Welcome, namaste, salam and sat sri akal!

If you’ve been here before, welcome back to Bagicha Blog, and now with a fresh look and renewed purpose. I developed this Blog in 2016 during a visiting fellowship in Lahore, carving out a corner of the internet where I could write freely, away from the noise of social media. What started as an experiment has grown into something more. This revamp reflects where I am now: more independent, still personal, and always authentic and professional.

If you are familiar with my work, you will know that I have been an academic for nearly 25 years now. My work sits at the crossroads of social and cultural history, art, public history, photography, and human experience – interests that have shaped every work that I have done. I have written four books and numerous articles and chapters.

I write about colonial and post-colonial India and Pakistan, Partition, Punjabi history, refugees, women, the South Asian diaspora in the UK and increasingly in the area of digital humanities. But my approach has always been rooted in people – their stories, their migrations, their memories, their visual traces and how they retain and reinvent their identities. I believe social change reveals itself most powerfully through individual stories.

My own story spans three continents. Born in Ludhiana, India, I spent my early years traveling between there and Nakuru, Kenya, where we eventually settled. Later, we migrated to the UK, where Coventry became home, and this has remained home ever since. Yet my connections to the Punjabs, both personal and professional, remain vital. These layered identities give me multiple vantage points, a broader lens through which to understand displacement, belonging, and transformation.

This blog is my scrapbook but also much more. It is a space for short essays, photographs, and reflections. It’s where I explore freely, following curiosity wherever it leads. It is a way of connecting and being connected.

If you like what you see, I’m open to freelance collaborations and commissions with people who care about education, history and heritage. I’ve consulted with museums, written for diverse publications, and spoken at events ranging from academic conferences to community events and literary festivals. Whether you need expert advice on a heritage project, support with oral history work, or a speaker who can make the past come alive, get in touch. Email me.