Author: Lavina Melwani

  From an Unknown Cook to Time’s 100 Most Influential People Vikas Khanna has been selected by Time magazine among this year’s 100 most influential people in the world. Maybe it’s his winning smile or his loving involvement with every human being who comes on his radar, but the award-winning chef of Bungalow has definitely got a secret magic talisman which makes him a total crowd pleaser. I first met Vikas Khanna in the 1990’s when he was still working in a small restaurant called Poornima. His saga is a story of struggles, a rags to riches fairy tale but…

Surrender to the Joy of Music with Grammy winner Falu Shah   It is her inborn language from birth and it comes from the heart. She learned the language of Hindustani music in childhood and has introduced it to major international stages from the Grand Ole Opry to the White House to Carnegie Hall. Meet Falguni Shah, known to the world as Falu, who comes from an unbroken lineage of 11 generations of Indian classical musicians. She has won Grammys and has performed with major names like Yo-Yo Ma and Philip Glass. In her newest concert Surrender which premiered at…

New York Diary Meet Zohran Mamdani in Union Square in Manhattan If you’re a Zohran Mamdani fan/believer or merely hankering for a connect with the new mayor, take a subway to Union Square. You won’t actually see him there, but you’ll get all the Zohran merch your heart desires – from sweatshirts to caps to stickers to Hot Girls for Zohran tees!  Yes, amongst the art vendors, fruit sellers, street musicians and chess players, now there is a Zohran store catering to the walkers, dawdlers and lovers of the historic Union Square Park and the surrounding area. Hard to believe…

    Our Communities: Gender Equality – an Aspiration for India and the Diaspora Women were centerstage this month and women from India and Indian women from the Diaspora had come together at the Consulate of India to celebrate International Women’s Day together. The special guest was the Honorable Minister of State (WCD) Smt. Savitri Thakur, and her delegation from India, who gave a report card on the progress Indian women had made over the years and celebrated their empowerment. The literacy rate, which was 8 percent in 1951 is now 75 percent and women’s life expectancy has increased from…

International Women’s Day – Women Standing Up for Women….   I was on my walk on the New York waterfront, when a young woman handed me a tulip. It was a lovely feeling to be recognized and seen by another woman – not as a Valentine, not as a mother but as just another woman on a journey to create happiness, face struggles and understand the world. The young woman was Urmi from Uzbekistan and she had two other friends carrying bags of tulips, giving them to random women for being women, and so special. Well, of course we became…

People Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit – The Missing Woman – Do We Know Her at All?   We’ve all seen that famous photograph of Mahatma Gandhi and India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru – but did you know that there was a third person in that picture who was edited right out of the picture?   In the original photo, you will see the person who was left out, and who remained just a footnote in history. This being March, Women’s History Month, I should tell you that this canceled person was, of course, a woman – Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, Nehru’s sister,…

  New York Diary Can CHAT-GPT tell you about your personality and the chaat you want to eat? Trust the brains behind AI to come up with a fun game to tell you about your personality and the street food or chaat you’re most likely to enjoy. At a fun event on Sunday at the Museum of the Moving Image (MOMI) ChatGpt and ChaatGPT came together in a delicious free community event where you got to eat chaat and learn about AI. Sitting at a computer you first filled in a survey and AI spit out the street food most…

    Hyderabadi Zaiqa takes Manhattan, One Biryani at a Time. By Lavina Melwani This is a tale of how three unknown chefs with unknown names conquered New York’s food world with Hyderabadi Ziaqa. Hyderabadi Zaiqa? What’s that? It’s the new kid on the block in New York’s ever churning, unstoppable food universe. It’s the restaurant Zohran Mamdani named as one of his favorites and visited at least seven times during his mayoral run. Mayor Mamdani loves biryani and haleem and any restaurant which is so close to the 6 subway line is bound to be close to his heart.…

    New York Diary ChatGPT, ChaatGPT, Chaat BOTs – and Amitabh Bachchan too! In this AI-driven age, we all know what is ChatGPT – but do you know what is ChaatGPT? It is an AI-powered Holi celebration combining food, play, and ideas. Eat chaat—India’s iconic street food—and generate your very own combination of chaat condiments & add-ins with an open-source ChaatBOT, based on your personality and tastes. All this action is happening at the Museum of the Moving Image (MOMI) in Queens where on Sunday, March 8 from 2 pm to 4 pm ChatGpt and ChaatGPT will come together…

