At a board meeting on October 24, 2016, Tata Sons removed Cyrus Mistry as its chairman. His email to the board, written on October 25, reached the media the next day. In it he criticized decisions linked to Ratan Tata, including the Nano car, and said he was “shocked beyond words.”
Tata Sons replied on October 27. It called the email “unsubstantiated claims and malicious allegations” and objected that it had been released “in an unseemly and undignified manner.”
In 2011 Business Standard asked Indian companies how they found their staff. “We hire almost 30% of our lateral talent acquisition through our employee referral programme,” said Raghavendra K, head of human resources at Infosys BPO. At iGATE Patni, Mahesh Guru said that 24 percent of the previous year’s hires had come through referrals.
Sifarish means a recommendation. A person with sifarish has someone who has spoken for them. The Rekhta dictionary gives recommendation and intercession as its first meanings. It notes that the word can also mean “undue favour or influence.”
Indian banks used to ask anyone opening an account for an introduction from an existing customer of the bank. Someone the bank already knew had to vouch for the newcomer.
In December 2012 the Reserve Bank of India told banks to stop insisting on it. The requirement, it said, was not mandatory under any of its rules.
Indians applying to government offices often needed copies of their mark sheets, birth certificates and other papers attested by a gazetted officer, a senior government official. An affidavit was the alternative.
In July 2014 the central government asked states and union territories to accept self-attested copies instead where possible. The change was to come in phases. Attestation stayed where a law requires it.
In rural Punjab, a jugaad is a vehicle built from what is at hand. One kind bolts a farm trailer to a diesel engine of the kind that drives water pumps. Another, in Moga, fixes a 10 horsepower irrigation pump engine to the front of a wooden cart. It carries about 40 people.
The word means a workaround. In 2017 the Oxford English Dictionary added it: “A flexible approach to problem-solving that uses limited resources in an innovative way.”
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.”
On February 25, 2022, the UN Security Council voted on a resolution condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. India abstained, together with China and the United Arab Emirates.
India’s ambassador, T.S. Tirumurti, explained: “It is a matter of regret that the path of diplomacy was given up. We must return to it.” He added: “For all these reasons, India has chosen to abstain on this resolution.”
Jaan-pehchaan means knowing people and being known by them. A study by Berger, Barnes, Konwar, Singh and colleagues surveyed managers at more than 300 companies in India.
It describes three parts of the practice: pehchaan, recognition, len-den, give and take, and bharosa, trust. Together they shaped how satisfied companies were with their business relationships and how long they planned to keep them.
In Munna Bhai MBBS (2003), the hero has no medical skill. He wins people over with a jadoo ki jhappi, a “magic hug,” which his mother taught him.
The phrase came from the film. BollyMeaning, a site that explains Bollywood expressions, defines it as a hug the hero gave “to anyone in trouble, to make them feel better.”