Chai, an incredibly versatile drink, is next to God in India. Like the Almighty, chai is omnipresent across the country, from a poor man’s hut to billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Antilia, from a roadside stall to a Taj Hotel restaurant, from rural interiors to urban hangouts, from railway platforms to the height of 35000 feet, from Kanyakumari to Kashmir, and from a writer’s desk to an IT employee’s favorite pastime. Reportedly, India consumed over 1.1 billion kilograms of tea in 2021 alone.

Ek cup cha (a cup of tea) is the elixir of life, especially in Kolkata. Serving tea with a couple of Britannia biscuits to guests in households is unique to the culture of Kolkata. Discussing and debating the current state of affairs, from politics to economy, while sipping garam cha (hot tea) at a tea stall is a morning ritual in the City of Joy. Tea is a must-have stimulant accompanying a big bowl of jhalmuri with tele bhaja (fritters) at any adda, a get-together of friends or family members, in the City of Rabindranath Tagore.

Picture Credit: Kolkata Chai Co

Having grown discontented with the westernized versions of tea in the USA, Ani and Ayan Sanyal – an Indian American sibling duo – have been brewing desi chai for thousands of Indians in and outside New York since 2018. Chai is one of the few things that have filled in the void between their life in America and the life they lived in India during their vacations. Ayan and Ani Sanyal in their thirties, established Kolkata Chai Co, an authentic Indian tea brand in New York, out of their love for Kolkata, respect for the native tradition, cravings for cha and, most importantly, nostalgia.

The genesis of the Sanyal brothers’ Kolkata Chai Co began with their trips to India. Right from the booking of flight tickets to Kolkata from USA for vacations, their tastebuds would long for the flavor of roadside tea stalls and street food that the City of Joy is known for. Their excitement would culminate in a visit to their parents’ favorite tea stalls during every trip to Kolkata. The visit is as holy as that to College Street, Coffee House, Nandan, and the Victoria Memorial for art and culture buffs. Hardly does any American tea brand have the flavor and aroma of chai brewed by even traditional stalls in Kolkata’s lanes and alleys.

After their return from one such enlightening trip to the City of Joy in 2017, Ani and Anil started brewing their thoughts and cooking up business plans to make their dream of making America sip authentic desi chai come true. An overwhelming response to the pilot testing of desi chai in farmers markets and culinary workshops gave them green signal to launch Kolkata Chai Co in 2019. Today, Kolkata Chai Café is a landmark on the lower side of Manhattan and a must stop for Indian tea lovers.

Just when the business started toddling, the pandemic shut the café down. Inarguably, opening a business is a capital-intensive process in a city like New York. On top of that, the pandemic made it a lot more difficult to make the business stand as public life came to a standstill in the Big Apple (rather across the globe). They started delivering chai door to door across the city in between two waves of the pandemic. They also came up with Chai Mix and began to ship it across the country. Chai Mix, a signature packaged product with different flavors including the one made with “organic Assam tea leaves and premium spices”, sells like hot cakes.

“Tea being the mainstay of Kolkata Chai Café, the menu has Masala Chai, Kesar Chai, Ginger Chai, Iced Chai, Oatmilk Chai, Filter Coffee, Cardamom Coffee, and Assam Milk Chai. Masala Limca, Turmeric Latte (haldi doodh), and Almond Milk are among the seasonal specials on the menu. Be it the Sanyal brothers’ café in NYC or a humble tea stall in India, chai and samosa make a perfect Indian couple. Therefore, the menu features samosa with mint and tamarind chutney. With egg rolls on the menu, the sibling duo brought a slice of Kolkata’s street food culture to New York. Egg rolls dominate the mood of evening outings in Bengal. However, I am surprised to see jhal muri missing from the menu of Kolkata Chai Café in New York,” said Sourav Agarwal, the Editor of Travel Beats, a leading community portal for Indians in America.

Kolkata Chai Café in New York City is one of the best hangouts for Indians living in or visiting the United States. This exclusive story is part of the new series – Life in America – by Indian Eagle that hundreds of thousands of Indians in USA have chosen as their reliable travel-booking partner. Subscribe to Travel Beats, a subsidiary of Indian Eagle, for community stories, US-India travel news, visa and immigration updates.

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“17 to 1 is the current ratio of male CEOs and female CEOs in the world. Female representation at the top of C-suites was only 8% in 2021, according to male vs female CEO statistics. Women CEOs led merely 10.4 % of businesses owned by US-based conglomerates, as per a 2023 study by Fortune.com. The gender gap in the American corporate is so wide that we got to cover only one Indian-origin woman CEO, Devika Bulchandani, against 15 Indian-origin business leaders who made it big as global CEOs in the past two years,” said Sourav Agarwal, the Editor of Travel Beats.

