Why you can't sleep at 1 a.m. (Even when you're exhausted)
Dead tired at 1 a.m. and still scrolling? That’s revenge bedtime procrastination, and it has very little to do with being lazy.You could put the phone down and sleep right now, but you already know you won’t. In about six hours someone will throw the curtains open, say half the day is already gone, and the word they land on is lazy. I spent two weeks going through sleep research to understand why so many of us are stuck in this loop, and why we keep blaming it on weak willpower. The reasons are stranger, and a lot more unfair, than that. In this podcast, I get into the one experiment that breaks the word “lazy,” why your brain goes hunting for time at midnight when nothing is stopping you from sleeping, why sleep deprivation hits harder in India, how delayed sleep phase disorder makes night owls look lazy, and the kind of tiredness and oversleeping that doctors treat as a warning sign instead of a personality trait. If you stay up scrolling just to feel like some part of the day belonged to you, this one is for you. By the end, the next time you want to call someone lazy for sleeping in, you’ll ask two questions first.
26 Sept 2026
CJP to Reservation Hatao: Why India's Gen Z keeps building 'Joke' parties
CJP. Dimagi Naxal. Reservation Hatao. You’ve probably seen all three on your feed recently! Three different movements, one much bigger story about why India’s internet keeps producing them.India's Chief Justice compared unemployed youth to cockroaches. Within four days, a meme page called the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) had more Instagram followers than the BJP. Everyone has covered WHAT happened. I want to get into WHY it keeps happening. The anger behind CJP, how "main bhi cockroach" became an identity, why these online movements grow so fast, and what happens when memes turn into real-world action.
25 Sept 2026
No more free UPI in India!
I scanned a QR code and paid ten rupees for a cup of chai, the money moved into the seller’s bank account. An hour later I split an auto with a friend and sent her forty rupees the same way. A very normal day.Then something odd hit me, no one paid any fees on those transactions. Not the seller or my friend, and definitely not me. But moving money should also cost money right? The servers, the fraud checks, the whole system behind that little green tick. Somebody has to fund all of it, and it is clearly not you.Who actually pays for it then? In this podcast, I cover the exact moment a fee on your payments became illegal, why the government covers only a small slice of what the system actually costs, the apps everyone uses make close to nothing on the thing they're famous for, the time an American card giant complained to Washington about UPI, and the plan to bring a fee back that keeps getting pushed.And this one is particularly well timed. In early August 2026, the Finance Minister tabled amendments to the Payment and Settlement Systems Act that would remove the zero-MDR rule and open the legal door to a merchant fee on UPI. Nothing is final yet, no rate or start date is fixed. The version being discussed points to a small fee of roughly 0.25 to 0.5 percent on payments above 2,000 rupees made to large merchants, while ordinary payments, small shops, and money you send to another person stay free. This video explains the whole fight behind that headline, so you actually understand it while everyone else is panicking.I spent two weeks going through RBI notes, a parliamentary committee report, and NPCI numbers to put this together, so you get the whole picture in fifteen minutes instead of digging through any of it yourself. By the end, you'll never look at that green tick the same way again.
24 Sept 2026
We are running out of sand
This one started with a single news story I couldn't get out of my head, an Indian journalist shot dead in 2020 for reporting on sand. Sand. The stuff kids play in.Every year the world digs up 50 billion tonnes of it, about 18 kilos per person, per day. It is the second most extracted material on Earth after water, and we are pulling it out of rivers far faster than rivers can make more.I spent 3 weeks reading UN reports, mining data and court records to put this together, so you don't have to dig through any of it yourself.
In this podcast: why desert sand is completely useless for construction, why Dubai ships sand in from Australia, how Singapore grew itself 25% bigger using other countries' land, how India's sand mafia actually runs its paperwork, and why the UN just put sand on the same shelf as oil.By the end, you'll never look at a construction site, a riverbed, or your own home loan the same way again.
23 Sept 2026
How Dubai sold a desert to the world
This story started for a really dumb reason with three of my friends who moved to Dubai this year. And I couldn't stop wondering why because they didn’t work in oil or have an insane amount of money to be billionaires. Half the year is unlivable there with the heat, and it’s a desert. So how did this become the city almost everyone wants to move to? I went down a rabbit hole of documentaries, government reports, old interviews from the 1960s, and what I found was very different from what I expected.In this video, I'll walk you through how Dubai turned sand into one of the most powerful brands on Earth: the ruler who bet against oil before it even showed up, a hotel built on its own island for a single photograph, a $20 billion bailout most people have forgotten, and the part of the story that doesn't make it into the brochures.I spent 2 weeks reading and putting this together, so you don't need to watch ten videos or dig through reports yourself. By the end, you'll never look at a Dubai reel the same way again.
21 Sept 2026
Why your snacks keep getting smaller | The truth about shrinkflation in India
This video might hit home, and it’s definitely something you have wondered about.Your Parle-G packet used to weigh 100 grams, today it sits closer to 45. The price didn’t reduce much, but in reality, we lost on the quantity. This is called shrinkflation, and once you notice it, you start seeing it across almost every product in your kitchen.Shrinkflation is when a company keeps the price of a product the same and quietly reduces the quantity you get. Sounds relatable? In this video, I will tell you all about shrinkflation - how it started, what’s legal, and how Indian brands leverage it.I spent 2 weeks working on this, so you don’t need to watch another video or read a book.By the end, you will walk into any grocery store and read the shelves completely differently.Chapters - 0:00 The packet that started all of this0:35 What shrinkflation actually means1:06 Where it began: the 1973 oil crisis2:00 The economist who named it2:45 Why companies love this move3:20 The Parle-G story: 100g to 45g4:25 The Maggi price trick5:06 Every big brand is doing it5:28 Sacred price points explained5:38 What the CEOs actually said5:55 Why five and ten rupees matter so much here6:40 Skimflation and the Cadbury gold foil7:10 The little details you never noticed7:30 Why nobody is regulating this8:15 How shrinkflation hides in official inflation8:55 What France, the UK, Australia and the US do9:40 What this is really costing us9:58 The last thing my grandmother saidIf this made you look at your grocery bag differently, share it with someone who needs to see it.Subscribe to Writtelycut for more such stories.#Shrinkflation #ParleG #Maggi #FMCG #Inflation #IndianEconomy #Skimflation #ConsumerAwareness #Cadbury #Writtelycut
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