Life & Style

The first time I meet Archana Trasy and her partner Pooja Chaudhri is via a beautiful pride advocacy short film on Instagram. “I always say this to Archu, you really brought colour into my life,” Chaudhri, a media consultant, says in the film, walking into an open windy terrace overlooking the Arabian Sea, perhaps hinting at the openness of their own identities. “We are in a same-sex relationship and we wear this love with a lot of pride,” says Trasy.

“I feel privileged to have a partner,” she tells me later. “We’ve been together for five years.” Trasy, 53, founder of an entertainment design company in Mumbai, came out at 18. Her parents were supportive though many others were not.

Archana Trasy (left) and Pooja Chaudhri

Down south in Tamil Nadu, Gita, 67, has recently moved into a senior living community with her 77-year-old partner. “Everyone thinks we are cousins and it’s best kept that way,” she says over a video call. Gita looks visibly exhausted from caring for her ailing partner. Moving here took up much of her savings, she says. “I have no support from my family because I choose to live with her. Keeping our identity hidden works best.” Gita and her partner initially lived in an apartment in a different South Indian city but the latter’s failing health made a senior living set-up with medical assistance on hand a practical choice.

Gita’s decision to hide her truth, unlike the openness celebrated by Trasy and Chaudhri, is the lived experience of many older queer persons in India, who grew up in the shadow of Section 377. Despite long battles for equal rights, they struggle to carve out a secure life without legal or institutional support.

In a landmark judgment in 2018, the Supreme Court of India decriminalised consensual same-sex relations by striking down Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. While that opened a big door for the LGBTQIA+ community, which constitutes roughly 10% of the population, another one was shut a few years down the line when the court rejected the community’s plea for marriage equality in October 2023. Same-sex couples in India also do not have the legal right to jointly adopt children as they are not recognised as eligible adoptive parents.

Marriage as a framework provides legal security in inheritance, housing and medical decisions, apart from social recognition and acceptance, the key factors behind the push for marriage equality. But it remains a contested demand among some queer activists who believe the focus should instead be on implementing existing directives and fighting to remove discrimination.

Some rights exist — such as opening a joint bank account or adding a queer partner’s name in the family ration card — but enforcement remains a challenge, say activists. The denial of these basic rights often has repercussions as people grow older or start planning their future in their late 40s and 50s. It impacts decisions around parenting, financial security, healthcare access, social inclusion, caregiving and dignity in death. Growing older as a queer person in India is fraught with problems that many take for granted in a heteronormative framework.

Finding data on the number of older queer persons in India is difficult. Surveys are hard to come by. “An online survey of more than a million queer participants in India showed that almost 40% of the participants were aged 45 years or older, with almost 30% of this group married to women and 20% hiding their gay/bisexual identities from their spouses,” notes ‘Psychological well-being of middle-aged and older queer men in India: A mixed-methods approach’, a rare study on the group by Sharma A.J. and Subramanyam M.A., published in PLOS One (2020), a peer-reviewed journal.

A fragile revelation

Girish, 58, a doctor’s assistant from Chennai, speaks to me on a WhatsApp audio call from a friend’s office because at home his conservative brother still doesn’t accept his sexuality. He doesn’t want to switch to video though he shares his first name. For years, his family took him to “counsellors” to cure his sexual orientation. “Now they don’t ask as long as I stay quiet; I also don’t force them to accept anything, as long as I have a place in their house,” he says. Girish would like to live independently but cannot afford it. “I no longer have a partner or the resources to be active in gay circles. I’ve accepted my life and live quietly,” he says.

For many older members of the LGBTQIA+ community, coming out remains the biggest issue. Those who manage to do so, often talk about the lack of reference points growing up. Filmmaker Sridhar Rangayan refers to that era’s impact as “permanent scars”. “Our generation has always lived under the cloud of criminality… Even now, when greater freedom is there in the cities, and the youth feel liberated, most elderly gay men live in the shadows. Hardly a few are partnered and even in these partnerships, they have to tread with caution, since there is so much pulling them apart.” Rangayan, 62, a marriage equality petitioner with his partner Saagar Gupta, 56, is co-founder of The Humsafar Trust and the annual Kashish Pride Film Festival in Mumbai.

Queer activists Saagar Gupta (left) and Sridhar Rangayan

The Seenagers, a Mumbai-based group of gay men over the age of 55, has many closeted married members. The group introduces itself as an initiative that gives “elderly gay men a safe space to connect over cups of chai”. Founder Ashok Row Kavi, among the first to openly talk about homosexuality and gay rights in India back in the 80s, says, “Many use pseudonyms at first. Once they feel safer, they share their true identities.” He warns that secrecy can lead to risky behaviours and even blackmail. “Older gay men in India often find themselves vulnerable,” says the 78-year-old.

Mental health concerns are also prevalent among the older group. “Anxiety, depression, and stress are significantly higher in the LGBTQIA+ population,” says Delhi-based psychologist and marriage equality petitioner Ankita Khanna. “For those in their 50s and 60s, these struggles are chronic, shaped by decades of secrecy. Mental health stigma intersects with the taboo around sexuality and gender, making it even harder for older individuals to seek help.”

The dearth of queer affirmative mental health specialists in India further complicates care. “When you think in terms of those catering to the ageing population, then it becomes even more of a rarity,” says Amit, 47, an LGBTQIA+ rights activist in Kolkata. He has seen a recent disturbing trend that may increase chances of elder abuse, he says.

“When the Supreme Court read down Section 377, it made it clear that only consensual acts were decriminalised, while non-consensual acts remained punishable. However, with the Bharatiya Nyaya Samhita replacing the Indian Penal Code, the government has left out any direct mention of non-consensual same-sex acts, creating a legal vacuum,” says Amit. In both online and offline spaces, he thinks this has contributed to an increase in abusive behaviour. The lack of prosecution makes the elderly more vulnerable.