However, filling the gap a little is Indian-origin Dhivya Suryadevara who recently got her foothold in the American C-suite as CEO of financial services at UnitedHealth Group, the world’s largest health care MNC by revenue. With this most prestigious designation, she joined the elite club of not only Indian American CEOs, but also South Indians like Indra Nooyi, Sridhar Ramaswamy, Sundar Pichai, Anand Eswaran, Satya Nadella, and Somyanarayan Sampath.

CEO Dhivya Suryadevara, who lives in New York City, had made history in 2018 as the first female Chief Finance Officer (CFO) of General Motors in its 110-year history. Her journey from a humble background in Chennai to the C-suite of the leading American automaker was so popular a story in international media that she became a ‘poster girl’ for ambition. She joined GM as a senior financial analyst in SEP 2004 and rose up the ranks, such as Manager, Fixed Income; Managing Director, Investment Strategy; Chief Investment Officer, Asset Management; VP of Corporate Finance in 2015.

She used to be referred to as one of the fastest rising stars at GM due to the meteoric growth in her ‘American Dream’ career. As the youngest Chief Investment Officer of GM Asset Management, Dhivya was at the helm of funds worth $85bn for the company’s pension plans. She made it to Fortune Magazine’s ‘40 under 40’ list of the most influential young people in business for her decisive leadership in finance and investment.

Her strategy for investor relations was a pivot in GM’s profitable investments, including that in Lyft, a ride-hailing service provider in USA and Canada. Her corporate finance planning was among the drivers for the company’s hassle-free acquisition of Cruise, a self-driving tech startup. In an official statement issued in June 2018, GM acknowledged Dhivya’s efforts behind Softbank’s $2.25bn investment in the company’s autonomous vehicle technology project.

Evidently, her resignation only in two years of her role as General Motors’ CFO was headlined as ‘a surprising departure’ in the media coverage far and wide.

Dhivya Suryadevara’s ceaseless thrust for performance and progress comes from the way she was raised along with her two sisters by a single mother in Chennai, India. After her father’s untimely demise, her mother worked hard to provide for their education. “Her high expectations made us want to do better, and we learned that nothing comes easy. You have to work diligently to get what you need or desire,” Dhivya told Quartz.com in an interview.

After having passed Chartered Accountancy following an M.Com. degree, she travelled to the States to study MBA at Harvard Business School. Thereafter, she got to intern at the World Bank in 2002, which propelled her career to UBS Group as an Investment Banker.

Her story may resonate with thousands of Indian students from middle-income families, who are aspiring to get an F1 visa or currently studying in the US or any other country. Since Indian American CEO Dhivya Suryadevara’s flight to USA, Harvard education, and other expenses were funded with student loans, she found herself under a pressure to perform, earn and succeed so that the loan could be paid back with the accrued interest amount.

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The palatial Patel House would have been the shooting location if Bollywood filmmaker Karan Johar’s Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahaani had been filmed in the United States. Spread over 17 acres, the majestic residence – Surya Kiran Palace – is either a dream or envy of every Indian-origin billionaire. Home to three generations of an Indian American billionaire family, the Patel House is worth a visit (by invitation only) in the southeast US.

PC: Malviyacraft.com

Surya Kiran Palace is a most prized possession of Dr Kiran Patel and Dr Pallavi Patel who call Tampa their home in Florida. Their newly-built Carrollwood residence is, apparently, the largest in Hillsborough County. It took 10 years to be complete in 2023 following the ground-breaking ceremony in 2013. This is where the Patel couple hosted their golden marriage anniversary amid fun, feasts and fireworks 9 months ago.

With Mughal-style arches, towering columns, and pink-hued sandstone, the multimillion-dollar Patel House features traditional architecture (an eclectic mix of Indian, Persian and Italian styles) from outside. The grand interior is very much American and exudes contemporary elegance, from 22-ft floor to ceiling windows to the exclusive collection of handpicked artifacts for décor.

The residential part of the Patels’ 17-acre estate in Tampa Bay has two main wings over a total area of 63,000 square feet. Dr Kiran Patel resides in one wing with his wife Pallavi, and the other wing houses their son and his family. Each wing has a private entrance. They share the kitchen, the living area, the home theatre, and the indoor temple out of their adherence to the age-old Indian practice of keeping family members united.

