In the early weeks of January 2012, a report of four cases of tuberculosis from Mumbai, India, stirred up a storm.1 India bears a giant's share of the world's multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) burden, but these cases were different even though they came from a centre (Hinduja Hospital and Research Center) which has been reporting on the alarming escalation in drug-resistant TB in Mumbai over the last two decades. (Editorial)