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The Wire
20 minutes ago
- The Wire
Humayunpur: Where Fermented Tea Leaf Salads and Korean Bakeries Celebrate Delhi's Diversity
Until recently, my understanding of northeastern Indian cuisine was shaped by a film. Axone, a 2019 indie gem, follows a group of young northeastern women in Delhi on a fraught yet funny quest to cook a traditional dish for a wedding. The story, laced with themes of displacement, prejudice, and resilience, was a touching introduction. But looking back, it was just a sampler – an amuse-bouche, if you will – for a much richer culinary world I hadn't yet begun to understand. The full-course meal came this past weekend, thanks to an unexpected guide: Hemant Singh Katoch, historian, author, and perhaps one of the most qualified people in Delhi to bridge the cultural gap between the Indian mainland and the Northeast. Hemant's scholarship is best known through Imphal-Kohima 1944, a deeply researched book on the pivotal World War II campaign that thwarted the Japanese advance through Northeast India into Burma. But his time spent living and researching in the region–over five years across the Indian Northeast and Myanmar–also nurtured a deep appreciation for its overlooked cuisines. We were joined by Esha Roy, an equally insightful companion and former Northeast bureau chief for The Indian Express. Her reporting, often among the few handful of national coverage of the region in mainstream Indian media, has shaped how many Indians understand issues from Nagaland to Manipur. Our destination was The Grub House, a quiet eatery in Delhi's Humayunpur neighbourhood – essentially a microcosm of Northeast India in the capital. The place recently brought in a Burmese chef, and the menu reflects a shift: a willingness to present the cuisine without apology or fusion. We began with Htamin Thoke, a rice salad with lightly fermented notes; Kyaukpwint Thoke, a sea mushroom salad rich with umami; and finally, the standout: Lehpet Thoke, or fermented tea leaf salad. Salads in the Grub House. Photo: Faisal Mahmud. This dish is a hidden treasure in Myanmar – equal parts texture and taste, where bitter fermented tea meets the crunch of roasted beans, fried garlic, and a whisper of chilli heat (likely from fermented shrimp paste, that glorious umami bomb Southeast Asia has long mastered). Every bite delivered a bright jolt – intense, unexpected, addictive. The main course, Mohinga, is often called Myanmar's national morning dish. A fish-based broth with rice noodles, it's comfort food with depth – a cousin, perhaps, to Vietnamese pho or Thai khao soi, but with its own rustic complexity. Topped with crispy lentils and fried garlic, it became a bowl of warmth and surprise. Beyond the boundaries Most Indians know the Northeast through momos or generalised assumptions about 'tribal food.' Yet what I tasted was part of a much broader cultural and geopolitical landscape – one that includes ancient spice routes, the wartime legacy of the Burma campaign, and centuries of migration and exchange across what is now India, Myanmar, and Southeast Asia. Food is never just food. It's a marker of identity, autonomy, and sometimes survival. For decades, the cuisines of the Northeast have been marginalised in India's national consciousness – reduced to side dishes or stigmatised for their unfamiliar ingredients and 'strong smells.' This dinner felt like a quiet rebuttal to that dismissal, a celebration not just of flavour but of presence. After dinner, Hemant suggested we walk through the neighbourhood that – unlike much of sanitised, master-planned New Delhi – feels defiantly alive. Tucked behind the diplomatic sheen of South Delhi, this compact enclave has quietly evolved into a cultural refuge for Northeastern Indian communities, migrants from Myanmar, and even waves of Korean students and professionals who've carved out a new sense of belonging in the capital. Humayunpur. Photo: Faisal Mahmud. If Connaught Place is colonial nostalgia and Gurugram is global capitalism on steroids, then Humayunpur is a reminder of the grassroots, immigrant-powered energy that actually defines urban life. Here, diversity isn't performative–it's the lived-in, crowded, and deliciously fragrant reality of shared existence. You will find restaurants with names like Hornbill or Dzukou coexist with Korean grocery stores and Tibetan cafés. It's a pocket of pan-Asian coexistence in a city that too often flattens difference. As Hemant pointed out favourite spots – Naga joints with smoked pork and bamboo shoot, Tibetan cafés with steaming momos and butter tea, Korean bakeries tucked beside Assamese thali houses – the neighbourhood unfolded like a map of quiet resistance. Every eatery is more than just a business; it's an assertion of identity in a city that often tries to homogenise everything outside the mainstream. The streets hummed with something also rare in Delhi: a sense of community rooted in difference, not in spite of it. You could hear it in the easy laughter bouncing down narrow lanes, in the strains of Manipuri pop music mingling with Korean ballads, in the aromas of akhuni, ginger, garlic, and sesame oil spilling from kitchen vents. It is, in every way, a grassroots counterpoint to the elite conversation about 'India's soft power.' You don't need government-sponsored fusion food festivals or televised state dinners when neighbourhoods like this exist – when the soft power of fermented tea leaves, smoked meats, and multilingual menus can speak for themselves. By the time we left, the streets were still glowing. I couldn't help but feel that Humayunpur isn't just a place – it's a possibility. Of a city that doesn't flatten its people into one language or one cuisine or one face, but allows a hundred versions of 'home' to bloom in the same square mile. Faisal Mahmud is the Minister (Press) of Bangladesh High Commission in New Delhi.