Be it philanthropy or their personal space, the Patels are equally liberal with their wealth. The colossal entrance leading to the main hall faces a pool with fountains; a testimony to their king-size living. It is a square structure with shikharas and intricately designed arches on four sides, like the magnificent porch of mansions in the erstwhile Rajputana provinces of Gujarat and Rajasthan. Surprisingly, bigger than this is the outermost entrance built like a watchtower.

The central unit consists of a fully airconditioned, palatial edifice having 32,000-sqft space. The formal living area is as immensely spacious as over 15,000 square feet that can accommodate more than 500 guests at a time. What is more surprising is that the Patels’ Surya Estate in Tampa has a banquet hall sprawling 4,000 square feet and three guest houses. The residential area is meticulously landscaped with sprawling lawns, gardens, fountains, waterfalls, and an astounding 450m long swimming pool.

In Florida, the Patel House compound also has two small blocks, each having over 7500sqft space, where the Patels’ two physician daughters will gradually move in with their spouses. “I am very fortunate that all my three children decided to stay in Tampa, which is unusual in this day and age,” the Tampa Bay Times quoted Dr Patel saying in an article. There is dedicated space for yoga and meditation, and a beautiful lotus blossom made of glass draws attention to this relaxing space.

The compound, on the inner side, is lined with cypress trees which were planted celebrating Dr Kiran C Patel’s 65^th birth anniversary. The 17-acre Surya Estate does also encompass a lake that adds to the serene ambience and scenic beauty of the palatial residence. If the richest Indian business family’s Antilia in Mumbai is a vertical wonder, the Indian-American pharma baron’s Surya Kiran Estate in Tampa is a marvel on ground.

Florida-based Dr Kiran Patel and Pallavi Patel are healthcare entrepreneurs with several philanthropic undertakings to their credit. In 2019, they made a whopping, nonprofit investment of $200 million to Nova Southeaster University for free medical education of meritorious students from India and other developing countries. Most recently, they inaugurated a new medical college of osteopathic medicine in Orlando, Florida, among their funded projects for the welfare of humankind.

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The growing cohort of Indian-origin global CEOs, on February 28, welcomed a new member who had nurtured American Dreams in a small temple town of South India. He was a growth driver for Google’s advertising business from $1.5 billion to over $100 billion during his 15-year tenure but could not enter the search giant’s C-suite despite his huge potential. He resigned from Google within 3 years of Sundar Pichai’s new leadership role as CEO.

Finally, Sridhar Ramaswamy, the erstwhile king of Google advertising, hit the jackpot as the new CEO of a multibillion dollar data cloud company, Snowflake, headquartered in Montana. Within 12 months of joining Snowflake after the acquisition of his ad-free search engine named Neeva, he is elevated to the CEO role and the company’s board of directors from the previous position of Senior Vice President of artificial intelligence.

PC: news-lankasri.com

The 57-year-old tech behemoth has been helming the AI strategy at Snowflake, from planning to execution to scaling up, since 2023. “As the leading cloud data platform, Snowflake is at the epicentre of the AI revolution. There is no better person than Sridhar to lead the company into this next phase of growth and deliver on the opportunity ahead in AI and machine learning. He is a visionary technologist with a proven track record of running and scaling successful businesses. I have the utmost confidence in Sridhar,” said Frank Slootman, the Chairman of the Board at Snowflake.

As CEO of Snowflake, Sridhar Ramaswamy will be leading a global workforce of around 6000 employees to reach new highs in artificial intelligence; a herculean task given Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai’s struggle to make Google Gemini deliver unerring performance. Apparently, Mr Ramaswamy is consummate in both online search technology and artificial intelligence. He is a fitness freak and avid reader too.

Born in Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, Mr. Ramaswamy took the world aback with his launch of the world’s first private ads-free search engine, Neeva, nearby Google’s headquarters in California. Neeva was born out of his disillusion with Google’ s reckless tracking of user data for more revenues from online advertising. Possibly, his picture of a utopian search world where consumer privacy is not a commodity fell apart, leading to his resignation from Google where he climbed up the ranks from a software engineer to the Senior Vice President of ads and commerce.

Also Read: Billionaire CEO Nikesh Arora, Google’s Once Highest Paid Executive

Sridhar Ramaswamy co-founded Neeva with Vivek Raghunathan, an ex-VP of Engineering at Google, to generate a revenue by selling economical subscriptions for ad-free experience, not by tracking users for targeted advertising. Google was (and is) too formidable to be shaken though Neeva was initially hailed as competition to Google and was able to raise funds. Nearly a dozen of Googlers joined Neeva in various roles and departments over time. However, Snowflake acquired Neeva in 2023 and brought the cofounders – Sridhar and Vivek – on board.

