BIRYANI

The exotic aroma of biryani emanating from a newly opened restaurant rekindled a craving lying dormant in me for years. My yearning for this delicacy dates back to a time when my father led me, my mother and my kid sister to an obscure restaurant in Central Calcutta more than half a century ago. Though I do not remember the place, the exotic experience remains fresh in my memory even today.

Over the passing years, I discovered there are many varieties. The connoisseurs and culinary experts have been on perpetual disagreement on the supremacy of one genre over the other.  But then, who cares? I like them all. But I definitely despise the fakes, often a mishmash of conventionally cooked meat or chicken pieces served on a plateful of yellow rice. This is sheer sacrilege and there should be a stern law against this malpractice. Biryani is not cooked, it is “created” with tender love and care.

The origin of this exotic art is unknown and often disputed.  Currently, it is known the world over as an Indian (or South Asian) delicacy. But is it? Some believe that the word Biryani is derived from the Persian word “Birian” which means fry-and-cook.  In all probability the Mughals were the ones to introduce this gastronomic delight in this part of the world.

At home and abroad, there has been a healthy rivalry between the Hyderabadi and the Lucknowi (Awadhi) varieties. The former obviously was patronized by the Nizams and the latter by the Nawabs of Awadh. Nizam’s kitchen boasted of forty-nine different varieties.  There are several Awadhi varieties as well. One of them is Dum Pukht Sabzi Biryani and it has an interesting story. Nawab Asaf –Ud-Daula of Awadh was taking a stroll in the afternoon interacting with his people. Incidentally, there was a construction site on the way, with hundreds of labours toiling. In one corner, there was a large vessel containing meat, rice and vegetables simmering in very slow fire. It was the afternoon meal for the workers. The Nawab was mesmerized by the aroma and summoned the royal chef.  The chef, a culinary expert, came over, collected the recipe and fine tuned it. The rest is history. There are no Nawabs these days but the art lives in the non-descript eateries of Lucknow’s chowk area.

There is a Calcutta variety as well, which unfortunately is not very popular outside Bengal. The legacy goes back to the last Nawab of Awadh, the ill-fated Nawab Wajid Ali Shah, who was exiled to my beloved city.  The Nawab’s favourite food soon caught up with the local residents. However, being poor, many could not afford the required quantity of meat and settled for potatoes.  Nowadays, the potato is an indispensable part of ‘Kalkatta Biryani’, nestling like a golden egg in a bed of fine aromatic rice and soft melting pieces of mutton. Arsalan restaurant in Park Circus, Kolkata is famous for the Calcutta variety. It is a favourite haunt of ours during our yearly holidays.

 

 

Unfortunately, I had never been to Hyderabad and cannot authoritatively comment on the genuine Hyderabadi variety.  There are several restaurants outside Hyderabad claiming to serve the original stuff but their quality and authenticity have always been disputed by my die-hard Hyderabadi friends. The trick of the trade, I believe, is the skill to induce the aroma of the spices without actually mixing them with the final product.  It is light and healthy. It is claimed that authentic Hyderabadi Biryani can be eaten with bare hands and there would be no trace of grease on the fingers.

 

A Bangladeshi friend of mine introduced me to home-cooked Kachchi Biryani.  This is cooked with the rice and marinated meat placed in layers in the vessel with the lead tightly sealed. This is a challenging process as it requires meticulous attention to time and temperature to attain perfection. The trick is just a wee bit of overcooking to ensure a divinely delightful gastronomic experience.  This is supposed to be one of the Hyderabadi varieties originally. It has a sister version aptly named Pakki Biryani, where the meat is pre-cooked.

I personally believe that mutton Biryani is the real stuff. The ones cooked with chicken, beef, prawn or vegetables are at the most pilaffs or pulaos. Some puritans agree with me. Unfortunately, there are some who do not.

Bon Appétit.

7 August 2011

CHINA VS INDIA

 

Some times back, I had an opportunity to meet a delegation from a Middle Eastern oil company looking for alternative sources for the supply of steel tubular products. Their target destinations were manufacturers in China and India. Their traditional suppliers from Japan, USA and East European countries have been unable to meet their requirement within the required time schedule.