“The concerns of older queer individuals were not part of the LGBTQIA+ agenda, likely because most queer activists back then weren’t older. Until one personally experiences ageing-related vulnerabilities, they may not act on them. Research on these issues is increasing, and the Varta Trust is planning a year-long qualitative study on the concerns of elderly trans and queer persons. In Varta’s mental health peer counsellor support group, for instance, efforts are being made to ensure at least 30%–40% of counsellors are over 40 or 50. For ageing queer people seeking safe spaces to live, there are the metro cities, but emerging queer networks in places like Kerala, Odisha, and Assam provide alternative options. These are places where the queer networks are young, active and thriving. However, much remains to be done to ensure that older LGBTQIA+ individuals are not forgotten, both in community initiatives and policy frameworks.”Pawan DhallQueer archivist, writer and founding member of Varta Trust

Legal hurdles with death and adoption

Even for those in secure partnerships or families, love comes with roadblocks. Dignity in death often crosses Trasy’s mind. “In medical situations, the lack of legal recognition scares me. I often worry that if I were to die, my partner wouldn’t have the legal right to make decisions for me or to claim my body. I want to live and die with dignity, and I’d prefer my partner to have the authority to act on my wishes,” she says.

Documentary filmmaker Pracheta Sharma, 44, is parent to a six-year-old girl she adopted in 2020, around the same time she met her partner Mamta Saraf. She talks about how India’s adoption laws and the lack of marriage equality adversely impacts their family structure. “Within the adoption laws, you are not allowed to declare anybody else as a legal guardian if they’re not from your family [blood relation]. One parent has to adopt and the other remains in the shadows. I think it’s a highly discriminatory space in a setup that has decided to be progressive. If I was with a man in this equation and I wanted a family, a civil marriage is all it would take, and he would automatically become the other parent. But with a same-sex partner I can’t do that,” says Sharma.

Among the small changes that Pracheta Sharma (left) and Mamta Saraf have managed to make around them is the introduction of gender-neutral ‘parent’ ID cards in their daughter’s school in Mumbai, replacing the traditional ‘father’ and ‘mother’ cards.

Not being a legal guardian in the adoption papers translates into several problems for Saraf, 46, who has no rights beyond social acceptance. Travelling alone with the child can create issues and even making an investment or insurance in her name needs to be done through circuitous routes, setting up problems for the future. Saraf and Sharma are open about their relationship (it helps to live in cosmopolitan Mumbai) with their families, housing society, and their child’s school. But challenges remain. The couple is currently working on options to secure their child’s future.

In the absence of marriage equality, some queer couples create a living will, or insurance nominations, or social contracts with family and friends to ensure their wishes are respected. “Since the system doesn’t give us rights, queer people must constantly safeguard their own,” says Saraf. “Making a will in your 40s isn’t enough; you have to ensure your partner isn’t sidelined later.”

There are couples who find protection through business partnerships. “Our production company, Solaris Pictures, ensures shared assets,” says Rangayan.

There is a constant need for jugaad if you are a queer person, says Khanna, 41, who lives with her partner, psychiatrist Kavita Arora, 51. In their eight years of living together, the mental health practitioners have faced several “minor dents”, be it in the process of opening a joint bank account or applying for a swimming pass in their apartment.

Maya Sharma, 70, says she and her older queer female friends often think of finding places to stay together instead of having to fit into heteronormative spaces. Unlike in western countries, where there is a push towards senior living communities catering to queer people or more acceptance within regular senior communities, India has a long way to go.

Writer and queer activist Maya Sharma

Sharma, who runs the Vadodara-based Vikalp, which works with marginalised queer women and transpersons, says she finds the senior living communities in Gujarat limiting. “The way we have been moulded because of our queer identities makes it hard for us to fit into the heteronormative environment of an old-age home. Secondly, many of these places are religion-oriented and many of us have friends and lovers from different religions and castes. So these religion-centric old-age homes are frightening to us,” she says.

Finding chosen families

In the absence of formal support structures, many depend on chosen families. “I have a network of friends who have been with me since college. They are my family,” says Iggy, 51, a production designer in Mumbai. Iggy recently moved from Goa with her partner of 12 years to give her dogs better medical care. She tells me how, while coming out in her 30s, she discovered a “whole new world” of queer individuals. There were groups such as Labia and Gay Bombay in the early 2000s; the queer-run store Azad Bazaar, where the balcony became a community hub, with free coffee; and Gulabi Adda, which held monthly meetup parties that brought a sense of belonging and lifelong friendships.

“It was almost like a renaissance where more queers were out to me visually than they are today,” Iggy says. It helped to create a community that Iggy feels has shifted to online spaces for younger queer people today. Activists believe this may leave out the older lot that is not digitally savvy and unable to access information on resources such as support groups, therapists, sexual health services or simply finding spaces to hang out.

Ageing and transgender persons

With her big bindi, gorgeously draped saris and bold voice, Ranjita Sinha is a fiery presence in Kolkata’s transgender community. She runs South Asia’s first government-run trans shelter home, Garima Grih. “Transgender individuals face unique medical, social, and legal challenges that cannot be conflated with those of the wider LGBTQIA+ community,” she asserts. Despite the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019, and the Ayushman Bharat TG Plus card which promises medical aid, Sinha says access to healthcare remains tough. “No one wants to go to government hospitals. There is no mindset change in the doctors there. Trained doctors are only in the big hospitals, and how many older transgenders can afford the ₹1,000-₹2,000 fees in those facilities?”

There have been promises from the government to establish old-age homes for transgender individuals but nothing has materialised yet. “There needs to be an ecosystem for older trans people. They face huge issues — mental health, post-sex reassignment surgery complications, and sometimes complications from quack treatments. But lack of access to healthcare or family support leaves them in a tough situation,” says Sinha.

That said, Maya Sharma points to the strong support among female queer collectives that are different from the worlds gay men inhabit, perhaps because women’s concerns are different when it comes to stigma and HIV-related issues. They often help trans-masculine and lesbian women from smaller towns who have fled to escape persecution or forced marriages. “A lot of us older women have created advocacy collectives such as Vikalp, Nazariya, or Sappho, and we help them out. But we can’t always help in day-to-day living. That kind of acceptance requires institutional support, which is lacking,” she says.

When it comes to older transwomen, the ‘jamaat’ takes care of them. “It’s their chosen family,” says Jaya, transwoman, trans-rights activist and general manager at Sahodaran, a queer rights NGO in Chennai. “The ‘jamaat’ system is a beautiful tradition in Indian transgender communities, where younger transwomen are adopted by older transwomen into a chosen family. As a result, very few older transwomen are homeless or in shelters as most are part of a ‘jamaat’. But even then problems persist,” she says.