It was Sridhar Ramaswamy, an IIT Madras graduate, whose fire in the belly, passion for new technologies, and prior experience of machine learning development were among the building blocks of Google’s advertising empire. In 2003, he joined Google with a treasure of experience as a researcher and a database analyst from Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies, and Epiphany, Inc. He became a part of the American workforce after having earned a master’s degree and PhD in computer science from Brown University, an Ivy League research university in Rhode Island.

“A lot has been told and written about Indian-origin CEOs leading enterprises over US$1 trillion. A documentary should now be made on what makes Indians astute business leaders and global CEOs, from Laxman Narasimhan at Starbucks to YouTube CEO Neal Mohan to Edelweiss AMC’s MD & CEO Radhika Gupta, giving an insight into their certain qualities, such as the art of dealing with cultural intricacies, flexible adaptability, expertise in making multicultural collaborations, the trait of treating a team like family, etc.,” said Sourav Agarwal, the Editor of Travel Beats.

The post Sridhar Ramaswamy, Who Drove Google’s Ads Revenue to $100bn, Becomes First Indian American CEO of Snowflake appeared first on Travel to India, Cheap Flights to India, Aviation News, India Travel Tips.

The world often wonders what makes overseas Indians secure seats in the C-suite of global conglomerates, earn big paychecks, and eventually, become billionaires. Various interpretations and views are boiled down to the inference that they were raised to be disciplined and dedicated during their journey from humble beginnings to mighty goals. This is also true about Indian American Nikesh Arora, who recently inducted himself into the club of billionaire CEOs.

Billionaire Nikesh Arora is the CEO and Chairman of Palo Alto Networks, a leading cybersecurity MNC headquartered in California. The $125 million stock and options that he received after joining Palo Alto in June 2018 has more than quadrupled to $830 million, riding the back of a huge demand for cybersecurity software solutions that boomed in the wake of high-profile hacking events in various industries, according to a Bloomberg report.

PC: IIT BHU, Varanasi

Combined with his investments and previous remunerations, the current worth of his enviable stake in Palo Alto Networks catapulted him into the elite club of billionaire tech leaders. Precisely, Nikesh Arora’s net worth is $1.5 billion, which places him beside Alphabet Inc.’s CEO Sundar Pichai and among the richest Indian Americans. His ‘lady luck’ at Palo Alto continues to run high as he is entitled to 750,000 stock awards as part of his compensation in 2023, as far as his performance is concerned.

The current value of the above award stock would probably stand at over $220 million. “Because of this significant vested ownership and the amount that Mr. Arora was projected to vest in over the next several years, the Board determined that a meaningful equity award would be necessary to ensure that such award retains and engages Mr. Arora,” the Bloomberg report adds.

Nikesh Arora’s impressive journey had no rosy start

CEO Nikesh Arora’s epic journey from rejections to survival with a few hundred dollars to the American C-suite is one of discipline, determination, and dedication. Obviously, he did not have a rosy start back home (India). Born to an officer in the Indian Air Force, Mr Arora had a disciplined upbringing, which played an important role in charting the course of his life and career, starting from a B.Tech. degree in Electrical Engineering from IIT BHU, Varanasi.

Driven by his passion for technology and business, he travelled to the United States in 1989. He earned an MS in finance from Boston College and an MBA degree from Northeastern University, strengthening his business acumen in the tech industry. His profound knowledge of finance and international business in the ever-changing tech landscape shaped and pushed his career through ranks at Google and Softbank during the dot-com period and in the aftermath of the 2008 Great Recession.

Nikesh Arora – Google’s highest paid C-suite executive in 2012

His decade-long epic career at Google started with his role of leading the search giant’s European operations from 2004 until 2017. The back-to-back senior leadership roles accelerated his rise to becoming the chief business officer – the fourth important player in Google’s core leadership team comprising Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt. He explored new markets and partnerships for Google’s advertisement verticals including display ads. His astute business strategies attracted scores of advertisers for YouTube’s revenue growth 10 years before Indian American Neal Mohan became CEO of Google’s video sharing platform in early 2023.

