else did. On filter bubbles, false confidence, and why the algorithm’s danger has nothing to do with politics.
Read the full essay →Cinema · Society
Wim Wenders Said Art Shouldn’t Be Political. Arundhati Roy Walked Out. He Was Wrong.
Two festivals, two juries, the same year, the oldest argument in cinema. Why claiming neutrality is itself a political position — and what Karuvachy Films learned making Sengadal and Maadathy.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Research · Long Read
In Defence of Boredom: The Mental Space We’re Erasing.
We have nearly eliminated boredom — and with it, the idle mental state where attention, memory, and original thinking are actually built. From a famous experiment where people chose electric shocks over sitting alone with their thoughts, to what the default mode network is quietly doing when you do nothing.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Policy · Founder Essay
Screens Are Not Teachers. The Question Is What We Put on Them.
A neuroscientist told the US Senate that classroom screens are driving a generational cognitive decline. He is right — and that is exactly why I am building Karkei. On the difference between a screen a child watches and a screen a child uses.
Read the full essay →Startups · Personal Essay
My Father Taught Tamil. I Filed Two Patents.
A commerce student who dropped out of Loyola’s English Literature department, ran a midnight browsing center to survive, became a filmmaker — and filed two patents in two days.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Product Design · Research
Two Generations Walk Into a Classroom. Only One Is Ready.
Gen Alpha students have an 8-second attention span and 49% are already using AI. Their millennial teachers and parents are eager but underprepared. Here is what this means for designing EdTech that actually works.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Neuroscience · Parent Essay
The Brain Learns by Doing. School Mostly Asks It to Sit Still.
Why your child forgets 70% of every lesson by tomorrow morning — and what we saw in a Chennai classroom when we stopped explaining and started doing.
Read the full essay →EdTech · India · Vision
What If India Actually Got Skilled?
Only 5% of India’s workforce is formally skilled. What happens at 50%? At 75%? At 85%? Three numbers. Three futures. One window that won’t stay open. A research-backed thought experiment with real economic stakes.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Policy
India Wrote the World’s Most Progressive Education Policy. The Classroom Didn’t Get the Memo.
NEP 2020 promised to end rote learning and transform Indian education. Four years in, a founder building inside Chennai’s classrooms gives an honest report card — and shows what it will actually take to close the gap.
Read the full essay →EdTech · Research
India’s Skill Gap and the World’s Wake-Up Call.
Only 5% of India’s workforce has formal vocational training that leads to employment. Germany: 75%. Japan: 80%. South Korea: 96%. We are not losing because we lack institutions. We are losing because of how we teach.
Read the full essay →Cinema
The Invisible Product: Why Positioning Decides a Film’s Fate Before a Single Frame Rolls.
Why Pushpa 2, Amaran, Maharaja, and Kalki 2898 AD won — and why big-budget films keep losing. A deep-dive into positioning as the defining advantage in Indian cinema today.
Read the full essay →Experiential Learning
Nine Ways to Know: What Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences Tell Us About Why School Fails Most Children.
School was designed for 2 of your 9 intelligences. Here is what Gardner’s framework tells us about the other 7 — and how SPARK is built to reach all of them.
Read the full essay →EdTech
What 11 Students Taught Us About Experiential Learning.
A first-pilot field report from a Chennai classroom. What the data said, what the teachers saw, and why the student who rated us lowest taught us the most.
Read the full essay →EdTech
Classroom Boredom Is Not a Discipline Problem. It’s a Design Problem.
What the research actually says about why students disengage — and why the answer has nothing to do with effort or attitude.
Read the full essay →Climate
Chennai’s Children Are Living the Climate Crisis. Not Reading About It.
While the world debates policy, our children are already paying the price. What the data — and the streets — show.
Read the full essay →Cinema
What Twenty Years in Television Taught Me About Storytelling That Matters
From R.K. Selvamani’s floor to the Busan Film Festival — what I learned, what I unlearned, and what I carry.
Read on Substack →Founder Notes
Why I Am Building Three Things at Once — And Why That Is the Only Way
Cinema, EdTech, social impact. To some people this looks scattered. Here is why it is the only coherent choice.
Read on Substack →Cinema
The Producer Is the Most Misunderstood Person in Indian Cinema.
Everyone thinks we write cheques and get out of the way. That’s the myth destroying our industry.
Read the full essay →EdTech
India Is Producing Certificates, Not Competence.
15 million trained. 82% of employers still can’t find skilled talent. The credential economy is producing a crisis we cannot afford.
Read the full essay →EdTech
We Built an Experiential Learning Platform. Then Added MCQs. Here’s Why.
A founder’s note on why the most honest EdTech decision is the uncomfortable one — and what it took to admit it.
Read the full essay →Neuroscience
Your Brain Is Forgetting Everything. Here Is Why That Matters.
The forgetting curve is not a flaw. It is a feature. And understanding it changes everything about how we should be teaching — and learning.
Read on Substack →