Jaya, trans-rights activist and general manager at Sahodaran, a queer rights NGO in Chennai.

Healthcare needs become more pronounced with age. Jaya says that older transgender individuals, aged 70 and above, are hardly visible in the community. She hints at a lack of medical care and good health habits as many fall into alcohol abuse. “Many post-operative trans people report health issues such as back ache and knee pain, likely due to weight issues,” she adds. The lack of doctors trained and sensitised in transgender healthcare is a big worry. Sahodaran is working to change this through awareness programmes among doctors, says Jaya.

In Tamil Nadu, the Chief Minister’s Comprehensive Health Insurance Scheme offers partial cover for medical treatment of transgenders but it works in only a few hospitals such as the Aadhi Parasakthi Hospital in Chennai, says Jaya. The Tamil Nadu government also has a pension scheme that provides a monthly allowance of ₹1,000 to transgender people over the age of 40, who are unable to earn a livelihood.

Many activists agree that the landscape is evolving. Khanna says that a number of people “came out to their families during the marriage equality fight” as it was being livestreamed on national television, resulting in these conversations coming into the mainstream. She admires how courts have provided support and protection to marginalised queer couples across India in the last couple of years. “People with privilege, and banks, organisations and authorities, need to come up with such explicit support to help those without privilege access it. Then, it can be truly empowering.”

The writer is a freelance journalist and the co-author of ‘Rethink Ageing’ (2022).

Languages have become a hot topic in India today, with a battle for linguistic supremacy raging across the country. But to constrain the nation’s linguistic diversity into monolithic grids is an impossible, and ill-advised task. With what would you replace words such as tahsildar, jama-bandi, asal, khaali, wasool, or jilla?

Long before the English language imprinted itself on South Asia’s collective consciousness, there were other tongues that held that position of high esteem. Arabic, Persian and Urdu co-existed and were assimilated into Indian languages in a more intimate way. Interestingly, interactions with Arabs through trade and religious dissemination also led to the growth of hybrid languages such as ‘Lisan ul-Arwi’ or ‘Arabi-Tamil’ (also referred to as ‘Arabu-Tamil’) and ‘Arabi-Malayalam’ — with a canon of published literature and daily correspondence that supported a multicultural society up until the 19th century in southern India. Arabic-influenced vernacular can be seen in Sindhi, Gujarati, Arabu-Telugu and Arabu-Bengali too, to name just a few.

Maritime heritage and flower-shaped poems

Arwi consists of 40 letters, of which 28 are from Arabic, and 12 are devised by adding diacritical marks that allow Arabic letters to express sounds particular to Tamil. Similarly, the Arabi-Malayalam alphabet has 56 letters.

In its heyday, publications in Arwi covered a wide range of subjects, including architecture, arithmetic, astronomy, fiction, horticulture, medicine, sports, sexology, war manuals, yoga and general literature. Madinattun-Nuhas (Copper Town, 1858), a historical novel in Arwi by Imamul Aras, published in 1858, is credited as being the first work of fiction produced by the Tamil-speaking people. And as scholar Tayka Shu’ayb Alim — the first Tamil Muslim to receive the National Award for Outstanding Arabic Scholar — notes in his book Arabic, Arwi and Persian in Sarandib and Tamil Nadu, Arwi Muslims wrote poems in the shapes of flowers, leaves and geometric figures, known as ‘Mushajjarah’ and ‘Mudawwarah.’ They were inspired by the ‘Nagabandanam’ and ‘Ashtabandanam’ genres of Tamil poetry, which were written in the shape of serpents.

A page from Arabic, Arwi and Persian in Sarandib and Tamil Nadu

Over time, these languages became the lingua franca for many Muslim settlements, and as recently as the 1950s, Arabu-Tamil was taught at home to girls and in Arabic colleges as an allied subject. Arabi-Tamil and Arabi-Malayalam played a key role in educating women from conservative Muslim families, at a time when they lived in seclusion.

Retracing a layered past

Publications in these languages have become rare today, and can only be found in libraries, seminaries and family collections — where, sadly, many of the owners do not know how to read them. Now, scholars have begun to scientifically document and preserve surviving literature.

Most recent among these efforts is a project for the British Library’s Endangered Archives Programme (EAP) titled ‘Mathematical Practices of the Indian Ocean World in Coastal Islamic Communities of the Coromandel and Malabar, South India’. It was executed by the Centre for Islamic Tamil Cultural Research (CITCR), affiliated to Jamal Mohamed College in Tiruchi, and in collaboration with Kerala’s Mahatma Gandhi University.

Text in Arabi-Malayalam

Supported by a grant of £14,926 (approximately ₹16 lakh), the year-long project surveyed and digitised notes, theological texts, printed manuals, marriage registers, publications and textbooks from the 18th century. The documents — sourced from personal collections, religious and social institutions, and Arabic college libraries in the states’ Coromandel and Malabar regions — focus on non-European learning and mathematical practices that are unique to the subcontinent. They are also a repository of ethnic medical knowledge, recorded in the form of songs for easy memorisation.

“You cannot write the history of a community with just stories,” says J. Raja Mohamed, director of CITCR and co-principal researcher of the EAP project (along with professor M.H. Ilias of Mahatma Gandhi University’s School of Gandhian Thought and Development Studies). “You need facts too, because these documents show how our ancestors lived.”

A book in Arabi-Tamil

Minutiae of the everyday

At a time when there’s a general lack of interest in record keeping and preservation in India, the project is a significant achievement.

Mohamed delved into the Coromandel region, while Ilias looked at Malabar, and their teams, with training from the French Institute of Pondicherry, the project’s archival partner, fanned out along the coastal towns. They retraced 62 printed books, 25 manuscripts, seven notebooks, six documents and four booklets in Arabi-Tamil and Arabi-Malayalam. The digitised versions — EAP 1457 — are available now on the British Library’s website.