In 2013, Nikesh Arora became a popular face on the cover page of leading business magazines as Google’s highest-paid key executive with a compensation package of nearly $58 million in cash and stock. After pushing the envelope of Google’s advertisement business until 2014, he joined Softbank Group as President in quest of bigger challenges and responsibilities. He created history by having become the first Indian-origin President on the board of Softbank Group. Today’s billionaire Arora led Softbank’s investments in India’s tech startups including Ola Cabs, Oyo Rooms, Grofers, Snapdeal, and Housing.com.

He is more known as a business leader and investor than a globetrotter. Few Silicon Valley professionals know that he is an avid traveler with his diary crammed with moments of business class travel to more than 60 countries. He has many miles to go as both a leader and a traveler.

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The Indian American CEO of Genpact, a leading global business transformation service provider, is hanging up his boots. Another Indian American is taking over the reins of Genpact as next CEO. The winning streak of Indian-origin business leaders at securing a C-suite seat at global tech giants continues with Balkrishan Kalra being named as CEO of Genpact headquartered in New York City.

Balkrishan Kalra, who hails from Punjab, is all set to join the growing cohort of Indian American CEOs helming multinational corporations, including Google, Microsoft, IBM, Adobe, Micron Technology, NetApp, Zscaler, FedEx, Starbucks, Verizon, and Chanel. Ravi Kumar as Cognizant’s CEO, Neal Mohan as YouTube’s CEO, Vimal Kapur as Honeywell’s CEO, and Rahul Roy-Chowdhury as Grammarly’s CEO ascended the hot seat of CEO this year.

Unlike his contemporaries in the C-suite of America, BK Kalra is neither an IIM graduate nor an IIT alumnus. He does not even have a degree from a prestigious American school. He graduated from Panjab University with a master’s degree in Business Administration and began his career as an investment banker in New Delhi. He will continue to render his services to Genpact as its Global Business and Digital Transformation leader until he takes office as CEO on February 9, 2024.

“BK has been an integral part of Genpact’s success, and I am confident that, under his leadership, we are well-positioned for the next phase of our journey and future growth,” said Tiger Thyagarajan, who is retiring as CEO of Genpact in February after 12 years at the helm. The current President and CEO, Tiger Thyagarajan, will be serving as a member of the Board of Directors after stepping down from his position.

Genpact’s new CEO Balkrishan Kalra got the opportunity to pursue his American Dream in 1999 when he joined General Electric, a Boston-headquartered MNC, as its global operations leader for banking and insurance. The turning point in his career came after 6 years when he was appointed as Vice President for Consumer Goods and Life Sciences at Genpact, then a new division of General Electric, in 2005. There had been no looking back since then.

With Genpact’s phenomenal growth from $4 million revenues to $4.37 billion in 2022, he rose through ranks on the corporate ladder “helping companies grow from idea conceptualization into large globally competitive enterprises.” A certified Lean 6 Sigma Black Belt, Kalra is a leading member of the seed team that founded Genpact and transformed it into a business transformation leader for Fortune 500 companies. In his nearly 20-year association with Genpact, BK Kalra has led business-critical digital transformation initiatives across various verticals including banking, finance, retail, healthcare, consumer goods, capital markets, and life sciences.

NV Thyagarajan initiated an investment of $600 million in generative artificial intelligence and data science over the next three years. As the succeeding CEO of Genpact, BK Kalra will be overseeing this initiative for smooth transition into AI. “He understands the importance of investing in emerging trends and technologies with a particular focus on AI-enabled solutions. BK’s strategic vision and deep understanding of our clients and business is exactly what Genpact needs as we enter this new chapter,” said Chairman James Madden.

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AMERICA continues to reap the fruits of what Sardar JJ Singh did by unblocking the path to US Citizenship for Indian immigrants in 1946. It started attracting intelligent brains and innovative minds from free India. The passage to America was widened by Air India’s first flight from Bombay to New York in 1960. Since then, America has nurtured and preserved Indian talents with a myriad number of opportunities on its soil.

In their second/adopted home, the Indian American community is equally shining in every walk of life, from spirituality to science. Like every year, 2023 has seen the best of them, from their winning the Scripps National Spelling Bee to the Regeneron Science Talent Search and the Miss Teen USA title.

PC: The White House | Dr Subra Suresh (left), Dr Ashok Gadgil (right)

Dr Subra Suresh is awarded the National Medal of Science

Indian-American Dr Subra Suresh is one of the nine recipients of the ‘National Medal of Science’ this year. An accomplished engineer, scientist and academic, he is a rare breed of exceptional talent. His pioneering research across engineering, physical and life sciences earned him the coveted medal. Dr Suresh, a Padma Shri awardee, has published over 300 research papers and co-authored three books.

