Loins of Punjab - The new lion

Looks like you are new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!It is a truth universally acknowledged by people in the know that when you get a bunch of immigrant desis from the length and breath of India into a single room, chaos will reign. Some would say [...]

Victory - it only took 56 years !(Updated)

India’s Sushil Kumar won the bronze medal in the men’s 66-kg freestyle category on Wednesday at the Beijing Olympics ending a 56 year drought. The last bronze medal won in wrestling was by KD Jadhav who won a bronze in the 1952 Helsinki Games (link)
( Sushil Kumar’s moment of glory :Image via TOI ) [...]

“A Custom Lungi” - a literary review

Over the years, we’ve watched with great interest the evolution, or rather the lack of it, of desi literature based in the U.S. The following is based on some common trends/threads in desi lit novels - bright covers with saris and bindis and the choice of “serious” South Asian specific topics like dowry, arranged marriages, [...]

India’s Olympic drought ends (Update)

India’s Olympic medal drought ended with Abhinav Bindra’s win in the 1om air rifle event.(link)

Abhinav Bindra won the gold medal in men’s 10 metre air rifle event of the shooting competition at Beijing Olympics.
The gold medal is India’s first since 1980, when the hockey team emerged triumphant in Moscow.

Update: Bindra’s gold medal is [...]

Desi guilty of trade secret theft

Former Hewlett-Packard Vice-President, Atul Malhotra, plead guilty to passing confidential information about his former employer IBM on to his new employer, HP. [HT]

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New Yorker goes overboard on Obama satire?

In case you missed it, yesterday news broke of the intended cover of the upcoming New Yorker’s July 21st 2008 edition. [CNN]
Highlights of the cartoon:1. Shows Barack Obama dressed in traditional Muslim garbs complete with turbanBackground: Barack wore a turban and traditional Kenyan attire in 2006 when he visited that nation. [UD]2. Show Michelle Obama [...]

Knocked Up: Desi septuagenarian edition

Sri. Charan Singh Panwar and Smt. Omkari Panwar are proud parents of newborn twins. [Fox News]
Boldly going where no septuagenarians have ever gone beforeimg: via Fox News
Here’s the twist, Omkari Panwar is 70, and her husband, Charan Singh Panwar is …… 77! And the twins were produced through IVF treatments! Science is wonderful, even when [...]

NRI sentenced in US-India arms scam

Parthasarathy Sudarshan, a NRI has been sentenced for three years in the US for an arms scam. [BBC]
As discussed on UD earlier this year, Sudarshan was accused violating arms control laws by secretly trying to sell components for space vehicles, ballistic missiles and fighter jets to firms associated with India’s defense agencies [UD].

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Immigration Update: Premium processing for some I140s, desis held in scam

Premium processing for some I140s
Potential good news for those who’re labor certified but approaching the end of their 6 year quota for H1B visas. Starting today (June 16th 2008), USCIS has announced plans for premium processing for I140 (permanent work permit). [USCIS]
The I140 will be processed within 15 days for a fee of $1000.
Desis [...]

Sarkar Raj - A short review

“Sarkar Raj”, the much awaited (not really, but it sounds poetic) sequel to “Sarkar”, which was inspired by Coppola’s “The Godfather”, is a dark brooding crime drama/political thriller. For those who haven’t seen the original “Sarkar”, it features the father-son duo of Amitabh and Abhishek Bachchan in a political crime drama that has the lead [...]

Hanuman named business school chief

File this under the “Dog bites man” and “It happens only in India” category.
Sardar Bhagat Singh College of Technology and Management in Lucknow was so frustrated by it’s search for a chairman, instead of settling for a lesser candidate they went higher. [Fox] (tip Jennie via email)
LUCKNOW, India — He’s a revered Hindu [...]

Bhootnath: Really scary

Be scared of the latest Bollywood movie, Bhootnath ….. real scared. Be scared because you have to pay real money for the ticket.
Regarding, Bhootnath. I watch desi movies in theaters because I get so few of them. Normally I don’t read reviews or hype, so I can form my own opinions. Ditto for Bhootnath, I [...]

