He is a grandfather and yet Neville Wadia’s passion for cricket at the age of 63 is never-ending. He has been playing cricket for over 40

years now. Some six months ago, he achieved something special.

Wadia scored 105 in just 60 balls slamming three sixes and 15 fours in a 20-Twenty match in Vadodara at the old age of 63 years and 305 days. No Parsi player has represented the Indian cricket team after Farookh Engineer. Now, he cannot but still Wadia’s effort is good enough to make the cricket fans in the country proud of his achievement. His feat has been recognized by Guinness World Records. He has become the oldest player in the world to slam a century in the 20-Twenty cricket.

A retired bank employee and native of Umargam in Valsad district, Wadia runs a school on Waghodia Road in the city. He plays cricket almost every day with the players half his age. His hits always amazes others like in the 20-Twenty match where his huge sixes crossed the 70 yards boundary.

Talking to TOI, he said, "I have never played Ranji-level cricket but have played Kanga League and Times Shield in Mumbai regularly." Father of a budding actor Delzan Wadia, Wadia senior, born on May 27, 1945, added, "I was not thinking of any records while batting against Vrajdham Vadil Pariwar team at Sitabaug Ground on 28 March 2009. Wadia, an opening batsman, hit 44 scoring shots of 60 balls he faced."

"But, we realized this knock could be the world record and so after much deliberation we sent the entry to Guinness World Records," said Wadia.

The Guinness World Records Ltd on their part checked all the details and verified them before issuing him the certificate of record holder on November 11, 2009

Original article in TOI

DESI DIALOGUES: Turning vegetarian leaves a pleasant taste on the palate

The past 15 days have been one of my most testing times. That’s because I decided to turn completely vegetarian. The reason – my Ayurvedic doctor suggested that the herbal medicine he gave me for my knee joints could work more effectively if I gave up non-vegetarian fare.

I know a large majority of South Asians are vegetarian and I have many friends who swear by it, but I am not one of them – not by a long shot.

Not that I dislike vegetarian food. Having lived in an all-Hindu tenant building in India I’ve grown up with my share of non-meat alternatives.

But to turn vegetarian here is no easy feat since my family does not favour green food.

The no veggie concept, right or wrong, also stems from my background.

My family is Zoroastrian (also called Parsis in India).

This community is notoriously famous for being extremely partial to meat. For instance, other communities in India will love to be a guest at a Parsi wedding. I’m told it’s due to the gastronomical meat delights served with much fanfare and gusto.

At the weddings there are several chicken, goat, liver and meat dishes. Even the rice is topped with spicy lamb meat.

In fact, the obsession with non-vegetarian food is so strong that many Parsis will even top vegetable dishes with meat. For instance okra has meat in it, cauliflower can have meat in it and if meat isn’t available, then we would throw in some eggs.

Now that you have a picture of my household, you can imagine how my parents reacted to what they call this sudden "green revolution". Despite not-so-supportive remarks from my husband, I decided to stick to my new meal plan.

The change has been refreshing to say the least. With so many tasty South Asian dishes that can be cooked sans meat, I have not had to worry about what to cook?

In fact I think that because of the high percentage of Hindus, Indian food is perhaps the only cuisine in the world that has so many vegetarian options.

As well, the fact that South Asian vegetarians make use of several lentils and tropical vegetables and prop them up with spicy masalas and condiments only brings zest to this cuisine. That can be borne out by hundreds of vegetarian restaurants in India, that now even adapt to other cuisines such as Chinese, Mexican and Korean to make their own concoctions of veggie fare.

But the biggest myth I seem to have broken, is that I can survive Canada’s cold weather – even if that means staying on vegetables. My concerned neighbours and friends were apprehensive initially and told me that with Canada’s chilly weather, the intake of meats providing high protein and iron content is mandatory, and that veggies and lentils alone may not suffice.

But I feel good after a fortnight, and most importantly have lost a ton of weight, which makes me feel 10-times better.

The only question for me now is: how long will the honeymoon last? As I continue to make non-vegetarian fare for my family and the party season sneaks up on us will I want to dig into those lovely pork and chicken dishes laid out at parties?

Or, will I call for another batch of herbal Ayurvedic medicine once the current batch runs out in the next two months to keep me on track?

Sitting next to the grandson of a late great English writer, himself a writer, at a dinner party in Exmoor, I am asked if I am a practising Zoroastrian. I say ‘not quite’ and am asked about its ethics and metaphysics.

"Simple," I reply, "Monotheism. The single God, Ahura Mazda in combat with Ahriman, the Lie. And three simple tenets: ‘Humata, Hukta, Huvareshta’ good thoughts, good words, good deeds, sometimes translated by the venal as good eggs, good fish, good meat!"

He is impressed. He tells me that he was even more impressed with the musical works of a Parsi composer called Kaikushru Sorabji who wrote an interminable piece for piano which was performed but once by a friend of his, the famous pianist John Ogdon. Sorabji had arrived in England as a convert to Christianity but reverted to Zoroastrianism later.

Other party guests now joined in and someone inevitably mentioned Zubin Mehta and then Freddie Mercury whose interpretation of our three tenets was probably somewhat different. Three Musical Parsis. (The title of my next opera!)

Grandson noted that Parsis were a tiny and dwindling minority in India but had
influenced it in a disproportionate way.

"Like the Jews,"

"No, unlike the Jews," said Grandson. "Parsis exude no sense of victimisation."
"Quite right," I say, "We eat what we like and so don’t feel sorry for ourselves. Pork, beef, no taboos. There was the news recently of a Parsi wedding serving vegetarian food. Which is like a Wordsworth poem with every reference to flora removed."

Now the dinner guests in remote Exmoor, like those at thefeast attended by the Ancient Mariner, had never been to a Parsi wedding. They did not know of what I spoke and if I had said Bheeda Pareeda or Patra-ni-Machhi they may have thought I was announcing the names of famous Parsi sopranos.

I was then pressed for a brief history of Parsis and I rehearsed the glories of the Achaemenid Empire, overrun eventually by the Macedonian bandit, Alexander the Damned. I progressed to the Sassanians who were in the 7th century AD overthrown by Arab-Muslim occupation, which caused our ancestors to flee as refugees to India.

"I’d like to convert to Zorastrianism," says Grandson.

"Feel free," I say, "But we Parsis won’t accept you as one of us. You have to be born of a Parsi father to claim that distinction."

"So no converts?"

"No. That’s why we are an endangered species. The silence will soon descend."
A bit melodramatic, but it had its effect. A silence descended as the gooseberry tart was being served.

"So you seem… er..content to die out?"

"Of course not," I reply. "We have stuck to racial purity in the interests of keeping the relative wealth of the Parsi community within itself. The only concession we have made through the ages is allowing the progeny of Parsi fathers who have made children with non-Parsi servant girls to join the fold.

"Now this is unfortunate as, for instance, my sister’s children, very beautiful human beings, can’t be included as their father was Hindu — not that it seems to bother them: they view Parsis and our ways with an amused tolerance. The in-breeding has diluted the gene-pool and we are sort of funny. And even if we resemble them we shouldn’t go the way of the Dodo!"

"So what’s to be done?"