Born into a middle class family in Mumbai, Dr Suresh graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. Having secured a full scholarship from Iowa University soon after his graduation, he bought a flight ticket to USA with borrowed money and flew to the land of the American Dream with nothing but $100 in his pocket and an ambition greater than his meagre funds. He received a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Iowa State University and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

After his postdoctoral research, he joined the engineering faculty at Brown University as the youngest member of the faculty. A decade later, he moved to MIT as a professor and later served as a dean. He was then nominated by the then-president Barack Obama (unanimously confirmed by the US Senate) as the director of the National Science Foundation.

Dr Subra Suresh holds the distinction of being one of the very few Americans elected to three branches of the US National Academies (engineering in 2002, sciences in 2012, and medicine in 2013). In his long years of academic service, he also held the positions of president at Carnegie Mellon University and Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He returned to Brown’s School of Engineering in September 2023 as a professor at large.

Dr Ashok Gadgil is awarded the National Medal of Technology & Innovation

Mumbai-born Ashok Gadgil is among 12 tech revolutionaries presented with the ‘National Medal of Technology and Innovation’ at the White House. Hailed as a ‘humanitarian inventor’, Dr Gadgil dedicated himself to developing low-cost, sustainable solutions to tackle grave problems worldwide, ranging from water contamination to climate change. His ground-breaking innovations have touched the lives of over 100 million people across the world.

His inventions are driven by an urge to uplift the vulnerable and his belief in the power of innovation to transform lives. In his own words, his journey started with the resolve ‘to make lives a little better for those who are born in less fortunate societies, less fortunate countries, and less fortunate circumstances’ (quoted from his interview with Berkeley Labs). The 1993 cholera outbreak in south Asia led him to create UV Waterworks while the suffering of millions of refugees living in camps in Sudan’s Darfur spurred him to develop Berkeley-Darfur stove.

For his UV Waterworks, he bagged two awards in 1996 – Discover Award for the most significant environmental invention of the year and the Popular Science Award for “Best of What is New – 1996”.

A post-graduate alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology, he earned M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Physics from the University of California, Berkeley. After his studies, he took a flight to India and joined a non-profit organization there. After 5 years, he flew back to California and began his career as a staff scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). A man of multiple interests, he expanded his knowledge and gained expertise in applied math, fluid dynamics, mechanical engineering, and technical, economic and policy research on energy efficiency in developing countries.

Indian American Ashok Gadgil is a distinguished Professor Emeritus of Civil and Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley and the co-editor of the journal, Annual Review of Environment and Resources. He served as the former director for their Environmental Energy Technologies Division. According to Berkeley website, he has more than 105 refereed archival journal papers, 150 conference papers, and several patents. In recognition of his life-sustaining innovations, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2014.

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No matter how familiar the beats of dhaak, the fragrance of shiuli flowers (Nyctanthes arbor–tristis), the taste of festive food, the ambience of festive evenings, the feeling of sacred flower offering, the significance of Sandhi Puja and the joy of sindur khela are to those living abroad, they strongly feel drawn to home this time of the year. They brave the odds to come home and go on a celebration spree in the neighborhoods where they have grown up. Undeniably, Durga Puja is not just an annual festival but a homecoming occasion for NRI Bengalis. So strong is their umbilical cord with the roots that many Bengalis in the Indian American community book last-minute flights to India out of an overwhelming urge to get together with the family, friends, and relatives back home during the festival.

On the other hand, there are those who have never been away from home during Durga Puja. They wonder how Durga Puja is celebrated abroad, how culturally different the celebration is, how authentic the rituals are, how joyous the festivity is, if young Bengali NRIs flaunt traditional fashion, etc. A women-only group from the Indian community in the San Francisco Bay Area has the answer to all these. Ena Sarkar, the founder and CEO of WomenNow TV, a trend-setting South Asian talk show in the Bay Area, shares nitty-gritty of their all-women Durga Puja celebration in Santa Clara with Sourav Agarwal, the Editor of Travel Beats, a leading Indian American community portal. 

Initiated in 2015 by the WomenNow TV team, the Santa Clara Durga Utsav is one of the best Durga Puja events in California. The women-only group is prepared with a better and greater plan for the celebration which has become one of the most awaited Indian events in the Bay Area. Ena Sarkar and her team of women from different walks of life pull all stops to make various arrangements for four days of the festival from buying the idol to shopping for puja-special things to organizing cultural functions to making culinary offerings for the Goddess to distributing Prasad to managing the gathering of visitors in the marquee.