Between You and Me Billionaire MacKenzie Scott’s Valentine to the World. Love Comes in Many Ways… Valentine’s Day is all about loving and giving and do I have a love story for you! Last year MacKenzie Scott gave away $7.2 billion to those who had been forgotten and left behind, bringing her gift-giving total to $26 billion. The world is chaotic at this time and it’s an especially difficult time for refugees, the downtrodden, and the outsiders. Along comes a savior, to restore some decency, some humanity to the tumultuous events. MacKenzie Scott conquers not with a sword, but with…

The President’s Cake, by debut Iraqi filmmaker, is Shortlisted for the Oscars Birthday cakes are such a ubiquitous, expected part of life – but not when it’s the President’s Cake!  Then it can bring fear and chaos and take impossible efforts to create something as mundane as a cake. Especially if it’s a mandatory cake for an authoritarian leader.  The President’s Cake, a debut film by Iraqi filmmaker Hasan Hadi takes on this nightmare scenario for Lamia, a nine-year-old girl in Saddam Husain’s Iraq in the 1990’s, who in spite of her fervent prayers, wins the lottery to make the…

New York DiaryPhoto of the Day Photo of the Day: On East River, Chasing the Sun in Manhattan During my daily walk on the New York waterfront, now often deserted, I saw the heavy clouds in the gray sky reflected in the gray waters of the East River. But wait – there was a pale sun struggling to break through them, barely visible! So, I decided to walk it out, chasing the wintry sun – it somehow felt necessary to see it on this cold January afternoon. I followed the moving clouds with my eyes, my finger on my phone…

  New York DiaryOur Communities Raj Goyle for the People of New York New York City is the kind of place where on a Sunday you are likely heading out to a Broadway play, a new restaurant or a book launch – and sometimes it’s for desi chai and bagels to root for a New Yorker who’s trying to change the equation in the public life in America! In a world which is usually full of bad news, this is a happy tale of another super fighter working to change the system. Raj Goyle, a lawyer and former legislator, who…

  New York Diary Celebrating Padma Lakshmi, Food and the World One of the final highlights of 2025 was a buzzing book launch for Padma Lakshmi’s new book at Asia Society. “Padma’s All American: Tales, Travels, and Recipes from Taste the Nation and Beyond” is a cookbook by Padma Lakshmi that celebrates the diverse cultures of America. Packed with a hundred recipes, photos and thoughtful essays, the book is a must-have for foodies. At this packed event, Padma was interviewed by Anu Sehgal of The Culture Tree. In this fun interview Padma spoke of diverse things and I will have…

Zohran Mamdani’s inauguration as mayor of New York brings new hope and possibility to the city

Humans in the loop – Artificial Intelligence, Our World and Us The juggernaut of Artificial intelligence which has taken over our world might seem very far removed from the lives of anonymous tribal women in Jharkhand, and yet, in a thoughtful new film, Humans in the Loop, we learn that both these disparate stories are entwined and very much a part of today’s questing for the future. Aranya Sahay, filmmaker from Mumbai, takes on these two far-flung tales and weaves them together, showing us the dilemmas of our world when an indigenous culture which is thousands of years old and…

      Between You and Me: Sunita Ratanlal – Celebrating A Beautiful Life Relationships: When You Lose the One You Love   Today morning I lost my much-loved older sister Sunita Ratanlal nee Prabha Kripalani. She left for her true home after a fierce battle fought courageously over the past few years and then finally in the ICU. She was 85 and had been ailing for a few years. I still remember her as the beautiful college student who looked like a model. She could sketch, paint and write and ran her own store before the term ‘woman entrepreneur’…

How about Bombay Masala Puffs for your guests during the holiday season? Easy to put together with ingredients you probably have in your pantry.

At Hanukkah, Indian-Jews remember the homeland which nurtured their faith. “India has been the only country in the world where Jews have never been oppressed or suppressed or discriminated against,” says Romiel Daniel, who is Jewish-Indian-American. Indeed, India has been nurturing home and haven for generations of Jews whose ancestors fled from persecution centuries ago. At its peak there were about 37,000 Jews living in India. “Discrimination is something that has never happened in India for 2000 years and that is something we are very proud of, and that is why we go back to India so often,” he says.

  New York Photo: Sunset Meditation over the East River As darkness falls early in December, it is startling to see the sun set over the East River so early in the day and gives me my photo for the day. As bundled up by passers rush home quickly to early dinner, they fail to catch the high drama going on above their heads and miss the most amazing conclusion to the day. Worried about work and family and busy replaying future scenarios of doom in your head? Just look up at the evening sky to witness the sheer magnificence…