In 2017 the actor Kangana Ranaut was a guest on Koffee with Karan, the talk show of the film director Karan Johar. On the show she called her host the “flagbearer of nepotism.” She also spoke of a “movie mafia.”
The phrase became part of a long debate in Hindi cinema about insiders and outsiders.
In November 2008 terrorists attacked the Taj Mahal Palace hotel in Mumbai. Employees of the hotel were among those killed. Their families “were entitled to receive full salary” until the date of the employee’s retirement, The Week reported.
Ratan Tata, then chairman of the Tata group, “visited his injured employees at hospitals and wholeheartedly embraced those who lost kith and kin to the violence.” He also “ensured the children of his late employees received a good education.”
Field Marshal Philip Chetwode spoke at the inauguration of the Indian Military Academy in December 1932. His words are known at the academy as the Chetwode Motto. Two of its lines read: “The honour, welfare and comfort of the men you command come next. Your own ease, comfort and safety come last, always and every time.”
In 1979 the first flight of India’s satellite launch vehicle, SLV-3, failed. Satish Dhawan, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation, faced the press himself. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, the project director, later recalled: “He took the whole blame on himself despite criticisms.” Dhawan told the press that “next year we would succeed because his team was a very good one.”
Mai-baap: mother and father. The Rekhta dictionary gives its meanings: parents, master, lord, the one who brings someone up, ruler, guardian. The same word names the parent and the person in charge.
In the Ramayana, Prince Bharata is offered the throne of Kosala after his elder brother Rama is sent into exile. Bharata refuses it. He goes to Rama in the forest and returns with Rama’s sandals.
He places the sandals on the throne to represent Rama. For fourteen years he governs the kingdom as regent, from the village of Nandigrama, until his brother returns.
The Palanpuri Jains, a historic business community, are prominent in the diamond trade of Antwerp, with networks reaching Mumbai and Surat. Their trade, an article in The Conversation explains, “operates on credit, relies on trust.” It adds: “The diamond industry cannot enforce written contracts.”
The community’s own social controls do that work instead. “In the diamond trade, your name has traditionally been your collateral,” one Indian essay notes.
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.
In 1967 Gaya Lal, a member of the Haryana assembly, changed his party three times. The Tribune says it happened in a single day. Other accounts speak of a few days or a fortnight. His name gave India a phrase for politicians who switch sides: Aaya Ram Gaya Ram. Ram came, Ram went.
In 1985 Parliament added the anti-defection law to the Constitution as its Tenth Schedule.