Chalta hai. It goes. It will do. Said of a half-baked solution that is accepted anyway.
Chaltaa kaam. A makeshift or temporary arrangement, according to the Rekhta dictionary.
Zara add-just karo. Adjust a little. A columnist in The Week described the habit of adjusting as “our accommodative spirit towards a less-than-perfect solution.”
In 1933, at the age of 11, Bhimsen Joshi left his home in Dharwad to find a music teacher. He traveled to Bijapur, Pune, Gwalior and across North India, until his father found him in Jalandhar.
In 1936 the singer Sawai Gandharva accepted him as a student. Joshi lived in his teacher’s house, in the guru-shishya tradition, the bond of teacher and disciple. He later received the Bharat Ratna.
In one of the Akbar and Birbal tales, Emperor Akbar’s pet parrot has died. No courtier dares to tell him, because he has ordered that anyone who brings news of the parrot’s death will be hanged. Birbal goes to the emperor and says: “Jahanpanah, your parrot is neither eating anything, nor drinking anything.”
When Akbar asks whether the parrot is dead, Birbal replies: “I did not say it. You said it.”