"Well, we have vast pockets of invested wealth. The lands in Mumbai which contains the towers from which dead bodies are disposed by feeding them to the vultures, are a very expensive chunk of real estate. The vultures are dying out as they absorb Diclofenac through eating cattle carcasses. It’s a medicine for cattle but lethal to thebirds and has killed 95 per cent of Indian vultures. We should dispose of the dead differently — after all the Zoroastrian Kings, Cyrus and Darius, are buried in tombs. The plan is we sell off the land and hold the proceeds in a Parsi Survival Fund.

Then use the fund to import a quarter of a million volunteer women of child-bearing age from countries such as Russia, Romania and places from which adventurous or desperate women volunteer for questionable service in the Gulf and even come to India to join Bollywood dancing choruses and work in the sex trade. These young ladies would be given the status and lifestyle of memsahibs and be required to, with forms of easy social introduction, provide the next generation of Parsis. As Parsi Baby-mothers they would be pampered and pensioned as saviours of the race.

"I think I approve," says the late great writer’s Grandson. Sorabovsky, Mehtanov or Mercurevich, anyone?

The writer is a London based scriptwriter

Still brewing in a dry land: Pakistan’s only beer and whisky firm After 150 years, business is booming at Pakistan’s only beer and whisky firm. Andrew Buncombe finds out why

On the walls of the historic Murree brewery, Pakistan’s sole producer of beer, hangs a slogan that its owners would wish upon the entire country. "Eat, drink and be Murree," puns the poster, seemingly produced in the 1970s.

Understandably, making beer and whiskey in a Muslim country, where 97 per cent of the population is officially banned from enjoying your products, has never been an easy business. Non-Muslims are exempt from the ban, but even for them obtaining a drink can be complicated: some five-star hotels require foreigners to affirm in writing that they are non-Muslims and will be responsible for anything that happens when they are under the influence before they can order a drink.

And amid the upsurge of militant violence of the last two years that has seen the Taliban attacking targets across the country, setting fire to girls’ schools and even banning the sale of videos and DVDs, common sense might suggest that the fortunes of this establishment, which celebrates its 150th anniversary next year, might be on the wane. Yet the opposite is happening: sales are booming – embarrassingly so.

"Sales are good," said Isphanyar Bhandara, the brewery’s 36-year-old chief executive, "but we don’t want to shout about it because that also brings negative publicity and criticism, because this is a Muslim country – and yet sales are growing."

Pervaded by a rich smell of fermenting yeast and equipped with Victorian maturing cellars, the brewery is located in the heart of the military cantonment area of Rawalpindi, the garrison city where 30 people died in a suicide bomb attack earlier this week. The scenes within the thick stone walls are reminiscent of a British brewery of the remote past. Located opposite the residence of the Chief of the Army Staff, the brewery says it has never received a direct threat from the militants.

Metaphorically speaking , the Murree brewery sits on one of the major fault lines of Pakistan’s often contradictory society. While Muslims have been banned from buying or drinking alcohol since 1977, few private social gatherings among the country’s political or business élite take place without the lubrication of liquor. A well-established network of bootleggers dealing in both locally produced and smuggled alcohol ensures that, while bars do not exist except for a couple of gloomy premises in five-star hotels, a drink in a private home is never far away.

For an institution such as the brewery, this two-faced attitude towards alcohol has meant several things. Firstly, while Christians, Hindus, Zoroastrians and other non-Muslims officially constitute its customers, there is a private acknowledgement that the overwhelming majority of drinkers are Muslims who work their way through the easily exploited permit system. Non-Muslims and foreigners can acquire an official permit that allows them to buy 30 bottles of beer or a quart of spirits every month. Reports suggest that such permits are easy both to copy and to obtain fraudulently.

At the same time, the brewery and distillery have to operate within a set of cramping rules. They are not allowed to advertise their products, for instance, and they have yet to be given permission to export them. The Islamic Ideology Council of Pakistan, which advises the government on policy issues, has made clear that it believes the export of alcohol abroad would damage the country’s international image. The council’s secretary Riaz-ur-Rehman confirmed: "We cannot allow anyone in the country to be engaged in the trade or production of alcohol."

Meanwhile, the company, which earlier this year produced the Muslim world’s first 20-year-old malt, provides the state and federal authorities with around $1m (£604,000) a month in taxes and duty.

"Absurd as it sounds, it’s true," said Mr Bhandara, who is a member of Pakistan’s tiny population of Zoroastrians or Parsis and is also, ironically, a teetotaller, even though he is permitted to drink because of his religion. "It’s totally hypocritical. I’m talking to the government at the moment about permission to export our beer to Britain [where it would be marketed with the catchphrase 'Have a Murree with your curry'], as many Asians in Britain are familiar with our products. Carlsberg were going to brew and sell it in the UK but then they said the beer market was shrinking. I am saying to them we have a 20 per cent increase in beer sales year-on-year in a Muslim country."

The Murree Brewery, shares of which are publicly traded on the Pakistan stock exchange in Karachi, was initially established in 1860 among the woods and cooling breezes of the Murree Hills, 20 miles north of Islamabad, where the elevation of 6,000ft was perfect for producing light beer for British colonial troops. Growing demand for its award-winning products saw the company establish additional breweries in Quetta in 1886 and in Rawalpindi in 1889, the site of the current operation.

On a recent morning, bright with early winter sunshine, Jamshed Iqbal, the company’s enthusiastic quality control manager, led The Independent on a tour of the facilities. "Making liquor is easy, but brewing beer is an art," he said, describing the challenges of temperature control in a region where the summer mercury can top 45C.

Part of his duties include checking the taste of the finished products to ensure consistency. He said he believed the company’s "classic" lager had the best taste. But as a Muslim, was he allowed to taste it? "Just a mouthful," he replied.

By Manoj R Nair / Mumbai Mirror

In fact, a member of the BNHS – which was initially involved in the breeding programme – has asked the State Forest Department not to grant permission for the project.

The BNHS had first decided to disassociate from the project in June 2007, but following recent reports that the BPP will be going ahead with it, the organisation has clarified that it wants to have no part in it.

An issue that regularly stirs up debate among Parsi-Zoroastrians is the partial breakdown of Dokhmenashini – a funeral system that relies on the sun and carrion birds to dispose of dead bodies. Though there are unverified reports of vulture sightings around the towers, the last time the birds were found in significant numbers there was more than a decade ago.

At a recent community meeting, BPP chairman Khojestee Mistree announced plans to set up an aviary in an attempt to reintroduce the birds at the towers.

“We will source them from a breeding centre and stock them in an aviary built in one of the towers,” said Mistree, adding that they were not planning to breed birds there.

“After saying in their report that the project was workable, BNHS backed out under pressure from members of our community who do not want the Dokhmenashini system to continue. We are nevertheless working towards the project,” Mistree added. The BPP plans to get between 60 and 75 birds for the towers.

BPP faces stiff opposition to breeding programme

The nation-wide decline of vultures has been linked to diclofenac – a drug used in a variety of medicines including painkillers – that causes kidney failure in birds.

“After speaking to scientists, we realised that we cannot go ahead with captive breeding because humans take diclofenac in various forms. Birds bred at the towers would die after feeding on bodies there,” said BNHS member Rishad Naoroji, a former member of the organisation’s executive committee.

Naoroji, who has suggested that the community look for alternate methods to bolster the traditional funeral method, is one of many naturalists to fiercely oppose the project.

“There is no way they are going to get permission from any State Government to breed or stock the birds. As it is, there are few of them left. We cannot take risks with the endangered bird,” he said.