The delegation was returning home when I met them. They were impressed by the range of products and the quality control mechanism of the manufacturers in both the countries. The prices were very competitive and the delivery schedule was very attractive as far as their project targets were concerned. They were all set to invite tenders from steel manufacturers from the two countries.

However, they made some observations which they were a bit reluctant to discuss initially. Later, they opened up and started talking.

They were immensely impressed by the development of infrastructure in China; wide and shining highways, gleaming high-rises, swanky shopping malls, recreation centres of global standard, uninterrupted power supply etc. They drove at 80 KPH through Beijing downtown. In comparison, the situation in India was dismal. They were caught in traffic jam on their way to the hotel from the airport at Mumbai. They experienced power cut in another town. City streets were choc-a-block with cars, trucks and people. There was dust and noise everywhere. “India needs to work on infrastructure”, was their comment. The image they had drawn in their mind after all the stories of economic boom, was shattered.

Interestingly, in spite of the unfavourable observation, their preference for doing business was tilted towards India. The reason was communication. The Indians were excellent communicators. Questions regarding the business details were answered clearly and promptly. The language of communication was, of course English.

On the contrary, the Chinese depended on an interpreter during the meetings and presentations. The interpreter apparently was put on the job after a brief crash course in spoken English. He learned the grammar but not the diction. Words spoken in a heavy Chinese accent were almost unintelligible. A few did have a better diction but they had no knowledge of the business. Therefore, any question put up by the delegation was translated to the professionals whose responses in turn were translated back. Apart from the time wasted in this process, vital information was literally lost in translation.

 

The Chinese seem to have woken up to this shortcoming. They have introduced English, spoken and written at elementary schools. And they mean business and in one generation this inadequacy will be wiped out and the edge that India has at the moment will disappear.

 

But one generation is a long time; enough to develop the basic infrastructure like roads, power and civic amenities in India to focus global attention to India as the major player. There is no shortage of funds as several IPO’s have demonstrated time and again.

 

With a little effort, we can improve our infrastructure before China polishes her English.

 

8October 2012

US PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE 2012

It was 4^th September 2012, Thursday morning at 4 am, Kuwait time. I jumped out of bed, rushed in front of the TV and switched it on. US presidential debate started already and Mitt Romney was explaining his vision of an America in the future. He was very confident and performed much better than I expected. In fact, the president was lacklustre. The incumbents are normally defensive and tend to cover the faulty tracks they left behind. Obama’s job was tough in a bleak economic scenario. He did not have much to flaunt from his first term except the revival of the auto industry at Detroit and his much maligned and controversial healthcare programme. He directed his message to the vast middle class Americans luring them to safety net of more government spending and tax reliefs. Mitt Romney was a winner at the end with his vision of creating more jobs and generating more revenue.

One would wonder what an Indian like me, based in Kuwait has to do with US presidential election. The people of USA will elect a man to take care of their interest, not mine. Ironically, the rest of the world also has a stake in US presidential election. An average American voter probably is not conscious of the global impact of their choice. While electing their commander-in chief, they also elect a leader who has the power and capability of influencing the destiny of people from distant nations.

I would like Obama to have a second term. He is trying to pull America back home from the remote corners of the globe. Mitt Romney seems to have other ideas. He intends to raise the budget allocation for the military. Does he have plans for a more intense global role? I have a feeling that he does. Republicans of all hue have been critical of Obama’s version of the current Middle Eastern policy of neutrality. They want more US involvement. Mitt Romney, on earlier occasions, rejected the policy of granting Iran any more concession on the suspension of its clandestine nuclear programme. If elected, he might pick up a leaf from George W Bush foreign policy manual and launch a campaign against Iran. As a resident of Kuwait, I would hate to see another war in my neighbourhood.

As an Indian national, I do not endorse Obama’s plans to stop exporting jobs abroad. The outsourcing of US jobs has benefitted India immensely. I shall, however, treat this as a minor issue because for any business to be profitable, the economic factor translating to obtaining best value for money is something beyond the control of any administration. USA which boasts of being a free county, and rightfully so, will not and cannot control their entrepreneurs’ way of doing business. Hence, his declaration of stopping job export is at best an election rhetoric.

