| Greetings from India! You're reading Meanwhile, Back Home, our daily newsletter specially curated for our overseas readers. While you were asleep, it was a whirlwind of a day here in India. We've got the top highlights lined up for you.
Dear reader, welcome back Back home, a Pakistan-based hacker group has allegedly breached Indian defence servers. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the group claimed they have access to sensitive data from the Indian Military Engineering Service and Manohar Parrikar Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis. Cybersecurity experts and security agencies are reportedly monitoring cyberspace to determine whether the claims have any truth. The development comes amid tense situations in India and Pakistan in the wake of the terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on April 22, in which at least 25 tourists and a local person were brutally killed.
 Spotlight
Back home, “caste survey” seems to be the political buzzword. Days after the BJP-led Centre agreed to include caste enumeration in the upcoming Census, the Congress-led Karnataka government has launched its survey to identify and enumerate Scheduled Caste (SC) sub-castes. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah announced the state-wide effort will roll out in three phases between May 5 and 23. Here’s why it matters and what’s happening on the ground: 📌 Phase-wise survey The state has deployed 65,000 school teachers to go door-to-door between May 5 and 17 to gather information from SC households. For those missed, special camps will be held May 19–21. An online self-declaration portal will also be open from May 19 to 23. 📌 Internal quotas The survey appears to be a data-backed push for internal reservation and will help determine how SC reservation benefits are distributed across 101 recognised sub-castes in the state. 📌 What will be asked? The survey will include questions on family size, education, annual income, job type, and even access to drinking water. Officials will also track how families have benefited from reservations so far. 📌 Long-pending demand The survey comes on the heels of the Justice Nagamohan Das Commission report and a Supreme Court ruling allowing internal SC reservations. Karnataka is not alone; Telangana and Haryana have already taken steps in this direction.
☕ Spill the Expresso Make films in America again US President Donald Trump believes Hollywood is “dying a very fast death” and, as such, has announced 100 per cent tariffs on movies produced overseas. But is the American film industry dying? While it is true that several filmmakers are shooting abroad – Canada, the UK, and New Zealand being popular destinations thanks to tax breaks and lower costs – American studios are still dominating global box offices and bringing home billions.
🚨 Must Read Tête-à-tête with Kiren Rijiju At the Indian Express Idea Exchange, Union Minister Kiren Rijiju opened up on the Pahalgam terror attack, the controversial Waqf Amendment Bill, and why he believes India’s global image is misunderstood. Defending the Waqf Amendment Bill, Rijiju, the first Buddhist Minority Affairs Minister, claimed that powerful voices within the Muslim community have long misused Waqf assets, and that the reform aims to benefit poor, voiceless Muslims rather than seize mosques or graveyards, as critics allege. He slammed Western media as “illiberal” and reiterated his view that Congress reduced minority affairs to “Muslim affairs.” Catch the full exchange.
📚 Book Nook Delimitation debate If you’re interested in politics, demographics or data analysis, I have a book recommendation for you. Historian Ravi K Mishra’s Demography, Representation, Delimitation takes a sledgehammer to a long-held belief that South India “controlled” its population better than the North. By crunching Census data from 1881 onwards (adjusted to modern state borders), Mishra argues that the South grew faster until 1971. His data-heavy case challenges the moral high ground often claimed in the South’s opposition to delimitation. He says this isn’t a North-South issue, it’s more of a South vs West battle.
📰 In Other News Storm in a teacup Finally, some tea from across the border, albeit from a London cafe. What started as a regular press event in London for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Salman Akram Raja, a close aide of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, spiralled into an expletive-laden verbal smackdown when journalists Safina Khan and Asad Ali Malik got into a shouting match that has now gone viral. The battleground has since shifted to social media, with either side hurling a volley of accusations ranging from online harassment to doctored footage. Khan alleges she was cornered, disrespected, and even targeted in an acid attack attempt. Malik, however, says it’s all fiction. Social media’s eating it up, of course. That’s all for now. Until next time, Aishwarya Khosla
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