Naoroji, who has written a book on raptors, has asked the BPP not to go ahead with project. He has even written to the state Forest Department to refuse permission to the BPP for captive breeding.

BNHS director Asad Rahmani has told BPP that unless the community stops using the drug, birds kept at the towers will die. “We withdrew because the BPP could not fulfil the conditions that we had set, including stopping the use of diclofenac by the community.

We are surprised that the BPP trustees have been quoted in recent newspaper reports that we are still involved. We do not want to be involved in the issue. Let them solve their problem,” said Rahmani.

The rough football ground of Dadar Parsi Gymkhana is cultivating rare laurels. Two middle-aged neighbours have won India a gold and a

silver medal at the prestigious World Masters Games held in Sydney mid-October. Fareez Vasania, a 45-year-old industrial photographer, and 49-year-old lawyer Rohinton Mehta, who defends tobacco major ITC in court, are untouchable in their events although the spotlight is yet to turn on them in a nation obsessed with cricket.

The WMG championship held every four years invites individual athletes above the age of 35 to participate. This year the Games were held from October 10-18 at the very Mondo track which was used for the Sydney Olympics 2000. Of 28,000 competitors representing 85 countries, three were Parsis from India and two of them won. Backed by nothing but self-will, with no government or corporate support to lead the way, they brought victory to India.

Vasania, whose mother Zarine was among the first female car racers in the country and father a boxer, won the silver at the triple jump event for men over 45 by clocking a distance of 11.77 m. Showing a photograph of himself at the victory stand, he laughs and says he "spoiled the party” for the Australians who came in first and third by taking the middle position.

The self-trained athlete builds his stamina by coaching the boys of Parsi gym at football. In the run-up to a major sporting event, though, Vasania goes over to the Army Sports Institute in Pune to fine-tune his skill and timing.

Meanwhile, dwelling on his exclusivity as a 400 m hurdle champion, Rohinton Mehta proudly shows the gold medal he won in the 45-plus category for a timing of 64.44 seconds. Mehra has compiled a portfolio of documents which contain every little fact and statistic on the Games as well as his own track record, along with pictorial evidence burned on a CD. "The World Masters championship is the equivalent of the Senior Olympics so none but the best qualify. We are untouchable in our events,” he declares, citing instances of having beaten sprightly 20-year-olds in city meets that are open to all age groups.

For both of them, the victory is significant given that they beat countries like Australia, Poland and the US whose athletes are naturally well-built, where training facilities are available and support plentiful. "I, on the other hand, paid for everything. In fact, each of us spent over Rs one lakh from our own reserves on travel, accommodation and the entry fee to the championship,” says Vasania.

Unsung and unhonoured in a country with eyes glazed by cricket, the duo is hardly signing autographs, granting marathon interviews or shooting commercials.

Original article here.

In a reprieve for Bombay Parsi Punchayat chairman Dinshaw Mehta, the charity commissioner’s office recently dismissed a complaint seeking

his removal for alleged irregularities and nepotism in allotment of flats. Joint charity commissioner N V Deshmukh ruled that there was no evidence to take action against Mehta.

"The application falls short of showing any act individually done by Mehta, which could be termed either as neglect in duty or malfeasance or misfeasance or breach of trust of misappropriation or improper dealing with the trust property,” said Deshmukh, adding, "There is no material to frame charges.

Mehta said the complaints were baseless. "Justice has been done and we are vindicated,” said Mehta. "This was an unnecessary controversy where policy differences between the then trustees were used to make allegations.”

The 350-year-old Punchayat is the apex body for the 45,000 strong Parsi-Irani Zoroastrian community in the city. One of the oldest trusts, it is also one of the richest and biggest landlords in Mumbai. The trust owns several acres of land and buildings in prime localities in the city, including the sprawling Towers of Silence property at Malabar Hill. According to the charity commissioner, the properties of the trust are currently valued at Rs 1,000 crore.

Mehta’s troubles started in 2006, when some members of the community lodged a complaint against him and sought his removal as trustee. They levelled three major allegations against Mehta. The first related to a purchase of a property in Andheri, which they claimed caused a loss of Rs 3 crore to the trust. Secondly, they alleged that he entered into an "illegal” agreement with a private builder to develop a trust property. And, the last concerned the allotment of the trust’s flats to relatives of one of Mehta’s friends.

The charity commissioner said there was no evidence submitted to back the claim of causing loss to the trust. With regard to the second allegation, too, the commissioner held that the agreement with the builder was not acted upon and the property was still with the trust. The allegations about allotment of flats also met a similar fate, with the joint charity commissioner ruling that there was no evidence, except for the resignation letters of fellow trustees, which were subsequently withdrawn.

"Mere fact that the persons who received the benefits were near relatives of Mehta’s friend cannot be a ground to frame a charge against him,” said the commissioner, pointing out that the allotments were made jointly by the trust and not Mehta alone.

Original article here.

The Parsis have a love affair with eggs. You have the Parsi pora or omelette and, of course, the various versions of whipped eggs covering myriad vegetables such as tarkari per eda and sali per eda (sali: shoe string chips), of which The Ripon Club (a club restricted to Parsis) in Mumbai’s Fort area does a particularly greasy, though sinfully delectable, version.

There is even eda per eda, egg on egg which is a bit of a joke. This is something perhaps which the Parsis derive from their Persian roots. Persian cuisine offers much in terms of egg preparation, particularly the kuku, an interesting variety of omelette similar to the Italian frittata and the Arab eggah.

Akuri holds a special place in this pantheon of egg-based preparations. In fact, the daddy of them all, the Bharuchi akuri uses an obscene amount of cream, dry fruits, fried onions and dollops of ginger and garlic and is occasionally served at Parsi wedding bhonu. Such is the esteem akuri is held in.

The principle using vegetables in scrambled eggs is not uncommon.In China the Cantonese do these extraordinary stir fried eggs, soft almost set, a rather ingenious halfway house between scrambled eggs and an omelette, a common addition are spring onions and chives. The Spanish have their oye rancheros, which is almost the same as akuri without the chilies and coriander.

Even English scrambled eggs can be inventive; there is a marvellous recipe by Jane Grigson using asparagus spears in scrambled eggs, although there is a tendency to use good cheeses like Emmanthal or Gruyere. You have the magnificent Basque preparation,piperade — capsicum, onion, tomato in scrambled eggs, the distinctive feature being the attractive contribution of the red and green capsicums to add a whiff of Mediterranean colour and magic. What piperade lacks though is spice and that is where akuri scores.

I recently got the opportunity to discuss akuri with a delightful Parsi lady, Nilofer Ichapuria King (now based in the US), who has written an uncommonly good cook book, My Bombay Kitchen (University of California Press 2007), receiving accolades from the legendary Alice Waters of Chez Panisse, no less, who has even written the foreword to it.

All akuri recipes I have come across including Katy Dalal’s (Jamva Chalo) have the usual suspects in the ingredients including tomato. Nilofer consciously excludes this, she believes that it adds a wateriness which is unnecessary and spoils the flavour and texture of akuri.

A Parsi connoisseur uses tomato paste which he claims eliminates the wateriness. Having done a little research into akuri recipes, I note with some satisfaction that Niloufer is supported by none other than the akuri recipe in the Time and Talents Recipe Book(the bible for all authentic Parsi cuisine, given the eminence of some of the contributors), a recipe by Gool Shavaksha.