WomenNow TV founder & CEO Ena Sarkar at Santa Clara Durga Utsav

What made the WomenNow TV team come forward to organize Durga Puja in the San Francisco Bay Area was the idea of celebrating the collective power of ‘women now’ (today’s women) that they represent. It coincided with the tradition of invoking Goddess Durga or Shakti to bless her children with the power of good over evil. In addition, a cultural platform was needed for the Bay Area Indians to gather under one roof and interact with each other.

“The Santa Clara Durga Utsav is an interface between the divine purpose of this festival and the philosophy of WomenNow. We also wanted to provide a cultural platform for the Bay Area Indians to gather under one roof and interact with each other. Ours is not just a women-only celebration but a community get-together,” Ena Sarkar said.

WomenNow TV’s celebration of Durga Puja is an absolutely different picture of what appears a male-dominated activity in the patriarchal society of India. In aristocratic households from urban India to rural India, women prepare for the celebration and make arrangements for ceremonies on each day of the festivity behind the curtain, while menfolk gear up with their tasks and activities in the outer world. However, the scenario is changing for women among the urban aristocrats of Bengal.

In contrast to it, WomenNow’s Santa Clara Durga Utsav is a women-only celebration in terms of preparation and arrangement. Needless to say, Durga Puja is a mammoth celebration which entails a lot of doing from fund collection to venue management to cultural performance to immersion of idols. However, the WomenNow team has proven that nothing is impossible for the collective power of women by overcoming all initial difficulties and challenges including selection of the venue. Since the celebration is not limited to worshiping but comprises feasting and cultural functions, they required a venue with ample space to accommodate a considerable crowd of visitors during certain rituals like dhunuchi dance.

The Santa Clara Durga Utsav in the Bay Area is no exception to such usual contrasts as India vs USA, East vs West, the Oriental vs the Occidental, and Indians vs Indian Americans which often come up in regular discussions, debates and conversations. Ena Sarkar unhesitatingly bared her mind regarding if there is any cultural difference between Durga Puja celebration in USA and that in India.

“Definitely, there is. You can never compare the way Bengal celebrates Durga Puja to anywhere else in the world. What a grand, fabulous, joyous, incredible celebration in Bengal! But we try to get as close to home as we can by dressing traditionally, having the traditional food and observing the age-old rituals during the festival no matter how many thousands of miles we are away from Kolkata. There is no dearth of enthusiasm about the celebration in the Bay Area Indian community.”

When Ena talked about the boundless enthusiasm of Bengalis in the Bay Area, we at Travel Beats felt curious to know if young Indian Americans who were born in USA feel the same about Durga Puja and connect with it the same way as India-born Bengalis or Bengalis from India do in America.

Ena Sarkar said in no uncertain terms, “It is somewhat difficult for young Indians in USA to feel connect with the festival as they have been growing up in a country where there are multiple cultures and religions existing side by side. They have not yet understood the value of surrender to a single divine power – the essence of Hinduism. However, children certainly visit the puja venue with their parents and enjoy the festivities. They may not groove to the beats of dhaak but they enjoy the festive music.”

On a closing note, Ena Sarkar acknowledged that the Santa Clara Durga Utsav would not have been a grand celebration in the Bay Area without her WomenNow team and that it has become popular with their American friends as well.

This article is part of the series, Indian Life in America, by Travel Beats, a leading community portal for Indian Diaspora. Travel Beats is a subsidiary of IndianEagle.com that thousands of Indians in USA have chosen as their reliable travel-booking partner for international trips. Subscribe to our newsletter for community stories, US-India travel news, visa and immigration updates.

The post This All-Women Durga Puja Celebration in Bay Area Proves that Indian Culture Knows no Borders appeared first on Travel to India, Cheap Flights to India, Aviation News, India Travel Tips.

Indian American Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao, who was a living legend in Statistics, departed to heaven before India reached the Moon on August 23. At the age of 102, Dr C R Rao, a mathematician with several feathers in his cap, breathed his last at his residence in Buffalo, New York on August 22.

Unlike today’s Green Card and US citizenship aspirants, Dr C R Rao had served Mother India until his retirement at the age of 60 before he settled in the United States.  He was once again in the spotlight of global media as he was awarded the International Prize in Statistics 2023 in July for his monumental work done 75 years ago, which “not only revolutionized statistical thinking in its time but also continues to exert enormous influence on human understanding of science across a wide spectrum of disciplines”, according to the International Prize in Statistics Foundation’s chair.