One would wonder whether this much hyped debates make an impact on the voting pattern. The event started in 1960 when a youthful John F Kennedy faced Richard Nixon. The former’s good looks and sophisticated grooming carried the day for him. Overnight, Kennedy’s rating zoomed at the cost of Nixon’s. I think in no other country, the contenders come face to face before an election.

In a parliamentary democracy like ours in India, the chief executive (Prime Minister) is elected by the members of parliament after the election. There is no definite candidate before an election rendering a similar debate completely irrelevant.

4 September 2012

COMMUNICATION - A REVOLUTION

I was a university student in the sixties. My family was based in a smallish industrial town in Assam. Banaras Hindu University was my alma mater. The train journey took three nights with a couple route changes on the way. I never travelled alone. There were always a few friends to keep me company. We ate at every station till we ran out of money, sang at our heart’s content and also indulged in mild mischiefs. It was fun.

Our parents came to the station to see us off extracting promises of writing a letter every week. We did oblige; to the extent possible. Having reached the campus on the fourth day, it would be a day of rest before picking up the pen to scribble a few lines; mostly stating how difficult it was to squeeze out the time to write a letter in such a busy schedule. Once posted, we would jump on our bikes to watch the latest movie in town. The letter took another week to reach home. In short, there was no contact with the family for ten to twelve days! And, the letter that our parents received contained news that was at least a week old. There was no question of talking to them on phone. Telephones were a rare commodity those days. Applicants waited for decades to get a faulty connection that remained “dead” most of the time. 

The Old Unfaithful

Many years later, in the early nineties to be precise, I had to communicate the news of a death in the family to close relatives scattered all over the county and beyond. By then, we were the proud owner of a black outdated telephone installed by MTNL in our house in Kolkata, which did not make any noise or sound of any sort. All the other telephone in the neighbourhood were dead too due to a chronic ailment known as “cable fault”. I had to hop into a taxi to travel all the way to the Telephone office at Dalhousie Square, stand in a queue to make a phone call, return to the back of the queue to make the second one and then the third etc. I was physically and emotionally drained out at the end of the gruelling exercise.

Slowly and gradually the situation started to change from the mid-nineties. After a lot of political hiccups, the government allowed mobile phone companies to set up business in India. The impact was stunning. In 15 years’ time, the industry went through a phenomenal growth. According to latest information, there are over 900 million telephone connections in the country. India now is recognised as having the fastest growing communication network in the world.

Running simultaneously, the internet technology also grew fast and steady. However, the impact remained confined to urban India only. Mobile phone connection reached the remote villages due to low tariff and mushrooming of transmission towers but the internet remained inaccessible to many. However, the privileged ones are audio-visually connected to their friends and family all around the world.

It is really amazing for someone of my generation to have experienced the revolution that communication has gone through. It would have been crazy to think twenty years ago that someday in future I would be able to call a friend of mine in California while walking out of a movie theatre in Kolkata.

The Contemporary Gizmos

This is a dream. However, there is indeed an adverse fallout.

As mentioned earlier, our parents had no clue of our whereabouts for almost two weeks. But these days, the parents tend to keep their young children on a communication leash. It must be pretty frustrating for the young generation to be just a-phone-call-away, particularly when they are taking a break in a cafeteria or a movie theatre or even trying to catch up on sleep. There are parents who expect their children to send text messages at least twice every day and an email almost daily. The kids of this generation lost their logistic freedom.

However, I cannot even visualise what the young lots of today will experience in the future in the field of communication. It will be a revolution that will be beyond our wildest imagination.

Alas, we will not be around to cherish it.

18 September 2012

 

BLESS THE LADIES

Last Friday, Shreya and Shamik took us to a Malaysian restaurant for dinner. One of the main attractions was an appetizer called Roti-Telur, which is very similar to our moghlai paratha and is served with a small bowl of chicken stew. It was delicious and quite filling. I have a picture enclosed but that is another story.

