Reclaiming the lost voices of Bunt women requires a critical examination of these power dynamics, a re-evaluation of the community's values, and a conscious effort to create spaces where women can once again exercise their rightful influence and leadership. Only then can the Bunt community truly honour its matrilineal heritage and harness the full potential of its members.

This essay walks through lived histories and personal echoes, tracing how Datth (adoption), Hakk (rights), Maryaadi (honour/respect), and Paal (division of property/inheritance) danced through Bunt's life—sometimes as a blessing, sometimes as the battlefield, and quite often as a very spicy family WhatsApp group.

Education is about more than memorizing facts. It’s about shaping minds that question, that think, that reach beyond what’s expected. It’s about preparing students not just for tests, but for a world that requires empathy, creativity, and adaptability. If we’re going to face the future with all its uncertainties, we’ll need more than algorithms. We’ll need people who can think—and who aren’t afraid to fail, try again, and learn from it.

I’ve always been a little Ron Swanson about it. The kind of person who throws out a computer if it gets too close. I love tech—I work in tech—but I also want to sip mimosas on a nameless beach, in a town where no one knows me. And for a while, the algorithm respected that. For a while, I lived in a little curated bubble of comedy chaos.

Again, this is not a study of how great or bad of a person he is—but how he had an impact on the Bunt community and the weight of his name that had garnered a fame like no other.

The evolution of the badhi system encapsulates the shifting intersection of culture, economics, and power. It highlights the ways in which marriage is not just a social institution but also a fundamental site of economic negotiation and redistribution. From its roots in securing family wealth and property to its contemporary expression in highly commercialized wedding practices, the badhi system reflects broader societal transformations—shifts from survival and alliance-build

Tulunadu is not utopia. But it is uniquely interwoven. Here, caste and religion are not flat categories—they are textured, nuanced, negotiated daily. Here, Siri’s curse and blessing still live in memory. Here, Podimma’s medicine lingers in old cupboards. Here, a temple wears a Sultan’s gift. And here, a Muslim, a Christian, and a Bunt may not pray together—but they know they belong to the same town.

That was my first brush with the word—what I’d later understand was the Bunt version of dowry. Since then, every time I’ve brought up the topic in conversations with people from Europe or America, I’ve noticed a similar reaction: a quick moral monologue, complete with a shake of the head and a “how could your country still do this?” tone. They’d launch into a takedown of the dowry system with the kind of conviction that made it hard to interrupt.

It began in 2020. The pandemic made everything foggy. I reached out to a friend in the mental health space and got myself a therapist. Let’s call them Therapist 001. We had a few sessions. Therapist 001 told me I had grown up in an environment that wasn’t entirely fair. It tracked. But after one session where I talked candidly about money, Therapist 001 increased their rates.

Panchaatige wasn’t just mediation—it was an institution. A person revered for their fairness, wisdom, and ability to weigh complex matters without bias would be called upon to resolve disputes outside the court system. Their final word was the paathera. It wasn’t notarised, stamped, or sealed. It simply had weight—because it came from them. Their word was their bond.