ABD student found dead in Delhi under mysterious circumstances (Update)

Update:
Correction from original story: the name of the victim is Keanan not Kenan. Keanan, was the son of Little India editor, Anchal Mehra. This is either one of the weirdest suicides ever, or, one of the craziest stories a police investigation cooked up. [TOI Online]
If going by the official police theories, Keanan did indeed commit [...]

PSA: Phishing scam now targets non-residents in the US

Of interest to our NRI readers in the US:
A bogus IRS letter and Form W-8BEN (Certificate of Foreign Status of Beneficial Owner for United States Tax Withholding) asked non-residents to provide personal information such as account numbers, PINs, mother’s maiden name and passport number. The legitimate IRS Form W-8BEN, which is used by financial institutions [...]

Indian company acquires movie theaters across US

Adlabs Films has partnered with Asian-American-focused media group ImaginAsian Entertainment to acquire around 240 screens in theaters in 28 cities. Why is this significant? As Lisa Tsering of India West explains “The chain may change the way Indian films are booked, released and promoted to NRIs, now that distributors such as Eros and Yash Raj [...]

Race: A James Hadley Chase redux

So, I braved the gang bangers and prostitutes on Orange Blossom Trail in Orlando, FL, to go watch the latest Bollywood potboiler, Race so I can review it for you, our beloved readers of Über Desi.
I can go on and on about the actual storyline of the movie but since it’s a mystery thriller, I [...]

NRI guilty in US-India arms deal

Parthasarathy Sudarshan, a resident of Simpsonville, South Carolina, has been found guilty of illegal arms export from US to India. [link]
img: via AFP
A citizen of India living legally in South Carolina pleaded guilty in federal court to conspiring to illegally export weapons to India, authorities said Thursday. It was one of two cases involving illegal [...]

Don’t touch that !

My friends of the XY peruasion - it has been hard times for that extra appendage that deludes you into thinking you has conferred on you the right to rule the world. Last month an Italian court ruled that grabbing the crotch to ward off the evil eye is unlawful. Evidently, Italian men follow the [...]

An American Conservative in India

Warning: Longest post in Über Desi history.
I find humor in irony. Back in the middle part of 2004, when George W. Bush and John Kerry were going at it, me and my fiancee were shopping for wedding dresses and jewelery for her in desi stories in Atlanta, GA. Around that time the news item on [...]

Desi Dr. Death

Police in India have launched an international manhunt for Dr. Amit Kumar ( alias Dr.Santosh Raut) for masterminding an organ snatching scheme . Poor laborers from Uttar Pradesh had their kidneys removed without their consent. The intended recipients for the kidneys were rich foreigners and NRIs. The involuntary kidney donors received between $ 1200 [...]

Macacas and Moral Pygmies

The “moral pygmy” comment, of course, is borrowed from Representative Tom Lantos, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who christened Internet giant Yahoo! thus, for their role in helping identify a Chinese dissident, who was later imprisoned [link]. While the pygmies wonder what they did to deserve for their name to be used in [...]

India Currents article on the South Asian Blogosphere

India Currents, the West Coast based publication that is “devoted to the exploration of the heritage and culture of India as it exists in the United States” has an informative article [link] written by Rupa Dev, covering the basics of the South Asian blogosphere (tip Ragini via email), sort of a “South Asian Blogosphere for [...]

Snake News from India

Namasssssssssssskar!!!
Snake Rameshimg: via The Hindu
In today’s snake news from India:
A snake goddess is buried alive and lives to hiss about it
Snake Ramesh performs C-section on a pregnant dying snake
and we will take a look at how snake jobs are being outsourced to human.
Hissssss, excuse me.
Sapna Kumari, a 18 year old girl from Himachal Pradesh, was [...]

Blood transfusions gone wild: A case of blood sucking desi parents

When it comes to grades in school and career choices, all desi kids experience parental pressure at different stages in life. Some quotes (translated in English) overheard in real life:
“Mohan beta, how could Raju score 92% marks, and you only get 87%? Your career and life are ruined ……..”
“There is no scope in music/sports. Why [...]

Bollywood’s enemy No. 1.