Time of India
9 hours ago
- Politics
- Time of India
Respect India's right to defend itself against terror, China told
NEW DELHI: India has asked China to constructively work towards a "permanent solution" to the border issue under a structured roadmap to bridge trust deficit, de-escalate tensions and rejuvenate the existing mechanism to demarcate it, even as their armies continue to be forward deployed against each other along the frontier for the last five years. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now Defence minister also told his Chinese counterpart, Admiral Dong Jun, on the sidelines of the SCO conclave Thursday that Beijing should understand and respect India's "principled approach" to defend itself against cross-border terror sponsored by Pakistan, officials told TOI. Rajnath: India, China should not remain stuck in the past Briefing Admiral Dong about the "heinous" Pahalgam massacre and the subsequent launched by India against terrorist networks in Pakistan, Singh said both New Delhi and Beijing should "avoid adding new complexities" to their bilateral relationship. T his came in the backdrop of Pakistan using a wide array of Chinese weapons, including J-10 fighters firing the PL-15 beyond visual range air-to-air missiles, against India during the cross-border hostilities from May 7 to 10. Under their deep military collusiveness, China is now also going to supply Pakistan with at least 40 J-35A fifth-generation stealth jets and HQ-19 long-range air defence missile systems. The hour-long meeting, however, mainly focussed on the need to maintain peace and tranquillity along the 3,488-km Line of Actual Control (LAC), with Singh stressing the need for "solving the complex issues through a structured roadmap of permanent engagement and de-escalation". India's repeated use of 'permanent' represents a new push for resolving the decades-old festering border dispute. Acknowledging efforts by both sides to bring back a "semblance of normalcy" in bilateral ties, Singh also put forward a four-point plan to put the overall relationship on an upward trajectory, officials told TOI. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now This involves both sides first strictly adhering to the plan that led to troop disengagement at the two remaining face-off sites at Depsang and Demchok in eastern Ladakh last Oct, which has reduced the risk of any inadvertent escalation. They should now move forward to the next steps of de-escalation and de-induction of troops from their forward deployments along the LAC. The two countries should also accelerate efforts to achieve the goal of demarcation and delimitation of the border and register concrete progress in the existing special representatives (SR) level mechanism to achieve a fair and mutually-acceptable solution to the boundary question and other issues. The forward momentum in bilateral ties has gained ground since national security advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi discussed various issues under the SR mechanism in Beijing last Dec for the first time since 2019. "Singh said India and China should not remain stuck in the past. He called for bridging the trust deficit created after the border standoff in 2020 by taking action on the ground," an official said. "The two ministers agreed to continue consultations at various levels to achieve progress on issues related to disengagement, de-escalation, border management and eventual de-limitation through existing mechanisms," he added.
Times
14 hours ago
- Business
- Times
Oresund Bridge is £58 to cross. Is the toll just daylight robbery?
For four centuries the Oresund, a strait between Denmark and Sweden that is the gateway to the Baltic Sea, was a geopolitical chokepoint. The Danish kings would routinely top up their treasury by extorting transit fees from passing ships. In 1658 the Swedes got their own back by crossing the frozen waters and surrounding Copenhagen. Urban legend holds that there is still a law on Denmark's statute books that permits loyal Danes to take up a cudgel and bash any Swede attempting to traverse the ice. The sound last became passable on foot in 1996 but no heads were staved in. Four years after that, though, Sweden and Denmark opened a five-mile, €2.6 billion bridge across the strait, whose 25th birthday falls on Tuesday. The kings and queens of both countries will mark the occasion by travelling in a convoy from the Swedish side to the Danish one, pausing halfway on the island of Peberholm. The bridge has become a symbol of European integration, all but turning Copenhagen and the Swedish port of Malmo on the other side of the water into a single conurbation. 'There is a before and after the bridge,' said Linus Eriksson, the chief executive of the company that runs it. 'Before the bridge, Malmo was a town in crisis. Even Copenhagen had a tough situation. Both cities had a tough situation with poor growth. Now it's a totally different region economically.' The crossing was also made famous from Tijuana to Bulawayo by The Bridge, a noirish crime drama in which a chilly Swedish detective called Saga Noren and her Danish partner Martin Rohde solved a series of grisly trans-strait murders. Now, however, many commuters who bought into the dream of living in one country and working in the other are complaining of what they regard as a lower-level but higher-volume crime: daylight robbery. • How Swedish gangs are exporting young contract killers across Scandinavia Weeks before the anniversary, the basic price for a one-way car journey across the bridge has been jacked up to 510 Danish kroner, or £58. For the largest vans, it is the equivalent of £218. Research by Sydsvenskan, a regional newspaper in southern Sweden, suggests this is by far the most expensive bridge toll on the planet, costing about twice as much as its nearest rivals in Japan and Canada. Tommy Frandsen, a Danish warehouse manager, is the embodiment of the Oresund ideal. He lives in Staffanstorp, a Swedish town 12 miles from the bridge, and commutes across it every weekday to his workplace on the Danish side. Even though he gets a reduced rate, this now costs him nearly £350 a month, or slightly more than 10 per cent of his salary after tax. 