The recipe uses 6 eggs, 1 onion which is crisply fried, seasoning, 1/4 cup milk, 2 teaspoons of ghee, 5 green chillies and a small bunch of coriander.Simplicity at its best.

Original article by Javed Gaya for DNA

Men in PLO T-shirts march through noisy, chaotic streets; their leader, all in white, stands before the wrought iron gate of a Zoroastrian fire temple urging followers to pledge purity and denounce outsiders.

Welcome to the fictitious world of the Parsi Liberation Organisation led by a buffoon character in a zany movie that looks at India’s Parsis — both their excesses and endearments — as a minuscule minority of some 70,000 in a country of more than one billion people.

Veteran screenwriter-turned-director Sooni Taraporevala has put the spotlight on the Parsis, an ethnic-religious group whose name derives from their Persian origins, in a film and in a book of photography because, for starters, she’s one of them.

"When you’re a Parsi you’re just used to nobody knowing who you are — and always having to explain yourself," she said before a screening of her film at the Quai Branly museum in Paris, where her Parsi photographs also are part of an international exhibition.

"I think I got tired of that and I just wanted people to know who Parsis were," added Taraporevala, whose screen writing credits include such hits as "Mississippi Masala", "The Namesake" and "Salaam Bombay!"

The Parsis arrived in India more than a 1,000 years ago, fleeing the Arab invasion of Persia to preserve their religion, Zoroastrianism. Today Taraporevala says they still seem to be living at once in many centuries, "from our religious rituals which are so many thousands of years old to being so modern and at the same time being so conservative and exclusive."

This "amalgam of contradictions" in the Parsi community is what she tackles in her comedy "Little Zizou", narrated by a Parsi boy in contemporary Mumbai, who is mad about soccer and French football star Zinedine "Zizou" Zidane.

The boy is also the younger son of a Parsi fundamentalist leader who is pitted against his arch rival, a reformist newspaper editor.

"In my film there are two warring families, one is a fundamentalist lunatic and one is a reforming journalist, a very particular subject but it also can be seen universally. That’s the battle being fought in the world today; in every religion you find the same thing," says Taraporevala.

But rather than take a heavy-handed approach to extremism, she said she chose to treat the Parsi ultra-conservatives in an exaggerated, mocking way in a light-hearted comedy.

India’s Parsis, mainly living in Mumbai, have been known down the centuries for maintaining their ethnic identity, marrying among themselves, and keeping to their ancient religion based on the teachings of one of the oldest monotheistic prophets, Zarathustra.

Even as their numbers dwindle, some Parsis still insist on exclusivity, making outcasts of those who take a non-Parsi spouse.

These "ridiculous policies" in Taraporevala’s view include religious membership, "that if a Parsi woman marries a non-Parsi their kids cannot be Zoroastrians," but she adds that other movements are now forming to make the religion more inclusive.

"Fundamentalist Parsis want to make laws that nobody can be Zoroastrian, but I think Zarathustra was a universal prophet, I don’t think we can lay such exclusive claims to him."

Taraporevala, 52, grew up surrounded by Parsis in Bombay — as she still calls her hometown — where Parsi families from the shipbuilding Wadias to the giant industrialist Tatas have helped grow India’s economic capital, right back from British colonial times.

And many a Parsi home, like those in her film, have on the wall a photograph of a favourite son — world-renowned symphony conductor Zubin Mehta.

Parsis with other musical tastes can point to Freddie Mercury of Queen.

After studying film at Harvard and New York University and spending 20 years adapting other people’s work for the screen, she said she sat down and wrote "Little Zizou" in 10 days, her first spec script and her directorial debut.

"I think that when you make your first film sometimes you choose a subject that is very personal and close to you," she said of the movie, which has won awards at Indian film fests in Los Angeles and New York and the Asian-Pacific First Film festival in Singapore.

The film was also well-received by the Parsis back home, she says, adding that "those Parsis who didn’t like it, just didn’t say anything."

Her happy-ending comedy lets the forces of tolerance and tender-heartedness win the day in the Parsi community, although the fundamentalist charlatan goes on to prosper with new followers on a cruise ship gig.

The film production does not stray far from the fold — most of the cast are Parsis and the leading child roles are played by brother and sister Jahan and Iyanah Bativala, who are literally family.

"They’re my kids," Taraporevala says with a big grin and laughs. "But I promised my husband (a Parsi dentist) only one film until they grow up."

IDEAL RESTAURANT ….a gastronomic heaven (Still there in 2009,But shifted about 100 mtrs away and inside from main road.)

(The IRANI Restaurant… quintessentially Zarathushti Restaurant of old.)

It was an old building standing guard –resolute and proud – on Hornby Road, a street that was and still is the main artery of Bombay. It used to have a typically Victorian façade, elaborately decorated in stone and brick, an edifice that was not only a symbol of times gone by, but a fine Irani Restaurant I first set foot in, before fire reduced it to a shell. They called it the IDEAL RESTAURANT Building thought it had another name.

It stood at the corner of Hornby Road and Ghoga St, next to the DadySeth Agiary, at Flora Fountain. Just a hundred yards down the road lived my uncle Ardershir Sorabji, on the top floor of the Kalfati Mansion and this is where we spent most of our vacations during the 1930 /40’s.

Often after visiting the Agiary, the aroma of the freshly baked wine cakes, cheese cakes, chicken patties lured us into the restaurant with our parents in tow. For these little perpetually hungry Parsis coming from North India, the Irani restaurant with its Faloodah, Ice cream, Irani Daram-No-Juice, Fresh Khari Biscuits, Batashas, mouth drooling chicken or mutton puffs, Kheema-na-pattice, wine “cake”, warm cheese “Cakes” with a crispy cheese crust, luggan –nu-custard, Bun/Muska, etc., was like being in a gastronomic heaven.

What I found peculiarly interesting if not amusing was that the waiters and the staff were all Iranis or Bawas very much like us, dressed in traditional black velvet “bhunva-nitopees", white Bundis (jackets), long white shirts on top of wide flowing white “lay-gas” (pajamas) with the long ends of their Kustis trailing behind. Only the Manager or the boss man, the man at the counter near the entrance /exit, to whom you paid your bill, was dressed in a coat type “Duglo” and wore thick horned rimmed spectacles . And when waiter came to take your order they spoke grammatically incorrect Gujarati. We had a tough time trying to choke our laughter.

Another peculiarity I noticed was that at the end of the meal no bill or cash-memo was presented. But no sooner you got up to go, from the corner of the huge sprawling hall, some one would shout in a sing song voice, giving details of what you ordered and the total amount you had to pay. We never could figure out how they did it. It is said no one ever escaped the shouter’s watchful eye or got off without paying. If one happened to walk into the restaurant and walk out without buying or eating, all could hear the loud sing-song chorus as the person passed by the cashier’s counter, “ this one did not eat or drink”.

Another thing we found amusing was, we kids were addressed as, “BOO-CHAAS” & “DICK-RAAS”! No body referred to us or called us so in the Delhi restaurants. This may interest some of the readers who in Jan 2007 paid RTI, Rs.15 for a mutton Puff or a pastry, or cutlets, or Rs 35 for packet of wafers or Khari biscuits, In the 1940’s at the Ideal Restaurant we paid:

Large glass of Faloodah with ice cream or Pomegranate Juice Annas 2= (Rs 0.125)

A large portion of Custard or ‘Kheema na pattice’ Annas 2.5 = (Rs 0.16)

A full breakfast with 2 eggs, bun, muska & tea, also cost the same.