M.H. Ilias

“We found several texts detailing non-European ways of measuring and weighing. They were possibly brought to India by Arab travellers, scholars, and trade-based diaspora,” says Ilias, explaining how the project helped them learn more about the way Muslim communities in these coastal areas lived and worked. “It is an eye-opener to realise that activities like boatbuilding and mosque construction relied on these measurements, and are still in use in certain regions.” As examples, he cites ‘kullam’, which is still used to calculate liquid measures, and amshik, the five-stroke method of counting, prevalent in local markets. In Malabar, boatbuilding continues to use the calculation system of marakanakku (measure of wood).

Measurements in Arabi-Malayalam

The widespread usage of Arabi-Tamil, especially among Muslim women, could be seen, too. “We found various guidance booklets, and a collection of poems and folk songs on Islamic themes, indicating that the language was being taught to and read by Muslim women,” adds Raja.

Ilias remembers his grandmother being a prolific writer of Arabi-Malayalam poems. “Whenever she prepared Ayurvedic home cures, she would sing the Arabi-Malayalam recipes. Literacy in the language was a mark of prestige for Muslim women in Kerala, just as Arwi was for Tamil Muslim women,” he shares. “Sadly, when the Kerala government began its campaign for total literacy in 1990, my grandmother was assessed as ‘illiterate’ because she knew only Arabi-Malayalam.”

Hope for rare publications

Despite the wealth of documentation unearthed, the project also proved to be arduous. “Quite a few books, especially in the libraries of educational institutions, were disintegrating because they had been stored haphazardly in musty rooms,” says Mohamed.

Raja Mohamed and his assistant working on the digitisation of Arabi-Tamil manuscripts
| Photo Credit:
M. Moorthy

In the case of personal collections, lack of knowledge about their own antecedents proved to be problematic. “Myths of origin and hearsay cannot be treated as historical fact, but that is what most people recounted. This is one of the reasons why it has become difficult to write an accurate history of Tamil Muslims today,” he adds. Some also developed cold feet, rescheduling viewing appointments umpteen times or flatly refusing to show their documents.

While similar problems were prevalent in the Malabar region too, Ilias is encouraged by initiatives to bring the outmoded Arabi-Malayalam into the modern era. “The University of Calicut’s C.H. Mohammed Koya Chair for Studies on Developing Societies has recently introduced a Unicode for Arabi-Malayalam that could help us recover more documents through computerisation. It gives us hope that rare publications in other dialects like Hebrew-Malayalam and Syriac-Malayalam will also get preserved eventually,” he concludes.

nahla.nainar@thehindu.co.in

“It’s written in the wind.” The saying holds significance to the Kolis. This ancient fishing community, endemic to Mumbai and its neighbouring coastal villages, calibrates the various characteristics of the sea breeze — its speed and direction to even its smell and salty taste — as harbingers. Crucial decisions are made based on it: when to head out into the Arabian sea in their colourful wooden boats; and when to return to shore, fishing nets laden with a bounty of lobsters, tiger prawns, squids, and, if lucky, iridescent silver pomfrets. The last one is the star of the Koli mejwani (feast).

With Kolis as their inspiration

You’ll find Kolis around Worli Fort. Historical conjecture has always shrouded the origins of this central Mumbai landmark overlooking Mahim Bay. It is often erroneously assumed to be a vestige of the island city’s Portuguese colonial past, but it was built around 1675 by the British. Today, the fort is flanked on either side by a sizeable hamlet made up mainly of fisherfolk.

Called Koliwada, it is also where one can find Slink & Bardot. The restobar sits cheek-by-jowl to every possible fishing accoutrement, from beached trawlers to yardages of nets. Inside, perfectly augmenting this seemingly incongruous, yet harmonious coexistence, is Koli Echoes, one of their signature cocktails. Made with sake, vodka and green botanicals, it is a refined riff on the Koli community’s penchant for a tipple of toddy.

Koli Echoes
| Photo Credit:
Assad Dadan

The cocktail shares bar top space with other neighbourhood-inspired libations such as Sunset at Slink, and Coast Guard’s Brew. The latter is a vodka-based, milk-washed coffee and ghee cocktail that’s named in honour of the nearby Coast Guard station and the bar team’s interactions with the hardworking men who are always drinking coffee to stay awake.

The cocktail menu serves as a corollary precursor to the restobar’s seven-course tasting menu. It features a seafood heavy procession of dishes, including a Barramundi Ceviche with Solkadhi. Executive chef AliAkbar Baldiwala shares that it is an ode to the Koli community’s fondness for the fish and the blushing pink solkadhi sauce with tart kokum.

Barramundi Ceviche with Solkadhi

“Nauvaris [nine yard saris], fish and colourful boats — we took inspiration from it all, but mostly from the Koli fish thali,” he adds. “There are courses inspired by traditional rawa-crusted fish fry, besides a curry [called an akha mhawra kalvan] where we use the whole fish, which is very intrinsic to Koli weddings.” The close proximity to Koliwada home kitchens helped the team infuse some authenticity into the dishes.

Chef AliAkbar Baldiwala

Breaking bread in Bandra

Just like Slink & Bardot, there’s a spurt in restaurants across Mumbai paying homage to everything from micro communities and local neighbourhoods to iconic street food. As one of Mumbai’s newest sandwich shops, Santa Maria in Ranwar is a tribute to the village (one of nine original Bandra villages). The menu also pays homage to local athletes and residents. For instance, the Markie’s Mortadella, a pesto-slathered focaccia bread sandwich with pistachio nut-studded pork mortadella, is named in honour of international para badminton player and local “Bandra boy’ Mark Dharmai.

Markie’s Mortadella

For more meat, there’s Ranwar Square, with a bounty of sliced salami, mortadella, pepperoni, and bacon — and a tribute to the many Christian family-run cold cut stores that dot the area. The meat is used as part of the stuffing for typically East Indian dishes such as whole roast suckling pig, a celebratory dish in local Catholic homes.

Another iconic food landmark here is Elco Pani Puri. Morphing over the years from a pavement-side kiosk to a multi level restaurant, this chaat shop now finds its famous samosa chaat and patti samosa a part of Taj Lands End hotel’s ‘The Bandra Trails’ high tea. Curated by chef Rohit Sangwan at Atrium, the afternoon tea service features a cornucopia of Bandra-centric street food, such as the flaky lamb mince-stuffed patties found at old Catholic bakeries such as Cafe Andora and J. Hearsch & Co. Sangwan says he visited a number of his “favourite eateries and bakeries in the locality to scope out ingredients and techniques”.