'I feel like it's terrible because they raise the prices every year,' Frandsen said. 'The ferry is not an option. The train is not a possibility because I live out in the country and there's no trains from here.' Aravin Chakravarthi, who is based in Malmo but works in Hedehusene, Denmark, said he could not afford to traverse the bridge by car and was forced to take longer rail journeys instead. 'I don't drive by car because of the bridge toll, even on desperate days when I'm juggling tight schedules to drop off or pick up my two kids,' he said. Although the bridge consortium is jointly owned by the Swedish and Danish states, it is financed with sizeable loans, which have to be paid back. The toll is also linked by law to the cost of the privately operated ferry that runs between Helsingor and Helsingborg further up the strait, to protect the commercial viability of the latter. 'We are state-owned, so we would not be able to cut the price by half because then the commercially operated ferry company would complain or even sue us,' said Eriksson. Despite the vehicle toll, the total number of people crossing the Oresund by car, train or ferry hit a record 38 million last year, equivalent to about 105,000 trips a day. A one-way railway journey between central Copenhagen and Malmo typically costs only £13. Locals' sentimental attachment to the bridge remains largely undiminished. 'It has created love relationships. It has created party culture and university research,' said Niels Paarup-Petersen, a Swedish Centre Party MP from Malmo. 'There are such gains that have actually become a reality because of the bridge.'
Indianapolis Star
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Indianapolis Star
Meet IndyStar investigative and politics intern Marissa Meador
IndyStar's newsroom internships are an important tradition that benefits readers, the news industry and aspiring journalists. We have nine summer interns for 2025 — students who have shown a passion for local journalism and have prior internship or student media experience. The program provides a bridge from student journalism to the professional ranks and helps the Star fill the gaps as our full-time staff take well-earned vacation time. Similarly, we're taking a break from our "Meet the Staff" feature for the summer to give you a chance to, yes, meet the interns. We also call them Pulliam fellows — in recognition of the family that used to own the newspaper and has continued to support journalism in Indianapolis — and past participants have gone on to rich careers at the Star and elsewhere in journalism. Up this week is 2025 IndyStar intern Marissa Meador. My beat is investigations, with a focus on politics. I just graduated from IU Bloomington with degrees in political science and journalism in May. My favorite part of being a journalist is the variety and unpredictability of each day. I love how the stories I write can teach me more about hidden corners of the world, from the nitty-gritty of the debate over forest management practices to the quirks of a person I'm profiling. I applied to IndyStar because I admire the great work its reporters and editors do, from hard-hitting investigations to critical community news. I grew up getting the newspaper delivered to my house in Mooresville, just south of Indianapolis, so IndyStar holds a special place in my heart. My internship is sponsored by the Ida B. Wells Society for Investigative Reporting. I'm still working through season 2 of "The Last of Us," so no spoilers please! I'll never get tired of "Don't Think Twice It's All Right" by Bob Dylan (but preferably the duet version with Joan Baez). This is an impossible question because I love them both! But I grew up around dogs and currently have a beagle named Pixie, so I may have to go with dogs. I'd love to see the beautiful sights of Utah's national parks one day. If I could travel back in time, I would meet Joan Didion. She's my favorite author and I'd love to pick her brain about how she developed her writing style.
Time of India
a day ago
- Politics
- Time of India
MP CM convoy's 19 vehicles filled with water instead of diesel; Watch video of cars getting pushed after cars got towed
As many as 19 vehicles of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav's convoy had to be towed after water was reportedly filled instead of diesel in them, according to news agency PTI. The petrol pump was later sealed over fuel contamination. Video: — PTI_News (@PTI_News) Recently, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Thursday said that he had instructed officials and the state minister to rectify the objection raised against a Railway Over Bridge (ROB) having around 90 degrees sharp turn design in Bhopal and take action against those responsible for mistake. "Recently, it was brought to my notice about the issue of a bridge (ROB) being built with an almost 90-degree sharp turn. I said that it was being constructed from 2022 and is yet to be inaugurated. The bridge is under construction. In such a situation, I have asked officials and the minister to consider the objection raised, rectify the curve to avoid any accidents and also take action against those who make the mistake," CM Yadav told reporters. Live Events