Cheese Cake as big as a standard muffin was 5 Paisa or Annas 1.25 = (< Rs 0.08)

Pastry same size as today, chicken/muttom/vege puffs, packets of 8 khari butter biscuits, Nan khatais, packet of batasas or wine cakes, were just Anna One each; that was the price also for a large 5 inch fresh bun with a liberal helping of muska (butter) with a hot cup of tea.

Many a times as we were leaving after a spicy meal, the good natured man sporting the black horned rimmed thick glasses would politely enquire in his grammatically incorrect and broken Gujarati ; “Khaadhaa? Gumyaah”? meaning “khaadhu? Gumyou”? i.e. Did you like what you ate?

And then hands out small packs of 4 English toffees or caramels. On other days it would be cubes of Gaaz from Iran. In response to our shy ‘thank yous’ he’d say, “God Bless you my child”.

We, it seems lived in a World then full of Zarathushtis who derived joy from simple & natural things.

While selecting a table in the Ideal Restaurant we would choose the Hornby Rd side, sitting so we could watch the double decker trams & buses pass by, and also to walk down to the vendors on the side-walk to pick up British comics, war books and penny dreadful.

In later years and until the 70’s, these sidewalks were my happy ‘hunting grounds’ for things foreign like watches, calculators, electronic gadgets, imported fabrics etc. Here sometimes you found good bargains and often got cheated.

Other of the now disappearing Irani Restaurant we frequented during the World War II days in Bombay was the "Badsha’s", opposite Crawford Market. This used to be one of the best place for Faloodah and Mango Juice…….(STILL HERE IN 2009).

There was another, Irani Restaurant that we frequented for lunch, was called Standard or something, it also was on Hornby Road, opposite Evan’s Frazer, (Handloom House, in later years).

In our scriptures there is a mention that ‘it was obligatory, as thanks-giving’ to save a bit of the meal at the end for the dog – during Sassanian times, it was called the "Chom e shvaa". Those who did not have a pet dog , used to carry the saved food to the back door ‘paachhloo baannu’ to give it to the stray dog.

My parents, did the same in Delhi. Besides the dogs of which he had many, my father had a handsome pet Rhode Island Red cock who would walk in at breakfast time to peck at the piece of omelette on toast, or "charveloo eedo with rotli".

My wife carries on the tradition here in California. Before she has a bite at breakfast, she offers our dog a piece of toast that is held out on a fork, you should see the dog gently walk up to her, sits down and then delicately slips the bread off the fork with the side of his mouth, without ever touching the fork. Then with an expression that conveys a silent "thank you’, without waiting for a second helping he softly tip-toes away to the entrance room where he sits at the window as the self-appointed guardian. We sometimes wonder if this four year old did come to us from a "finishing school".

Breakfast time is when we have several winged visitor at our back door waiting for the
daily hand out of bird feed. Sometimes on weekends when we are late for breakfast, the inquisitive squirrels would come scratching on the dinning room door to remind us that we have delayed their mid-morning hand out.

Some readers may frown on such acts, but this daily ritual with our pet, this insignificant act of kindness passed down to us, gives us a tremendous sense of joy, a great lift-off to a beautiful day.

My late octogenarian father-in-law Dinshaw Burjorji Karbhary in Valsad used to feed
crows and "mynah" birds after breakfast. They would fly into the first floor balcony in
time to see if the old man was at the table. Dinshaw and his wife Gool had given each
bird from the group, an identifying Parsi name. It was really wonderful seeing the birds
assemble in a row on the parapet awaiting their piece of "malhai-nay-rotli’ or just "rotli"
from the old man’s hand. When making the ROTLI my mother-in-law Gool, would
always say," Ah-ay chalia-o-nay-varey chai".i.e. this is for the birds. The birds would
share the "nastoe" and fly away. Sometimes a bird or two would linger on, the old man
would tell his wife , "Gool, Muncherji nay Cawasji nay varey please rotli laoso kay? Aaje A’ logono hisso koi beejo khai gee-yo"? ( Translated: Gool. Will you please bring bread for Muncherji & Cawasji; today someone else ate their share.)

It was so wonderful watching the old folks happily excited and delighted hosting this
daily Rotli parties for the birds. The dogs had their day at night time from the ‘Kutra nay
varey Bhonu" that was saved from dinner to be equally divided amongst the dogs that
would be waiting.

Talking of "PAACHCHLOO BAANNU", and dogs, takes me back some sixty years or
more in Delhi (1940s), when I was still wearing short pants. After the dogs were fed the left-overs from dinner ( like your "FOOi" used to), we remembered that we should give some hot milk to the six pups that were about a month old. I gave four annas ( a quarter of a rupee) to the servant to get hot milk from the nearby "Halwai" ( that is a
meethaiwalla nee dukaan). Those days 4 annas would get you one SEER of milk, that’s about one litre. Hot milk is better than hot chocolate for the North Indians especially on a cold Delhi night. So when the servant brought the milk and went to feed the pups,

I wanted to make sure the man did not gulp down half of it before feeding the pups, so in the darkness flanking myself with the PAACHCHLOO BAANNU I was peeping out to
watch. It was then I noticed what appeared to be a long line of black ants carrying their
white eggs along the corner of the BAANNU. Ants do that when the seasons change.
Looking closer I was petrified, when I realised I was starring into the beady eyes of a
snake when his forked tongue shot out, trying to get a taste of this young Parsi. Quickly
backing off, I called the cook, who would not do anything as it was against his religion to offend the snake, I called my father who came and sent the snake to his heavenly abode.

I wonder if future generations of Z’s will have any knowledge of these beautiful little
rituals like "Chom e-shvaa" or have time or inclination to follow them with the same love and reverence as our forefathers did. Will they ever experience the transcendental joys inherent in these little Zoroastrian acts ?

One of the daily ritual in a Parsi/Irani homes in India of the early 20th Century, that brings back happy memories of our childhood, of a bygone era, when the days had morehours, families had more members, dinning tables had more chairs, we were more religious and the community felt like being a large close knit happy and contented family, always in concert with each other, always helpful.

Reminiscing of those days, in my minds eye, I caught glimpses of mom or grand mother glide by at sun-down with the silver or German-Silver afargan through each room as did the grayish-blue smoke, fragrant with sukhar (sandal wood), loban (incense), agar that when mixed with the sent of tube-roses, or jasmine or ‘motia.’ (Arabian jasmine) from the cut flowers on the prayer table or in the rooms was a heavenly experience . With one small hand we, brothers, sister, aunts and uncles, would cover our heads and with the other add a pinch of "whair" , loban or agar, then hurriedly putting both hands together, say an Ashem Vohu. Then with both hands, we would pull the smoke towards us. At the end of the round of the house, the Afargan was place at the "prayer table" and before the charcoal embers died they’d be transferred to the coal burning "choohlow" ( stove ).

In the 1930 there was no gas or electric stoves except in parts of Bombay or Karachi. The LOBAN did the round of the rooms in the morning also, but we were then well on the way to school.

