Vox Borders

The story of how a hastily-drawn line divided one people into two.

Elections in India aren’t like others. India voted to pick its central government for the next five years throughout the spring of 2019. An eighth of the world’s entire population was eligible to vote in this election. That’s 900 million people, and more than 67 percent voted. India runs the world’s biggest elections, and officials put in a lot of effort to make this democratic exercise is as accessible as possible. This means they make sure everyone, even in the most remote locations, is near a polling booth — even if it means bringing voting machines to them by elephant.

Fishing is the economic lifeline for villages in northern Sri Lanka. But after a decades long civil war, fishermen returned to find their fish stocks depleted – and they pointed the finger squarely at neighboring India. As Indian fishermen developed methods to increase hauls, and crossed a maritime border that was more permeable during the war, they depleted the fish stock for both sides. Now, the Sri Lankan Navy is retaliating with force, only making the relationship between the two communities that rely on these waters worse.

Bedfords were first introduced to British India during World War II. This truck model and others similar to it stuck around, and since then they've been produced commercially throughout the country. But today, they’re not just functional and mundane — their paintings make them stand out. Colorful trucks aren’t rare in India, and their designs aren’t random. Artists that specialize in painting these trucks put a lot of thought into the art form, making the vehicles a spectacle of beauty in India.

India’s government has strict laws surrounding cow slaughter because cows are sacred in Hinduism. Prime Minister Narendra Modi emphasized the need to make sure India’s cows are protected and some state governments followed suit by opening more cow shelters and ordering more police crackdowns. But some took cow protection into their own hands. Cow vigilantes started patrolling neighborhoods looking to physically punish those who were allegedly harboring cows, consuming cows or even transporting cows. In most cases, the victims of these mob beatings were Muslim.