Author: Lavina Melwani

Lavina Melwani is a New York-based journalist who writes for several international publications. Twitter@lavinamelwani & @lassiwithlavina Sign up for the free newsletter to get your dose of Lassi!

Feeling hungry? Then let’s introduce you to New Yorker Divya Gugnani who’s turned a passion for food into a delicious new start-up company.This savvy venture capitalist gave up a solid financial career – much before the current downturn – to start a fun new online business called Behind the Burner.

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Forget about the amateurish fight scenes and burning toy cars of the past – special effects, animation and action shots are now all the trend, and very serious business in Bollywood!

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The crowds were as thrilled to see Abhishek and Ash together as if they had done the matchmaking themselves, and they erupted into cheers when Aishwarya said, “New York has special significance in my life – this is where Abhishek proposed to me! It will always remain very, very special to me.”

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Can cinema change the way you think? Can it shape the way society collectively views difficult choices – or can society change the way films reflect certain stereotypes? Rarely do you get an opportunity to mull social issues while enjoying endless cinema and this was the special attraction of I View Film, an annual film festival with the ambitious title of New Ways of Seeing Human Rights Cinema.

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“I have never flown, spoken, moved from hotel to hotel or country to country. Those are activities I long ago delegated to my body. I am always at home and have never left.”

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In the last decade, audiences have seen the emergence of slick comedies, horror films, murder mysteries, sci-fi, ensemble movies and a whole lot more from innovative young directors like Mani Ratnam, Ram Gopal Varma, Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Vishal Bharadwaj and Karan Johar.

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Imagine an opera sung entirely in Sanskrit in the heart of New York! ‘Satyagraha’ is composer Philip Glass’s landmark work, set to text from the Bhagavad Gita, and revolves around Mahatma Gandhi’s years in South Africa and his experiments with civil disobedience. This dramatic event at the Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center uses giant puppets created out of newspapers and powerful special effects combined with Philip Glass’s all-encompassing music. Tenor Richard Croft stars as Gandhi in this must-see opera. Indeed, the high drama and simple truth of Mahatma Gandhi’s Satya Graha or non violent movement came to New York with…

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Religion and culture are best absorbed in childhood, yet these children do not see Hindu culture echoed in the world around them, especially if they live in Small Town, USA where there may be few people who look or worship like them.

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