The prayer table was where mom or dad , who so ever got ‘ready’ first in the morning, would light the "Divo". The kids got their turns on their birthdays. The divo used to be a short glass partly filled with water topped with either, pure ghee, cooking oil or special oil-lamp media with a long ‘kakrow”,( i.e. wick) held by a metallic clip or a floating ‘kakrow”on a cork float or even a candle that were kept alit perpetually. As pure ghee became expensive, ghee was only used on festive occasions or on birthdays.

In our uncle’s house in Bombay the ‘divo" was suspended from the ceilings in all the main rooms, in an old fashioned chandelier, like you find in some of the Atash Behrams.

Maybe it was something left over from the pre-electricity days and these were the lights that the BATTIWALLA’s as a profession lit.

What is nostalgia but an attempt to preserve that which was good in the past? The past has served us well.

The above is a first in a series on Memories of the Parsi Past. More will follow in the days to come. If you would like to add to it, please write to us and we would love to publish it on the site.

My earliest memories of going to a fire temple are of seeing a bearded man dressed in all white sitting all alone, greeting us when we entered. Feeling awed and scared at the same time, it took a while to understand why this man looked so similar to the ones in photographs on the wall. It took patience and effort on my late grandfather’s part to make me understand that this was “aapra dastoorji.” The man in question was the revered head priest Dasturji Hormazdji of the Batliwala Agiary in Tardeo all those years ago. Since then I have had numerous friends and relatives who are priests and that has led to a deeper understanding of what they stand for and what they mean to our ancient religion.

In a religion as ancient as ours, the center of our spiritual physical being lies with these very priests. The dasturs, as they are known, are the custodians and implementers of all matters pertaining to religion, customs, ceremonies and the overall conscience of the religion. Zarathusti priests have over the centuries been the guiding force in the interpretation of our ancient texts, performing ceremonies of happiness and sadness, and being the silent custodians and arbitrators of our religious ethos.

You can continue reading the article on NextGenNow.com

Comments, opinions and critique appreciated.

Abhishek Mande / Rediff

For over ten years now, Khushroo Poacha has stood by the sole belief that to do good work you don’t need money. Poacha runs indianblooddonors.com (IBD), a site that lets blood donors and patients in need of blood connect with each other almost instantaneously. He also does not accept cash donations.

The site has been live for almost ten years and with over 50,000 donors in its database, IBD is perhaps a classic example of what the Internet is truly capable of. But more importantly, it is a reflection of a single human being’s desire to make a difference to this world.

It all started in the mid-’90s when Khushroo Poacha, an employee with the Indian Railways in Nagpur saw a doctor being beaten up because he couldn’t save a patient’s life. No one in the mob seemed to understand that it was the lack of blood that caused the death.

"A few years later, I witnessed the death of a welder because he couldn’t get blood. The two incidents really shook me up," Poacha says, "And that was when I expressed to my wife my desire of doing something."

Poacha, however, had no clue about how he could make a difference until one day, sitting in a cyber cafe with a 56 kbps connection, the idea came to him.

"I did not know head or toe of the Internet, let alone about domain names, but I knew this would be the tool that would make a difference," he says, explaining the dotcom extension to the site.

Over the next few months, Poacha liquidated practically all his savings, purchased a domain name and started up indianblooddonors.com.

"During the time, there were no companies booking or hosting web domains in India. I was paying USD 300 every three months to keep the site live and running. Meanwhile, I had spent almost Rs 40,000 in developing the site and had gone practically bankrupt," he says.

Poacha says he even went to a local newspaper to place an ad. "I needed visibility and that was the only way I thought I could reach out to the people. The day the ad appeared, I was expecting a flood of registrations," he recollects. "No one registered."

The silver lining to the dark cloud came when someone from the outskirts of his hometown Nagpur contacted him, expressing interest. "It was a saving grace," Poacha says.

Meanwhile, the dotcom bubble had burst and Poacha was being told what a fool he had been. And then there were household expenses to be taken care of too.

"There were many occasions when unpaid phone bills would be lying in the house and there would be no money to pay them off," Poacha recollects, adding that "things always have a way of sorting themselves out. And mysteriously during such times, a cheque would make its way into the mailbox."

Poacha admits that his wife was quite apprehensive about his endeavour. "But she believed in me," he says, "And that has made all the difference."

Visibility, however, was still an issue. No publication was willing to write about him. No major hospital or blood bank was interested in taking his calls.

And then the 2001 Gujarat Earthquake happened. As visuals of the devastation flashed before his eyes on television, Poacha realised yet again he had to do something.

Only this time he knew just what.

"I called up (television channel) Zee News [ Get Quote ] and requested them to flash the site’s name on the ticker and they agreed."

Five minutes later, the ticker was live. Ten minutes later, the site crashed.

"I spoke to the people who were hosting the site (by now website hosting had started off in India) and explained to them the situation. They immediately put me on a fresh server and over the next three days or so I received some 3,500 odd registrations," Poacha recollects.

Realising the difference he had made, the 42-year-old started working on getting visibility again.

Over the next few months, Poacha had contacted every major magazine and sure enough, a few responded. "Outlook (magazine) wrote about me, then (British newspaper) The Guardian followed suit and then came the BBC," he says.

Along the way, IBD had also gone mobile. All you had to do was type out a message and send it to a short code and you’d have a list of blood donors in your inbox.

As luck would have it, the service became far too popular for Poacha’s pocket. "By then I had stopped taking cash donations and had to discontinue it," he says.

Interestingly, IBD is not yet registered as an NGO. "We function as individuals. We don’t take donations and only accept bumper stickers (of IBD) and postage stamps to send out those stickers and create awareness," he says, "I was asked to deliver a lecture at IIM during a social entrepreneurship seminar and was asked what my sustenance model was. I replied I didn’t have one. And I have been doing this for the last ten years."

Today, the database of IBD is growing at the rate of 10-15 users every day and the requests have grown from 25 to 40 per day.

Poacha says he eats, drinks and breathes IBD. "The zeal I had ten years ago has not diminished and the site continuously sees innovation." The latest, Poacha tells us, is the option of being an exclusive donor to one patient.

"During my journey, I realised there were some patients who required blood every month. So if you want, we can put you onto them so you can continue making a sustained difference to one person’s life."

IBD is currently on an auto pilot mode and Poacha continues to keep his day job. He says, "Initially I would take the calls and personally connect the donor with the patient’s relative. But I know only three languages and I’d get calls from all over India," he laughs.

Poacha recounts an incident that never left him: "A man from Chandigarh called me and told me he was desperately seeking A-ive blood for his 2-year-old. About five minutes after the call, he got the (difficult to find) blood group he needed. Soon after the surgery he called me up crying, thanking me for saving his child’s life. For me, it was just another day at work. But his whole world was at stake that day. I can never forget that call."

Last year Poacha was invited to the Asian Social Entrepreneurs Summit 2008 in South Korea where venture capitalists argued that it wasn’t possible to sustain an endeavour without money. He says, "I pointed out that Mother Teresa [ Images ] had no revenue model when she started the Missionaries of Charity. If you want to do good work, you simply do it."

For someone who has sustained his enterprise for a decade with just a few bumper stickers and postage stamps, Khushroo Poacha knows best.

[Hat Tip: Jasmin]

By Ashutosh Shukla / DNA

The Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) announced the project at a meeting with the community after the new trutees completed one year. They hope to build an aviary in next three to five years’ time.

