ASHWINI BHATIA

Abdul Sattar, 70, operates a power loom at a workshop in Bhiwandi, India, Feb. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
AP PHOTOS: Decades-old weaving businesses near India’s financial capital struggle to survive
BHIWANDI, India (AP) — Abdul Sattar stands in a dimly lit aisle surrounded by dozens of electric-powered looms that make a rhythmic din several decibels above what is considered healthy for a human ear.
 
Police try to detain protesting Tibetan exiles during a protest outside Chinese embassy to mark the 1959 uprising in Tibet against the Chinese rule on this day, in New Delhi,India, Monday, March, 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
Tibetans scuffle with police outside the Chinese Embassy in India as they mark uprising anniversary
Dozens of Tibetan protesters have clashed with police outside the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi as Tibetans living in exile mark the 66th anniversary of their uprising against China.
 
Monks belonging to the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism walk with ceremonial drums in a procession at the Palpung Sherabling monastery near Baijnath, India, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
AP PHOTOS: Wrathful deities are invoked in a Tibetan Buddhist dance in a monastery in north India
BAIJNATH, India (AP) — Wearing colorful robes and fearsome masks, the monks high stepped and spun around around the sandstone courtyard to the sound of drums, cymbals and long horns.
 
A devotee holds a trident, a symbol of Hindu god Shiva, as she climbs the steps of the Lingamanthula Swamy temple during a Hindu pilgrimage called the Peddagattu Jatara, in Suryapet, Telangana state, India, Sunday, Feb. 16, 2025. (AP Photo /Mahesh Kumar A.)
AP PHOTOS: Pilgrims make offerings to Hindu deities at a biennial festival in southern India
One family led a goat wearing a marigold garland around its neck.
 
Men with tonsured heads sit in rows for initiation into an order of naked Hindu ascetic holy men known as the Naga Sadhus, during the 45-day-long Maha Kumbh festival in Prayagraj, India, Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)
AP PHOTOS: Hundreds join an order of naked, armed holy men at Hindu festival
PRAYAGRAJ, India (AP) — Thousands of devotees jostle behind bamboo fences to get a glimpse of the grand procession of the naked, ash-smeared and armed Hindu holy men.
 
Bar-headed geese, which migrate from the Tibetan plateau and parts of Central Asia to spend winter months in South Asia, gather at the Pong wetland in Nagrota Suriyan, Himachal Pradesh state, India, Friday, Jan. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
AP PHOTOS: Tens of thousands of migratory birds have made this Indian lake their winter home
A lone fisherman wrapped in a blanket rides his bicycle in the darkness, relying on his familiarity with the landscape.
 
A Hindu pilgrim prays after bathing at the confluence of the Ganges, the Yamuna, and the Saraswati rivers on the first day of the 45-day-long Maha Kumbh festival in Prayagraj, India, Monday, Jan. 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
AP PHOTOS: Tens of millions of Hindu devotees make do with little at Maha Kumbh festival
PRAYAGRAJ, India (AP) — It’s late evening in the city of Prayagraj and the roadside vendors selling snacks are packing up their wares to shut for the night.
 
Hindu holy men, or Sadhus, inspect a site for their camp on the banks of the Ganges river for the upcoming Maha Kumbh Mela, one of the world's largest religious festivals, in Prayagraj, India, Friday, Nov. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)
AP PHOTOS: An Indian state prepares for a Hindu festival that’s the largest such gathering on Earth
Wherever other sacred rivers flow into the Ganges, the benefits of bathing at the confluence on auspicious days increases manyfold.
 
Camel herders bring their animals to a water tank at a camel fair in Pushkar, in the northwestern Indian state of Rajasthan, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Deepak Sharma)
AP PHOTOS: Once-traditional camel trading fair in India transformed into tourist attraction
Many camels wear necklaces made with a string of small round bells and have brightly colored plastic flowers on their snouts and heads. Specialized barbers walk around trimming camel hair for a fee to make them look more attractive to buyers.
 
People watch a laser show after a record 2.51 million earthen oil lamps are lit along the Saryu river during Deepotsav celebrations, an event organized by the Uttar Pradesh state government on the eve of Diwali, in Ayodhya, India, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)
AP PHOTOS: Ayodhya in northern India celebrates the night before Diwali with pomp and pageantry
AYODHYA, India (AP) — A priest stands with folded hands praying toward the rising sun on the banks of the Saryu River in Ayodhya in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
 
Ragavendra MS, descendant of a former minister of Mysore's royal kingdom, poses with decorated elephants on the eve of the final day of the Dussehra festivities, in Mysuru, India, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)
AP PHOTOS: An elephant procession for Dussehra draws a crowd in the former Mysore kingdom
MYSURU, India (AP) — The spectators were getting restless after hours of waiting when a drizzle began.
 
Firdosa Jan, a Kashmiri, pours Tata tea leaf into a container as she prepares tea in her kitchen on the outskirts of Srinagar, Indian controlled Kashmir, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Dar Yasin)
AP PHOTOS: Tata is a household name for hundreds of millions across India
NEW DELHI, India (AP) —

Tata has been a mythical name in Indian consumers’ imaginations for generations. Every day, all across India, people consume the Tata Group’s salt and lentils, commute to work on Tata buses passing Tata cars and trucks after applying Tata beauty products in homes built from Tata steel.
 
