Dr. Indira Chandrasekhar, started writing stories when she returned to India after many years of living abroad. It is as if a re-immersion in her heritage and the vibrancy of life in the country triggered a cascade within her. Until then, she had worked as a scientist with biological molecules, and in addition to the cultural sources of family and ancestry, her stories are influenced by the big questions about life.
As well as being a writer and a scientist, she is the founder and principal editor of Out of Print, one of the primary platforms for short fiction bearing a connection to the Indian subcontinent. An anthology marking ten years of the magazine was published in December 2020 and celebrates writing from the Indian subcontinent.
Indira is a literary curator and curates Literature at the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival, Mumbai. Her fiction has appeared in anthologies and literary journals across the world, and she has published a collection of short stories, Polymorphism.
My father was a scientist, and my mother was an artist, so I tried to create a wonderful combination out of this. Migrating to the world, I came back to India to know my roots. Mumbai has had a great influence on my writing. My father was an alumnus of Nagpur University who won gold medals in his academic life. So we are connected with Nagpur. Many things were happening in contemporary India to investigate. I met many writers who were aligned with issues and thought of starting a magazine. It was Subcontinental magazine people writing from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and another diaspora. I have naive thoughts about the commonality of all these writings, which need to be investigated differently. "Phul Aur Kanten" is a unique title. It has everything a story needs to have. "Out of Print" is a collection of interesting stories which are indeed out of print.