It is against the Parsis’ Zoroastrian faith to either bury, burn or submerge their dead as they believe it pollutes the environment. Hence, they leave the bodies at the tower of silence left to be consumed by the vultures.

"Earlier, a proposal was scuttled but we are working on a vulture breeding program. It will also take care of the threat of the drug Diclofenac as we will try and ensure that the human body is Diclofenac-free," said Khojeste Mistree, BPP trustee. It is believed that the vulture population is tapering off because of the intake of drugs like Diclofenac from the human body.

The meet also presented a white paper of sorts and the future plans the BPP has for the community. Among them is a housing project that will see 2,257 spacious flats for the Parsis built in the six colonies in Mumbai. "Of these, 1,457 flats will be allotted free to the Parsis after cross-subsidisation," said Dinshaw Mehta, chairperson of the trustee.

A new logo was also launched with two wind bulls featuring on either side of the BPP. "It is done with a motive to bring healthy interaction and harmony in the community," said Jimmy Mistry. Its symbolic importance represents strength in the physical world, consciousness, and spirituality.

A youth program — Zoroastrian Youth for Next Generation will also be launched with a dedicated website by December that aims to promote healthy interaction, encourage participation, bring a sense of pride in the community, recognise its achievements, promote networking, provide details on scholarship, religious events, jobs, matrimony and lists social events.

By Manoj Nair / Mumbai Mirror

Trustees of Bombay Parsi Punchayet, the apex representative body of Parsi-Zoroastrians, have decided to replace the trust’s fire logo, which they thought was symbolic of the ‘trial by fire,’ into which it has been dragged into lately by community groups accusing it of corruption.

The logo will be replaced with winged bulls that are emblems from the ancient Archimedean empire. The old logo shows the letters of the acronym ‘BPP’ stylised as flames.BPP Trustee Dr Khojestee Mistree said, “If you look at the old logo, it looks as if the letters of the acronym are being burnt in the fire. There was something wrong with the concept. The new board of the trust wanted a more modern logo and it was unanimously agreed to adopt the new symbol.”

Fire is a sacred symbol in the Zoroastrian religion; so are winged bulls. The new emblem with two bulls dates back at least 2,500 years to the Archimedean empire of Persia. The images of the bulls were depicted as sentinels that guarded palaces and also the gates of heaven.

Though the BPP – which is one of the largest land owners and charity groups in the city – is nearly 330  years old, the fire logo is less than 10 years old. The organisation did not have a logo before that.

The new symbol was inaugurated at a community meeting in Dadar on October 25.  Mistree said that the new emblem symbolised the trust’s new plans for the community, including a proposal to set up a youth wing.

Lately, the trust has been under intense scrutiny by community groups that have filed complaints at the office of the charity commissioner and in civil courts accusing the body of corruption in housing.

The BPP controls nearly 5,000 flats in trust colonies across the city, that are meant for community members who cannot afford to buy their own homes. Recently, the Bombay High Court allowed the trust to sell flats in an Andheri colony so that it could generate funds to construct homes for poorer members of the community. The plan had been challenged earlier by community groups.

Chairman of BPP, Dinshaw Mehta said he associated the fire symbol with these constant tribulations. “We have been hounded by people who lost the trust elections to us. They have been filing one complaint after another against us in various agencies, and they are not giving up. The old logo was shown burning in the fire. The trustees felt the logo was not appropriate,” said Mehta.

[Link via email: Mickie Sorabjee]

The loudspeakers were switched off halfway through the function after complaints to the local police station.

This forced the trustees to shout to the 3,000-strong crowd and allege that some people within the community were jealous of the BPP’s achievements.

Even after the mikes were switched off, speaker K Mistree remained defiant, shouting his last words, "This is a work of sabotage, though the voice of honesty and truth cannot be scuttled."

This lead the irate audience to even suggest that they pile into cars and gherao the Dadar police station to find out who was behind the complaint.

A woman said, "Functions have been held here in the past, but loudspeakers were never shut."

And resident S Panthaky said philosophically, "When a community tends to dwindle, it goes into destructive mode. This is what is happening with the fighting here."

Ironically, just before the mayhem started, BPP’s Jimmy Mistry had said to the audience, "Let the fires and fighting in our community stop today."

Original article here.

The invitation for the function was issued by the president of the Dadar-Matunga Parsi Zoroastrian Association (DMPZA) Rustom C. Chothia and other trustees on the board, with the blessings of Dastur (Dr) Kaikhusroo JamaspAsa. The inauguration was at the hands of member of parliament Eknath Rao Gaikwad in the presence of member of the legislative assembly Kalidas N. Kolambkar, municipal corporator Raghunath D. Thawai and other political figures. Dadar Athornan Madressa prin­cipal Ervad (Dr) Ramiyar Karanjia, princi­pal of the J.B.VachhaHigh School Banoo A. Makoojina and Bombay Parsi Punchayet trustee Amavaz Mistry were also present, along with members of Bha­rucha’ s family and other invitees, a press release notes.

Many tributes were paid to Bharucha, a dedicated teacher who believed that education must remain a joyful experi­ence. Her long-term of service to the J. B. Vachha School was recalled and appreci­ated. The Nagpur born and educated Bharucha was associated with the School from 1974 until her death at the relatively young age of 51 years in 2005. Under the guidance of her mentor and school chair­person Tehmy Nari Aga, Bharucha first taught English and Science before be­coming principal in 1989. During her ten­ure Bharucha received a slew of awards —Best Teacher Award from the National Welfare Teachers’ Foundation, Bombay in 1994; National Award for Best Teacher in 1997 received at the hands of the Presi­dent of India in New Delhi; Vocational Award for Excellence 2001 presented by the Rotary Club of Bombay Muduty; KalaGuru Award fromPrempurjiu Ashram in 2002; and in 2004 she was among those felicitated as aprominent educationist by Gurudas Kamat, member of parliament and Congress party officeholder, under the aegis of the DMPZA

Bharucha was remembered as an un­assuming and kind-hearted person, gen­erous to a fault and a valuable asset to the Parsi/Irani community as attested by the large turnout at the inauguration of the chowk, especially students, parents and teachers who came to honor the memory of their popular principal. Following the inau­gural ceremony which was accompa­nied by music by the School’s band and a march-past by the girls, the gathering proceeded to the nearby Palamkote Hall where the digni­taries were welcomed with garlands. Fit­ter called upon them to speak and Chothia was the first to do so, followed by others who lauded Bharucha’s legacy.

Karanjia summed up Bharucha’s role thus: "Our life is God’s gift to us. what we make of our life is our gift to God. God must be very happy with the gift that Ms Bharucha gave Him… (She) put a lot into the few years that she lived on earth… (She) was very secular in nature but in her heart she had a soft corner for her religion and community. May her soul rest in eternal peace and keep on guiding and helping her community, her family and her school."

[Original article published in Parsiana and forwarded to us by regular reader and friend of Parsi Khabar, Mickie Sorabjee]

At end-September, bird watchers from across the world were abuzz about the remote, dry highlands of Himachal Pradesh’s Lahaul-Spiti. The region was witnessing a rare event — a congregation of over 200 regal Lammergeier vultures, popularly known as bearded vultures.

These vultures inhabit the rarefied heights of the Tibetan plateau and have equally rarefied tastes. They dine almost exclusively on the bones of dead animals. They don’t eat the hard calcium, but head for the soft and nutritious marrow that is found inside bones. To obtain the marrow, the birds perform an exquisitely synchronised routine. They soar high into the sky with the bones, and then drop them, to smash on the rocky ground below. Then they descend to peck on the exposed marrow.