The Bandra Trail

Hat-tip to Baghdadi Jews

Bringing to the city plaited challah bread slathered in a butter flavoured with a Baghdadi Jewish-style saluna sauce is the Jazz & Sassoon pop-up menu at Smoke House Deli’s Colaba branch. Inspired by the bustling Jewish community-established Sassoon Docks, it features several homage dishes. “Each dish boasts the day’s catch, prepared to reflect Baghdadi and Jewish culinary traditions that have influenced Colaba’s historic palate,” says executive chef Rollin Lasrado.

Challah bread slathered in a butter flavoured with saluna sauce

He distilled this into his capsule menu by speaking with Jewish chefs both in and out of India, and sending his team to meet local Jewish people who still live in places like Kala Ghoda. “We were particularly intrigued by how they make the dough for traditional Jewish breads such as challah, which is only made for the Jewish New Year called Rosh Hashanah as it is a leavened bread. We adapted the recipe to make the loaf softer and more pliable to appeal to a larger diner base,” he says.

Chef Rollin Lasrado

The nearby Baghdadi restaurant, too, was a source of inspiration, especially for getting the saluna sauce right, he adds.

Dadar’s seafood market

Cirqa circles back to the Kolis. Housed in the repurposed Todi Mills — one of the many former working mills that once dotted Lower Parel — the menu features a number of seafood dishes. Each referencing, not just the Koli community, but also the nearby seafood market in Dadar. A warren of alleys that is transformed during the monsoon into a market selling dried fish.

B.F.F.

“At Cirqa, we love to play around with flavours and cooking styles drawn from the city’s various communities,” says owner Pankaj Gupta. “For B.F.F. [Bombay Fried Fish], we primarily use bombil, which can be found at the market.”

Pankaj Gupta

Interestingly, a non-seafood dish, Miya Bhai Bolognese is the perfect reflection of Mumbai’s syncretic spirit. Influenced by the Muslim community dominated neighbourhood of Bhendi Bazaar, this one sees spaghetti topped with a local touch of the unctuous mutton kheema sauce. The dish is served with nigella seed-speckled khamiri bread, which is a staple at scores of bakeries in and around the Bhendi Bazaar area.

Miya Bhai Bolognese

Imitation, they say, is the ultimate form of flattery and one that finds itself manifesting as inspiration for dishes and drinks that hope to recreate the magic of Mumbai’s past. One sip or bite at a time.

The Mumbai-based writer is passionate about food, travel and luxury, not necessarily in that order.

Nijas Thamarasserry and the students at Mawlangkhar Secondary School in Meghalaya taking a vow against drug use
| Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

When Binu Varghese and Nijas Thamarasserry, lawyers at the Kerala High Court, planned a road trip this year, they did not want it to be just another drive across the country. “We wanted it to mean something — for us and for society,” says 58-year-old Binu over a phone call from Meghalaya, where they are currently travelling.

They call their journey the ‘Bharath Darshan Yatra – Phase 2’. In the first leg last year, they drove to Ladakh and back in 24 days covering 9,145 kilometres. This time, their mission is fuelled by a growing concern: the rise of drug abuse, especially among school and college students.

“Since January, Kerala has seen a surge in drug-related cases — across news and social media. The crimes are horrifying. And during our travels, which began on March 2, we realised this is a pan-India issue. Teachers and guardians everywhere are worried,” Binu explains.

Binu Varghese and Nijas Thamarasserry on the road.
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Their road trip has doubled as an awareness campaign, where they conduct interactive sessions in schools, colleges and any public events they came across while on the road, highlighting the dangers of substance abuse. “We tell students that travel is an obsession worth having — something that brings real, enriching experiences. They don’t need to seek dangerous highs like drugs,” Binu says.

The duo speaks to students about how drugs can derail academics, relationships, and long-term goals. “We urge them to stay alert and report any known cases of drug use to their teachers,” adds Nijas.

As lawyers who often handle drug-related cases — mostly involving MDMA in Kerala — they have seen first-hand the damage it causes. “Turns out it’s not just a Kerala problem. It’s everywhere,” says Nijas.

Their campaign has received enthusiastic support from educational institutions. They approached some school directly and the others through local contacts. They received an enthusiastic response wherever they went. “At one school in West Bengal, we spoke to 100 students, and the administration immediately asked us to address another class,” Nijas shares.

Nijas at Ramathanga Government Higher Secondary School in Cooch Bihar, West Bengal
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Depending on the region, they have conducted sessions in Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi, and English, with translators provided where needed. Their route so far has taken them through Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, West Bengal, Assam, and Meghalaya. They plan to cover the rest of the Northeast — Nagaland, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura, and Mizoram — before heading to Sikkim, Nepal, and Bhutan.

In every state, they inform students and educators about the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), which has zonal offices across India, and share helpline numbers and the NCB pledge to encourage reporting. “Many don’t even know these resources exist,” Binu says.

Both Binu (from Thrissur) and Nijas (from Kozhikode) are classmates from Karnataka State Law University, Bengaluru. Binu, a teetotaller, even has a signboard outside his home that forbids alcohol, drugs, and weapons. “People laughed at me once, but look at where we are now,” he remarks.

They are travelling in Binu’s jeep, sleeping either in the vehicle or at petrol pumps, and plan to stay on the road for another month.

Asked why they chose to turn a potential holiday into a demanding campaign, they say: “It’s our social responsibility as lawyers. There’s nothing in it for us — but we believe in contributing meaningfully. If we don’t act now, drug abuse will become an epidemic.”

Growing up, Athira J was not a big fan of idlis. “If someone at home said we have idli for breakfast, my whole mood would be spoiled,” she says. However, now, Chaikaari, the eatery she runs with her cousin Arun Kumar BS, sells around 2.5 lakhs idlis a day, through its five outlets in the city. The brand serves varieties such as ghee podi (a lentil-based spice seasoning) idli, kariveppila (curry leaf) podi idli, butter podi idli, ellu (sesame) podi idli, cilantro podi idli and peri peri idli.