The place was full when we reached. We had to wait in queue for ten minutes before being ushered in to a table for four. Sattam had a concert somewhere in Jersey City and could not join us.

As we were being seated, I noticed two attractive Indian ladies in western attires seated at the table just next to us, engrossed in intense conversation. They were probably in their early fifties. Their plates were almost empty. There was an ice bucket on their table with two bottles of wine sticking out. One of the ladies filled an empty glass in front of her and took a long swig. In the meantime, the waitress brought the menu cards for us. Inspired by the ladies at the next table, I suggested to order some wine as well to go with our meal and discovered, to my dismay, that the place had no liquor license. However, the diners could bring their own drinks and the restaurant will be too pleased to provide ice, soda, glasses and associated paraphernalia. The waitress was very helpful. She suggested there was a wine store just across the corner and we could just walk out and get our drink.

Something unexpected happened at this very moment.

One of the ladies raised her hand and said, “Excuse me”. When we turned she made an amazing proposal. They finished their dinner and were getting ready to leave. The tables being very close they could not help but hear our discussion. They were extremely sorry as they did not intend to get into our private conversation, but they had a couple of unfinished bottles of wine and they would be very pleased if we agreed to accept them. We protested vehemently but they insisted; and very politely. The waitress smiled and told us that it was a very common practice there. Many diners left behind their unfinished drinks for the next customer. When I suggested that they could take the bottles back with them they looked crestfallen and said rather sheepishly that they could not take the bottles home.

Well, to cut a long story short, we accepted the bottles and thanked them profusely and they insisted once again that it was their pleasure and left. Both the bottles were half full.

Shamik looked at the labels and nodded approvingly. They were good quality Californian wines, one red and one white. Shreya had a lemonade like her mother. Shamik and I did full justice to the kind gesture of two attractive ladies.

I am thrilled to think if strangers could be so considerate, how generous my friends would be!

God be praised.

9 May 2013

 

 

 

ANAND

Way back in 1967, a bunch of final year engineering students decided one Sunday afternoon to watch a movie. There was nothing unusual about it. Getting out of the campus to watch a movie was the best recreation possible.

 

Apart from a handful of avid movie goers, most in the group were rather reluctant. The hero was new and his earlier film was a flop.  There was no pre-release hype; the director’s was not a big name. However, the heroine did generate some interest. She was Babita Shivdasani, a first cousin of Sadhana, the goddess of the tinsel world of Hindi movies.

Oh yes, the film was “Raaz” or “The Mystery”.  As there was nothing better to do, we all jumped on our bikes and made a bee line to the theatre where the movie was running. Unlike the normal Sunday experience, the theatre was rather empty and finding comfortable seats (with ceiling fans in the proximity, a/c’s were a luxury those days). Well, the movie was average, the heroine pretty and it was a reasonably satisfactory entertainment.

 

However, there was something particular about the hero that did not escape our attention. His performance was measured, soft and under-played, a bit unusual those days. In short, he had a refreshing presence on scrren. After a bit of deliberations while sipping masala tea from earthen cups outside the theatre, we were anonymous that this hero would go far.

The hero, Rajesh Khanna was discovered through a talent hunt contest organized by Filmfare, a popular movie magazine and United Producers Association.  He was the winner among more than ten thousand contestants. Born Jatin Khanna, his name was changed to suit the glamour of the film industry. His first film, “Akhri Khat” flopped. Hardly anyone remembers this film any more. His career actually took off from “Raaz”.

Soon he became a phenomenon. The title “Superstar” was coined for him. He churned out consecutive fifteen super hit films, a feat unparalleled till date.  By then, I was a young professional and became an ardent fan of the superstar. The most memorable one probably was Kati Patang, which had Asha Parekh as a deglamourized heroine.  Soon after, Rajesh Khanna was in a deglamourized role himself in Anand. A film hero without a heroine was unthinkable those days. As expected, many established actors declined this role offered by Hrishikesh Mukherjee.  The stupendous success of the film must have frustrated those actors later. It was reported by the section of the press that a serious illness of Raj Kapoor inspired Hrishikesh Mukherjee to conceive the film. According to people close to both personalities Raj Kapoor  always referred to Hrishikesh as “Babumoshai”.