Kanchan Paul, 39, paints the eyes on an idol of the Hindu goddess Durga at his workshop during the Durga Puja festival in Guwahati, India, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Anupam Nath)
AP PHOTOS: Artisans in India’s Assam state make colorful mud idols of Hindu gods for Durga Puja
GUWAHATI, India (AP) — Kanchan Paul is deep in concentration as he paints the right eye on a clay idol of the Hindu goddess Durga. He stands on a plastic stool and leans in toward the 8-foot-tall figure.
 
A woman with a child on her back walks past a house which had collapsed due to flooding in the Nakhu river caused by heavy rains in Lalitpur, Nepal, on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Niranjan Shrestha)
AP PHOTOS: Nepalese grapple with loss after floods kill over 200 people
KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — Bishworaj Khadka, a cook in Lalitpur, could hear the Nakhu River becoming louder and louder as he sat with his wife and daughter-in-law in their house situated at the river’s edge.
 
An artist works on an idol of the elephant-headed Hindu god Ganesha inside a workshop ahead of Ganesh Chaturthi festival in Mumbai, India, Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool)
AP PHOTOS: Indians celebrate the birthday of elephant-headed Hindu god Ganesha
MUMBAI, India (AP) — A large idol of the elephant-headed Hindu god Ganesha sat in the back of an open truck traveling along a busy Mumbai street, dwarfing other objects on the road.
 
Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama greets a welcoming crowd from inside his car as he arrives in Dharamshala, India, Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
Dalai Lama returns to Indian headquarters after knee replacement surgery in the US
The Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, has returned to the headquarters of the Tibetan government-in-exile in northern India after undergoing a knee replacement surgery in New York.
 
A farmer holds onto the reins as he runs through mud behind his speeding oxen during a traditional oxen plow race known as Nangarni Spardha at Dervan village in Ratnagiri district, in the Indian state of Maharashtra, Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)
AP PHOTOS: An oxen race in a small Indian farming village draws passionate crowds
RATNAGIRI, India (AP) — Hundreds of spectators shout and gesture as lively music blares from loudspeakers.
 
Tsering Dolma, a school girl, gets ready to perform a traditional dance at an event to celebrate the 89th birthday of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama at the Tsuglakhang temple in Dharamshala, India, Saturday, July 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
Hundreds of mostly exiled Tibetans celebrate the Dalai Lama’s 89th birthday in India’s Dharamshala
The Dalai Lama has made the hillside town his headquarters since fleeing Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. Representatives of a Tibetan government-in-exile also reside there.
 
In this photo shared by the Office of the Dalai Lama, Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, left, is greeted by Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, at the Tibetan leader's residence in Dharamshala, India, Wednesday, June 19, 2024. (Tenzin Choejor/Office of the Dalai Lama via AP)
US lawmakers meet with Dalai Lama in India’s Dharamshala, sparking anger from China
A bipartisan U.S. congressional delegation met with the Dalai Lama at his residence in India’s Dharamshala, sparking anger from China which views the exiled spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism as a dangerous separatist.
 
Kakarna Alkananda, a member of the Goud family, keeps a child's mouth open with the help of a pen as she prepares to insert a live fish stuffed with a yellow herbal paste into the mouth, in Hyderabad, India, Saturday, June 8, 2024. Every year thousands of asthma patients arrive here to receive this fish therapy from the Bathini Goud family, which keeps a secret formula of herbs, handed down by generations only to family members. The herbs are inserted in the mouth of a live sardine, or murrel fish, and slipped into the patient's throat. (AP Photo/Mahesh Kumar A.)
AP PHOTOS: Myriad people flock to Indian city to swallow live fish with ‘miracle cure’ to asthma
Legend has it that in 1845 a wandering saint presented a secret formula of miracle herbs to Veeranna Goud, a man living in the old city of Hyderabad, and instructed him to give it to asthma patients for free. Since then, Goud’s descendants, known as the Bathini family, have preserved the tradition a
 
President of the Central Tibetan Administration, Penpa Tsering, speaks at an event marking the anniversary of the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala, India, Sunday, Dec. 10, 2023. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
Tibetans in exile accuse China of destroying their identity in Tibet under its rule
The president of the Tibetan government-in-exile has accused China of denying the most fundamental human rights to people in Tibet and vigorously carrying out the extermination of the Tibetan identity.
 
Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama smiles as he presides over a function marking his 88th birthday at the Tsuglakhang temple in Dharamshala, India, Thursday, July 6, 2023. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia)
The Dalai Lama, Tibetan spiritual leader, celebrates 88th birthday
The Dalai Lama has celebrated his 88th birthday among hundreds of supporters and exiled Tibetans at his hillside headquarters in India.
 
Leader-in-exile: Youths lead Tibet freedom fight
It is not easy for young Tibetans still living in Tibet — isolated from cousins, friends and former neighbors who have gone into exile in countries around the world, Prime Minister Lobsang Sangay said. Those who remain and remember how Tibetan National Uprising Day began in 1959 are aging.