Athira J and Arun Kumar BS, founders of Chaikaari.
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Chaikaari is among the several eateries in the city that have rolled out a range of idli varieties. From Ramasseri idli, almost the size of a pancake with its origins in a village in Palakkad district, to different types of idlis, the steamed dish is available in interesting variants, thanks to outlets such as Suda Suda Idli, Modak Food and Podi Idlyum Kattanum, among others in the city.

Kariveppilapodi idli from Chaikaari
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

The idli, once labelled “the most boring thing in the world” by a British historian on X (previously Twitter) in 2020, sent ripples across the internet with Thiruvananthapuram Lok Sabha MP Shashi Tharoor backing the rice and lentil-based South Indian breakfast dish. The latter retorted on the platform saying, “Civilisation is hard to acquire: the taste & refinement to appreciate idlis, enjoy cricket, or watch ottamthullal (a dance and poetic performance) is not given to every mortal. Take pity on this poor man, for he may never know what Life can be.”

For actor Venkitesh VP a.k.a Venky, who co-owns Suda Suda Idli located near Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple, cooking and serving idlis have a deep family connection. His grandmother, Saraswathy Ammal, used to run an idli shop decades ago, earning her the title Idli Amma in the West Fort area. He considers it fate that now he is running an idli kiosk with his friends Sreeram Krishnaswami, Vignesh G, Arun Kumar B V and Vijay Kumar.

Owners of Suda Suda Idli: (from left) Vijay Kumar, Vignesh G, Venkitesh VP, Arun Kumar B, Sreeram Krishnaswami
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

The idea of starting the shop popped up during a discussion with his friends when he returned home to the city following a break from a Telugu movie. “Almost a month after that, we managed to bring our plan to fruition. I love idlis. It is my favourite after porotta and beef,” says Venky.

Soya idli being made at Suda Suda Idli
| Photo Credit:
NIRMAL HARINDRAN

The outlet serves five idli varieties, including soya idlis (soya chunks cooked in masala folded into the idli batter), flat, thick butter thatte idlis coated with two types of podi and mini podi idlis, fried in ghee, and doused in sambar and chutneys.

Butter thatte Idli from Suda Suda Ildi
| Photo Credit:
NIRMAL HARINDRAN

Owner of Modak Food, a Kazhakkoottam-based cloud kitchen, Arun Anirudhan, says, “I have always liked idli and found it to be a healthy choice for breakfast.” Formerly working in Bengaluru, he was set to become a foodpreneur, inspired by what he had tasted in Karnataka, ultimately including podi idli, butter idli, ghee idli and so on in his menu.

Arun Anirudhan who runs Modak Food
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Podi idli from Modak Food
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Kariveppila podi idli, ellu podi idli, heart-shaped idli, ragi idli etc are served by Modak, which began operations in May 2024. The idlis are available throughout the day on food delivery apps and are served with sambar, tomato chutney, coconut chutney and kesari at prices starting from ₹110.

A recent addition to Suda Suda Idli’s menu is dum idli, which Venky discovered on the sets of a Vijay Devarakonda movie. “It was eaten there, especially by assistant directors and is made by mixing idli, sambar and uzhunnuvada (urad dal fritter) inside a container called a dum. You can have it with ghee and podi. We serve only around eight portions of it every day,” says Venky.

He adds, “Earlier our menu had ghee thatte idli and rasam idli, which we thought weren’t working. We also served cheratta (coconut shell) idli, but had to stop it since the cooking time was longer. They are planning to include a paneer idli for weekends and a pizza idli, with toppings like cheese, tomatoes, capsicums, corn and so on. The prices start from ₹40.

It was two years ago that Praveen Venky and wife, Rukmini started a vegetarian food stall Podi Idlyum Kattanum, opposite the Bhajanappura Palace, East Fort, after years of serving food exclusively during the Sabarimala season (November to January). “We decided to open a permanent outlet after I gave up my job as a temple priest. By then we were sure about having a regular flow of customers,” says Praveen.

Praveen Venky and Rukmini
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

The outlet serves plain idli, sambar idli and Ramasseri idli with five options for seasoning such as curry leaf, mint, coriander, red chilli and black pepper, depending on the availability of ingredients. The idlis are all priced ₹50 and ₹60 and the plain idli costs ₹10 per piece, says Praveen.

“We are going to introduce muringayila (drumstick leaves) podi as a seasoning, which will be nutritious as well,” says Athira. Among the specials at Chaikaari is neer idli, which is mini idlis soaked in neer chutney (a Karnataka style chutney made with coconut and roasted gram).

Neer idli from Chaikaari
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARANGEMENT

The idlis at Chaikaari are served with coconut chutney, a green chutney made with mint, coriander and curry leaves, a coriander seed chutney, nellika (amla) rasam, sambar and kesari. The idlis are priced from ₹149 onwards.

Varieties such as kheema idli, fried idli, chilli idli, sodhi (Tirunelveli-style vegetable stew) idli and so on are also available in the city at eateries such as Namma Veedu Vasanta Bhavan, Ariya Nivas and so on.

With a plethora of these steamed goodness options at their disposal, some customers are finally giving idli a chance. Karthika JS, who works at a company in Technopark, says, “Normally, I am not fond of things which are steamed, and I don’t like having idlis at home. But now, when we go out, we go for the idli varieties and are willing to try more.”Athira says, “We also have a lot of North Indian customers who are not used to this food enjoying idlis now.”

In a world of reels and shorts, where edgy, dramatic recipes stand out, Julius Fiedler aka Hermann — a German who now calls the U.K. home — is an outlier. He makes a sincere attempt to pronounce the names of dishes correctly (the Tamil paniyaaram, for one) and cracks open a coconut expertly, much to the admiration of an audience far removed from where he lives.

Fiedler, a filmmaker-turned-food creator, who has 2.4 million followers on Instagram and 7.73 lakh subscribers on YouTube, has been popularising plant-based food for some years now. He speaks of the homes he has visited, makes idli/dosa batter from scratch (“the texture should be similar to coarse cornmeal, and when you pour it out, it should flow in thick ribbons”), and whips up a creamy hummus. When he cooks, everything seems simpler, like the calming art it ought to be.

Julius Fiedler’s first taste of idlis

In May, he’s scheduled to release Naturally Vegan: Delicious recipes from around the world that just happen to be plant-based, a cookbook detailing his food journeys. On a phone call from London, he speaks about his inspirations, and more importantly, his learnings. Edited excerpts:

What’s the genesis of your social media handle, Hermann?