 

There is also another story involving Kishore Kumar. He was one of the established actors of the day to have been offered the role of Anand. When Hrishikesh Mukherjee reached his house to discuss the script and the songs, the security guard, unable to recognize the great film director, chased him away. The outraged director decided not to work with Kishor Kumar ever again. He even insisted on having Mukesh sing for the film instead of the maverick singer. Salil Chaoudhury, the music director relented and the rest is history. Who would ever forget, “kahin door jab din dhal jaye” or “maine tere liye hi saat rang-ke sapne chune” rendered so beautifully by Mukesh. Rajesh Khanna bagged the Best Actor award for this role in 1971.

Rajesh Khanna loved glamour. Unlike many other successful actors in India, he came from a well do family. His biological father was a school teacher. Early in his life, he was adopted by a rich aunt and had the best of education and upbringing. He was known to have driven a MG sports car to the studio for his first ever shoot.

Though he was romantically linked with Anju  Mahendru for many years, he sprang a big surprise by marrying Dimple Kapadia, the sensational young heroine of Raj Kapoor’s Bobby.  Many interpret this as a step to boost his career which was on the wane. However, his career never picked up to the dizzy heights ever again.

His downfall was as fast as his rise was. His chose wrong movies, became a prisoner of his once adored mannerism and resorted to theatrical excesses incompatible with the silver screen. A quality he was known to have lost during his heady days was humility. His friends deserted him and so did the producers. His wife left him and soon he became a recluse. Many years later, when he appeared on stage to receive a life time achievement award from Amitabh Bachchan, his fans were shocked to see a frail and sickly star delivering an unimpressive acceptance speech. 

He knew he will not be under the limelight ever again. Showman that he was, he probably wrote his last script to regain the lost glory of the yester years. The world came back to his door once again when the flower clad vehicle came out of Ashirwad for his final journey.

Did anyone notice a mischievous smile? I did.

23 July 2012

RUSTAM-E-HIND

 

I do not remember the year. It was summer vacation and I was in the high school probably in the 9^th or 10^th standard. One bright morning in the picturesque industrial town of Digboi in Assam,  I was on my way for a haircut. I met a couple of friends pedaling vigorously on their bikes coming from the opposite direction. Huffing and puffing, they urged me to turn around and join them. I did; though still in the dark about their mission.

One of them soon explained. Dara Singh was in town! He and a group of other internationally reputed wrestlers were touring the country. The rest of the group had moved on to their next venue but Dara Singh was spending a day in Digboi at the request of a few senior officials who were his great fans. Fascinated, I decided to get my hair grow for one more day and reached the guest house.

The security guard would not let us in. He was a big man and was under strict instructions not to allow intruders. We begged, pleaded and promised to just have a glimpse from a distance. The guard insisted that it was not possible because “Sahab bahut gusse-me hain” and he might react violently.  Why was he angry we wondered aloud. The guard explained once again, “sahab nashteme 25 ande khatey hain… aaj ek kam tha”. In a feat of anger he picked up the cook and threw him out of the window. The cook had been hospitalized with multiple fractures.

We grabbed our bikes and fled.

Later in the evening, I met an “uncle” of the neighborhood and narrated this terrifying story. He was one of the organizers of the reception planned that evening for Dara Singh. He smiled and asked me to come over to the club along with my friends.

It was a very embarrassing moment that evening when the “uncle” introduced us to the great man and narrated our story. What followed was big guffaw with his big frame shaking vigorously  and his gigantic arms grasping us with a bear hug.  There was so much of simple innocence in that laughter; it was clear that this man would not even hurt a fly.

I never met him again. Later, I saw him on screen as an actor; and saw him aging gradually and gracefully.  On 12 July 2012, all the TV channels broke the news, the champion was no more. He lost the final bout; probably the only one he ever lost.

There will not be another Rustam-e-Hind.

18 July 2012