This sighting in Lahaul-Spiti was welcome news for conservationists. It meant that they could breathe a little sigh of relief that at least one species of vulture found in the Indian subcontinent seems to be taking care of itself. The Indian heartland, far from the mountains, is still no place for vultures.

It only takes one sentence from India’s foremost expert on vultures to put things in perspective. “We shouldn’t be celebrating the sighting of a few colonies of birds, sometimes as small as 50 in number,” says Dr Vibhu Prakash of the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS). Prakash knows what he is talking about. In just two decades he has personally documented how the vulture population in India has fallen off a precipice. The numbers have collapsed — take a deep breath now — from about four crore to hardly 40,000 today.

Prakash, flipping through files on his computer, stops at one image and asks us to try and count the number of vultures it shows. The scene is from the 1980s at Delhi’s erstwhile Timarpur garbage dump. The dump itself is the scene of a feeding frenzy for hundreds of vultures. On the horizon and lined up on the roofs of buildings nearby are at least a thousand more, waiting their turn. Prakash says an optimist would put the total figure for vultures in Delhi today at 1,000.

These important and impressive scavenging birds have fallen victim to a tiny killer. For over two decades they have faced chemical poisoning — mainly due to the use of diclofenac in veterinary medicine. Diclofenac is a cheap, simple and effective painkiller which is safe for use in cattle and humans. Unfortunately it is deadly for Asian vultures, especially from the gyps family, which are vultures that feed on the soft tissue and organs in animal carcasses.

Gyps vultures — principally the white-backed, long-billed and slender-billed vultures — are the most numerous group, and they bore the brunt of increasing diclofenac use in Indian veterinary medicine from the mid-1980s onwards. This decimation is considered rare, as neither the vulture’s food supply nor its habitat have suffered significant damage, and there is no pathogen (disease-causing microorganism) involved.

By the time diclofenac was identified as and proven to be the offending chemical — in the late 1990s — the gyps had almost been wiped out. It was 2005 by the time the Indian government was convinced about the severity of the situation and diclofenac was finally banned for veterinary use.

That was the first step in saving the vulture. The second was the listing of white-backed, long-billed and slender-billed vultures in Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. Today things are looking up for vultures, and work by people like Prakash is setting the benchmark.

The smell of rotting flesh is unmistakeable as one nears the BNHS’s Vulture Conservation and Breeding Centre (VCBC). Nestled in the Shivalik jungles, an hour’s drive from Chandigarh near the town of Pinjore, this is ground zero for the vulture’s recovery. VCBC is the first centre set up exclusively to rescue injured or diseased vultures and to undertake captive breeding. BNHS is currently the only organisation spending time and money on an exercise such as this for the vultures. “I could have sat all my life researching and collecting figures. But here I am. People say educating people will save the vultures, but it is a slow process and we don’t have the time,” says Prakash who, along with his wife Nikita, also an expert on raptors, manages the centre.

VCBC is an unique initiative modelled on other successful programmes to captively breed predatory birds and then release them into the wild. Prakash says he embarked on the project after visiting and studying the programmes to rescue the Californian condor in North America. He says that the decimation of the vulture population has been so sudden, severe and “still continuing” that it is unlikely that nature can fight back on its own.

The five-acre campus, on land leased from the Haryana Forest Department, today houses 127 vultures. Special among them are the six who were born at the centre last year. And one of the six young ones is a slender-billed vulture, of the species which is most threatened.

Prakash has expanded this captive vulture programme by setting up two more centres, at Raja Bhat Khawa, West Bengal, and Rani, Assam. He says he has evolved a mathematical model that will serve to resuscitate the gyps vulture population in India. “Six hundred pairs of each of the three species will form a viable population. Twenty-five pairs of each of the three species at one centre will be able to produce a population of 100 pairs of each of the species in the next 15 years. Thus, we need six centres to produce 600 pairs,” he says.

The birds released from these centres and from centres in Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh will be the nucleus of the vulture’s revival. He further adds that collecting nestlings from the wild will add to the numbers, as vulture nestlings take to captivity easily. There will also be attempts to breed birds that are too injured to fly. For this purpose he has networked with bird watchers and conservationists across India, to report nests and injured birds, which can then be collected and flown to VCBC at the centre’s own cost.

VCBC has managed to collect a wealth of scientific information on vultures, as it is the first time the birds have been observed at such close quarters. But more significantly, the centre monitors levels of diclofenac in the environment. When vulture carcasses are reported from across the country, the team arranges immediately to collect viscera samples. These are then analysed and frozen for future reference. “Earlier we had to use expensive gas chromatography to detect diclofenac. Now we use the ELISA test, which detects the enzymes suppressed when diclofenac is ingested. We are working to develop this into a dipstick test where we can instantly, in the field, detect if diclofenac is present in cattle or vulture carcasses,” says Prakash. He is also helping to formulate plans for selected zoos across the country to set up similar breeding and monitoring centres.

Meanwhile, on the ground, NGOs and enthusiastic bird watchers across the country have been documenting sightings of vulture colonies and conducting education programmes. Wildlife filmmaker Mike Pandey, who produced a documentary on vultures, has been using his NGO Earth Matters to educate farmers to not use diclofenac on their cattle. “Some farmers have voluntarily stopped using diclofenac once we told them of dangers of diseases such as anthrax breaking out if carcasses are left rotting in the open,” he says. Parsi communities across the country have been eager to be involved in vulture conservation as the birds are integral to their funeral rites. The situation has been dire at Mumbai’s Parsi Tower of Silence as there are no vultures to scavenge on the dead bodies.

But the danger of diclofenac has still not disappeared. It is estimated that it will take five years for diclofenac to disappear from the environment, even after a ban. And a ban, unfortunately, will not happen soon. Prakash, Pandey and various NGOs have been protesting the misuse of human doses of diclofenac in veterinary medicine, and the circulation of old stocks of veterinary diclofenac. For human use, diclofenac “comes in smaller doses, so you just use a few more bottles. Essentially it is the same medicine,” says Prakash, while adding that the only solution is a complete ban.

The first batch of captive bred vultures are set to take off after 2020. It will be a momentous occasion. It is critical for the environment that the vultures hold their place at the end of the food chain. Prakash says he will be happy to release his vultures back into the wild, but warns that his flock will not fly out till the spectre of diclofenac is totally out of the environment.

By Anand Sankar for the Business Standard

But does that matter, when one can ‘eat one’s cake – and have it too’?

Its present owners are Tafti Iranis, originally from the small Iranian village of Taft. The affable Kaikhushroo Ardeshir Nejadkay, who hails from a family of agriculturists, arrived in Bombay at the tender age of ten, and worked with his father as an assistant baker at their Brabourne Bakery in Chira Bazaar, concentrating only on breads.

The family acquired the present Paris Bakery in 1963 from its previous Irani owners and turned things around for themselves and for us, forever.

Continue reading at Upper Crust India.

[Hat Tip: Regular reader and friend of Parsi Khabar, Mickie Sorabjee]

Paris Bakery, 278, Dr. C. H. Street, Our Lady Of Dolours Church Lane, Dhobi Talao, Mumbai – 400 002. Tel: 022 2208 6619