It refers to a sourdough culture that’s used to make a [Freundschaftskuchen] friendship cake. In Germany, we have many sourdough starters named Hermann. They have to be kept alive, and [the natural surplus] of the vibrant mix of bacteria is passed along to a friend to start their own culture, bake and pass it on. You’re not only passing on food, you’re helping them make a whole from a part. You’re helping keep a tradition alive. This is what I aim to do with my videos too. Hence, Hermann.

My Hermann is about five years old now, resting in my refrigerator, and I still feed it.

Why is the origin story of every ingredient important to you?

This too began with sourdough. It has just three ingredients: flour, salt and water. If you don’t focus on good quality wheat, your sourdough will reflect that. I apply that philosophy to everything I cook. Knowing where an ingredient comes from helps forge a connect with that world.

You aim for authenticity with your videos.

I learn when I travel, cook dishes as authentically as I can in my London studio, and then post them. I see the comments and learn from the feedback from people to whom the recipe originally belongs. I would go out seeking authentic street food from communities far removed from modern quick-fast style cooking. I’d notice what ingredients went in, and the basic but solid methods they followed that resulted in incredible flavours. That, I think, connected with people.

How do you view food?

Food is cultural heritage. When I try to cook a dish authentically, I choose the best way to connect with a culture. There’s always a reason for a lengthy step, or an ingredient that I might not understand. But, it all eventually makes sense. For example, the health advantages you get from a fermented idli where lentils and carbs are broken down to an easily digestible form, you will not from an equally delicious rava idli that’s made near instantly.

Cooking a dish from another culture is like attending a masterclass of sorts. Some recipes date back centuries. When you start with the authentic way, you learn about why a particular aspect of a culture has survived.

Mumbai’s vada pav

While you cook plant-based food, you rarely diss other food choices.

My plant-based food journey began about two-and-a-half years ago, due to ethical reasons. When I switched my diet, I found that plant-based foods around me were modern, torn away from culture. They were manufactured in a factory, and placed on a shelf, without any history. I then heard of chickpea tofu made in Myanmar with chickpea flour, water and turmeric. It is pastier than regular tofu, can be sliced and fried, or shaved onto dishes. And this, in a culture where the majority does not follow a plant-based diet. It opened my eyes to the fact that plant-based food does not mean soy-based food.

Cultures have figured out ways. Italy and Greece have traditional dishes that are vegan. They use local knowledge passed down the ages, like consuming legumes with grains and vegetables. This is interesting for the palate, is nourishing, but is also texturally rich and enjoyable to consume. And, with plant-based food, one dish leads to 10 others.

Dal tadka

You’ve compiled these recipes in a book now.

The idea began with wanting to appreciate a dish and culture, but has evolved into an effort to tell you why these cultures are special. I visited Italy, Turkey and India [Bengaluru, Kochi, Alappuzha, Munnar, Goa and Mumbai] over the last couple of years and documented many recipes. Each visit has been such a smorgasbord of culture — food and fine arts.

Naturally Vegan book cover

In Italy, I’d stay in a trattoria and it was like being witness to another kind of life. There’s so much culinary history to cover, I feel I am scratching the surface. This is a global project, and I want to show people India’s diversity.

The Mangalore-based independent journalist writes on films, food and sustainability.

What is a VVIP? They are nothing but a humble person who, by erecting a high security cocoon, glides through life with minimal friction
| Photo Credit: iStock/Getty Images

It was reported the other day that a 66-year-old former vice chancellor was arrested for impersonating a VVIP. Being a VVIP myself, the news made me very sad. Should we be penalising people for pursuing the second biggest achievement open to Indians? I don’t need to spell out the biggest — escaping from India (and not getting deported). But for those stuck here, their best hope for a good life is to become a VVIP.

There is a rationale to this: if you can’t get out but still want to escape, being a VVIP is the only way to keep India at bay. What is a VVIP? They are nothing but a humble person who, by erecting a high security cocoon, glides through life with minimal friction, at a safe distance from the pullulating swarms of fellow Indians.

Being a VVIP also enables me to do public service, such as having my security guards loitering outside a barber shop, intimidating passers-by, while I get a free head massage with sesame oil. As a VVIP, I get to meet other VVIPs in luxury resorts and exchange views on issues of mutual interest, such as hawala, real estate, and vandalism. Above all, nothing can beat the sense of safety I feel on the streets of Delhi when I realise that the police won’t stop me if I break the speed limit, or break the red light, or someone’s leg or head. If my body guards and I accidentally bash up someone from the wrong community, the cops will take one look at the blue beacon on my car and automatically arrest the person we beat up.

Free-floating aristocrats

Contrary to popular myths, VVIPs are not an arrogant lot. Maybe at a superficial level, someone like me might seem unapproachable. But deep inside, I am a nice person. Deep inside my security cordon, to be precise, I think of myself as a nobody, just like you.

But I am a nobody who needs crowds to magically part for me wherever I go. I need traffic jams to melt when I travel by road. Whether it’s the bank, the airport, the toll booth or the temple, queues must auto-dissolve when I approach, and reconfigure themselves after I have passed. The word ‘queue’, nay, the letter ‘Q’ itself, is banned from my dictionary.

This column is a satirical take on life and society.

People often seek me out for tips on how to become a VVIP. It’s simple. You need two qualities: an unshakeable conviction that you are the exception for whom the rules shall be broken, and a profound lack of shame. If you are shameless enough, rest assured you’ll make a great VVIP one day.

Indian society is founded on a fixed hierarchy, aka the caste system. The higher rungs have always commanded an exclusive set of perks and privileges. VVIP culture is merely a modern iteration of this ancient set-up. If tomorrow all of India’s VVIPs were to disappear, millions wouldn’t know who to kowtow to, and who to lynch. VVIPs are a ritual class that performs the critical role of offering guidance to the primeval Indian reflexes of sycophancy and obedience. They are the free-floating aristocrats without whom Indian democracy would implode, and the justice system would flail about blindly, unable to distinguish those who’re above the law from those who aren’t.

