Comfort shows
Sir — Many people quietly judge Korean dramas without watching them. That habit deserves reconsideration. These shows succeed because they offer clear storytelling, emotionally available characters, and respectful relationships. The appeal is easy to understand even for all those viewers who usually fall asleep during watching anything with subtitles. Masculinity is shown through patience, responsibility, and communication rather than bravado. The stories are predictable, but predictability brings comfort. There is no need to dress that up as cultural sophistication. Sometimes people want television that does not shout or punish attention. That preference may not sound clever, but it is honest and widely shared.
Pratima Chakraborty,
Calcutta
Legacy on plates
Sir — Many readers may wonder why food merits global recognition (“Tasty potential”, Feb 9). But gastronomy supports jobs, skills, and memory. In Calcutta, sweet-makers, fish-sellers, tea-stall owners, and street vendors sustain families and traditions. A UNESCO recognition of the city’s gastronomical legacy encourages training, tourism, and local pride when done carefully. The process demands evidence and planning. Treating food as serious cultural infrastructure would help protect livelihoods while improving hygiene, education, and urban planning outcomes for residents, visitors, workers and regulators alike.
Dyutiman Bhattacharya,
Calcutta
Sir — The recognition for Hyderabad and Lucknow by UNESCO shows how food heritage can be protected with planning. Calcutta holds an equally deep record of its food shaped by Bengali, Muslim, Chinese, Jewish, and colonial kitchens. Sweets like rosogolla and sandesh sit alongside fish delicacies and street food. What is missing are organised accounts of this culture. A government-backed inventory, training programmes, and tourism circuits could convert daily eating practices into a credible contender for UNESCO by supporting vendors, cooks, and livelihoods for future generations and boost cultural confidence.
Jayanta Datta,
Hooghly
Sir — Calcutta’s cuisine often gets reduced to nostalgia. That approach misses its practical strength. The city shows how Hindu and Muslim kitchens, colonial cafes, and migrant communities can coexist. Street food thrives beside formal dining. UNESCO nominations reward living systems, not frozen recipes. Clear mapping of food clusters, support for women-led enterprises, and training for young cooks would present this diversity as an organised civic asset rather than sentimental memory.
Kajari Das,
Calcutta
Sir — Recognition for Calcutta’s gastronomy would not diminish other cities. It would broaden understanding of Indian food histories. Hyderabad and Lucknow show different paths shaped by various royal courts. Calcutta shows an urban mix shaped by trade and migration. UNESCO can acknowledge multiple models. Preparing a careful bid would encourage research, documentation, and collaboration even before any title arrives, leaving durable benefits for residents and cultural institutions.
Shiuli Biswas,
Calcutta
Racist image
Sir — Public discussion often treats MAGA rhetoric as mere provocation. But it is something far more systematic. When the president of the United States of America, Donald Trump, posted a meme of Barack and Michelle Obama as apes, he told us nothing about himself that we didn’t already know. But his choice of this particular slur, among all the horrific insults he’s hurled over the years, illuminates an ugly truth at the root of MAGA: the movement is grounded in White Americans’ fear of sharing their country with fellow citizens of other races. A simple parallel would help explain this. When sports and entertainment opened to Black Americans, measurable performance forced reluctant acceptance. But soon, claims about rigged systems and unfair advantage replaced older language about biological differences. The argument about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion reflects this shift. Racism adapts.
Dattaprasad Shirodkar,
Mumbai
Sir — The ape insult carries special import in the US. It is not random abuse but a racial code with a long history. Linking Black Americans to animals allowed slavery, segregation, and exclusion to appear natural. That logic survives today in attacks on competence and belonging. Understanding this history matters because it shows that present political rhetoric is not crude humour. It is a continuation of ideas once used to deny citizenship, dignity, and equal participation.
Manzar Imam Qasmi,
Purnea, Bihar
Sir — Comparing Black people to apes is not a general insult. It rests on centuries of pseudo-science that questioned Black humanity itself. This may appear bizarre to Indians as in this country monkeys are associated with the divine. This contrast highlights how racism depends on local histories. What appears absurd to outsiders remains deeply wounding within a society that once used such imagery to justify enslavement and exclusion.
V. Jayaraman,
Chennai
Deeper problem
Sir — One revelation made by the Epstein files which has not been talked about much is that class, caste, race, nationality, and age shape whose bodies are most easily treated as disposable. The repeated use of words like ‘fresh’ reveals a market logic at work. This is not a failure of morals alone. It is a system that sorts bodies by their perceived value. Ignoring that reality limits the effectiveness of legal and cultural responses to the truths that have emerged from the United States of America.
Saurabh Tripathi,
Calcutta