India’s USP

Some say India should have a system of annually auctioning a fixed number of VVIP ‘tags’ to a select pool of cronies, just like we do with public assets and government contracts. But this is a bad idea because India’s billionaires are already accused — falsely, in my opinion — of owning India’s politicians. So having them gallivanting around with personal bodyguards paid for by the tax-payers not only makes for poor optics, it could even lead to accusations of ‘suit boot ki sarkar’, etc.

The greatest strength of India’s unique VVIP system is that a VVIP doesn’t need to contribute anything of value. All you need is alphabetic security of your choice: Y, Y+, Z, Z+, C, C+, along with a capacity to feel sadistic joy as thousands of commuters bake patiently in the sun for hours, waiting for your cavalcade to zip past.

Brazil produces dozens of soccer geniuses every year. China has an assembly line of Olympic class table tennis players. India’s USP is an unending pipeline of VVIPs. All those Soros-funded doomsayers who go on and on about India’s stagnating per capita income never give us the full picture: we have the world’s highest CAGR of VVIPs per capita. Why isn’t that something to celebrate?

The author of this satire is Social Affairs Editor, The Hindu.

sampath.g@thehindu.co.in

A Bhagath Singh’s mother, Kalavathi, would always eye the head of the biggest fish in Ennore’s Thazhankuppam market. “These fish would weigh up to five kilograms,” says the Puducherry-based independent researcher. Once she secured the head, she would go home and cook it whole in a fiery kulambu.

Bhagath’s memories of his late mother and her love for cooking seafood, forms the opening chapter of the recently-released bilingual book, Seasoned by the Sea (Neithal Kaimanam), published by Uyir Publications. The book, a compilation of recipes from across the Coromandel coast, has photos by independent photographer M Palanikumar. It is the result of a series of interviews and research by Bhagath and geographer R Niranjana between 2021 and 2023.

Once at home, the women were at ease, talking about their everyday lives and family as they chopped onions and sliced fish. 
| Photo Credit:
M Palanikumar

Bhagath and Niranjana have curated 43 recipes with a focus on Ennore and Pazhaverkadu (Pulicat), apart from Kasimedu, Besant Nagar, Pattinapakkam, and Puducherry. Bhagath, a native of Ennore, is a post-doctoral researcher with the French Institute of Pondicherry while Niranjana teaches Geography at Queen Mary University of London. Niranjana, a former journalist, was in Ennore in 2021 for a research project. During her many interactions with fisherwomen and fish sellers at the Thazhankuppam market, she realised how readily they shared recipes.

“At one point, I thought, why not put these together as a book,” she says.

The photos not only capture the vibrancy and variety of the food, but also the warmth of the women behind them.
| Photo Credit:
M Palanikumar

Along with Bhagath, she set out to convince these women to demonstrate their recipes. It is not easy to get a fisherwoman to indulge in a leisurely conversation when she is at work, let alone get her to take one to her kitchen from the market. “She is either busy or exhausted,” says Bhagath. Niranjana though, kept at it, despite their unpredictable schedules.

Once at home, the women were at ease, talking about their everyday lives and family as they chopped onions and sliced fish. It is these stories that form the backbone of the book. Interestingly, the chapters are named after the women who shared the recipes: Madhavi from Kattukuppam, Lakshmi and Saroja from Annai Sivagami Nagar, Uma from Odaimanagar… Palanikumar’s photos not only capture the vibrancy and variety of the food, but also the warmth of the women behind them.

Bhagath and Niranjana have curated 43 recipes with a focus on Ennore and Pazhaverkadu
| Photo Credit:
M Palanikumar

Through the recipes, the authors help readers get a glimpse into the culture and ecology of the Coromandel coast. Mekala, for instance, while she shares madavai recipes, talks about how her husband Desingu would catch fish using a small purse net in the river; Sangeetha shares stories about her life after she married a fisherman from Ennore, even as she shares her kavalan meen kulambu recipe; Saanthi and Sokkammal from Thoniravu village, resettled from Sriharikota, talk about working and living through the struggle of being displaced, as they prepare prawn urundai kulambu.

The book has been designed by Anthoni Guruz, who has also contributed line drawings.
| Photo Credit:
Special arrangement

Bhagath says that they have focussed on sea food varieties that are prominent to each region. “We have over 10 crab recipes from Ennore and Pazhaverkadu alone,” says the 40-year-old, adding: “There is puttu, kulambu, biryani, and rasam.” The book documents several unique, region-specific dishes; these include prawn suttadhu, parai kudal kulambu, prawn kulambu with shell on, prawn vaada, conch pepper fry, and thirukkai pakoda.

The book documents several unique, region-specific dishes
| Photo Credit:
Special arrangement

Bhagath points out that they have also turned the spotlight on the politics surrounding the industrialisation of Ennore. “Ennore’s identity has been reduced to its pollution, and the resulting stigmatisation. We wanted to show how the people have adapted; their culture and politics too,” he says. Niranjana adds that their book is an attempt at showing that life in Ennore can also be “vibrant and joyful” despite the pollution and degradation over the years.  

The book illustrates how fisherfolk from the Coromandel coast, all the way up to Nagapattinam, use plenty of tamarind and chilli powder in their cooking
| Photo Credit:
M Palanikumar

For a lot of people in the city, seafood is restricted to sankara (red snapper), vanjiram (seer), and vaaval (pomfret). “But there is so much variety that is not known. We wanted to introduce them,” says Bhagath adding that this will also help in ecological conservation.

The book illustrates how fisherfolk from the Coromandel coast, all the way up to Nagapattinam, use plenty of tamarind and chilli powder in their cooking. “These two are the main ingredients,” points out Bhagath. “Coconut is not used much, perhaps due to less availability,” he adds. “Raw mango is added to the kulambu to enhance the sourness of the tamarind, depending on the type of fish: mathi and nethili, for instance.”

A Bhagath Singh and R Niranjana with their book
| Photo Credit:
M Palanikumar

The response from the fisherwomen, evident during their two events in Ennore and Pazhaverkadu after the launch, was heart-warming. “When they saw the book, they felt happy that something they’ve been doing for a living is now being seen as art,” says Bhagath. “They felt that not many people respect their profession, let alone them. The book changed these perspectives.”

Seasoned by the Sea is available at neidhal.net