PC: PTI (left) and Bhavana.org.in (right)

The International Prize in Statistics is the highest honor in the field of Statistics and equivalent to the Nobel Prize. The prize comes with $80,000. The award celebrates the fundamental results that Dr Rao demonstrated in his 1945 paper published in the Bulletin of the Calcutta Mathematical Society. “His three fundamental results – the Cramer-Rao lower bound, the Rao-Blackwell Theorem, and Information Geometry – paved the way for the modern arena of statistics and provided statistical tools heavily used in science today,” said the International Prize in Statistics Foundation.

The Cramer-Rao lower bound is of significant use in signal processing, quantum physics, spectroscopy, multiple image radiography, and likes. The Rao-Blackwell theorem has influenced research on stereology, particle filtering, computational econometrics, and others. Dr Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao’s Information Geometry has been a great use for recent advancements in artificial intelligence, signal processing, data science, and image segregation. His work in the field of statistics has profound impact on other fields such as economics, biometry, medicine, national planning, genetics, and anthropology.

Dr C. R. Rao, who received the United States’ National Medal of Science in 2002, was born in a Telugu family in Karnataka in 1920. He had stumbled into statistics over his failure to secure military service during the British rule in India. He was among the first five students to have earned a master’s degree in statistics from Calcutta University. When he was barely 5, he could memorize multiplication tables up to 16 by 16, which helped people with everyday monetary transactions in the pre-independence era. He gave credit to his mother for instilling discipline into his life. He wrote in one of his books:

“In my younger days, she woke me up every day at 4 in the morning and lit the oil lamp for me to study in the quiet hours of the morning when the mind is fresh.”

At the age of 102, he was a Professor Emeritus at Pennsylvania State University and a Research Professor at the University of Buffalo, New York. In 2010, he received the India Science Award, the most prestigious honor that the government of India confers in the domain of science. Prior to that, he received the Padma Bhushan in 1968 and the Padma Vibhushan in 2001. In 2013, he had earned nomination for the Noble Peace Prize for his contribution to the International Encyclopaedia of Statistical Science.

The third and the first Indian-origin recipient of the International Award in Statistics, Dr C. R. Rao earned 38 honorary doctoral degrees from universities in as many as 19 countries. He was a member of National Academies in India, the UK, the US, and Italy. He was also the President of the International Statistical Institute headquartered in the Netherlands, and the International Biometric Society headquartered in Washington DC. He was also a Senior Policy and Statistics Advisor for the Indian Heart Association (IHA), a non-profit organization committed to making the South Asian population aware of cardiovascular health.

The post At 102, Indian American CR Rao who Earned 38 Honorary Doctoral Degrees from 19 Countries Takes His Last Breath appeared first on Travel to India, Cheap Flights to India, Aviation News, India Travel Tips.

Durga Puja is one of the grandest and most-awaited Indian festivals in October 2023. It is a most spectacular celebration in the Indian state of Bengal. However, the festival is celebrated with equal enthusiasm wherever Bengalis are in the world. About two dozen of Durga Puja events in New Jersey and New York transform the northeast cost into a mini Bengal with cultural exuberance this time of the year. Bengali associations across New York and New Jersey started preparations months ago, so that the festivity does not fall short of joy and happiness in their adopted home. They can live away from home, but can’t survive without the blessings of Maa Durga, the bliss of bhoger kichudi, the beats of dhak, and the ecstasy of dunuchi naach.

Travel Beats, a leading overseas Indian community portal by Indian Eagle, recommends some of the best places for Durga puja 2023 celebrations in New York and New Jersey.  “Elo re Dugga elo re…” 

PC: Canva | Freepik

Sanskriti Durga Puja 2023: Buffalo, New York

Sanskriti, a Bengali cultural association in Buffalo, is one of the best and oldest Durga Puja celebrations in New York. Founded in 1974-75, the Sanskriti Durga Puja is a cultural platform for the present generation of Bengali Diaspora in the northeast US to have a tryst with their heritage, literature, and traditions thousands of miles away from India. Sanskriti also celebrates other festivals with equal enthusiasm. Their Durga Puja celebration was graced by such renowned performing artists as Purna Das Boul and Bhupen Hazarika in the years gone by.

• Dates: October 20, 21, 22
• Venue: Hindu Cultural Society, 1595 N French Road, Getzville, NY 14068
• Contact: president@buffalosanskriti.org, +1 716-331-7657
• Website: Buffalosanskriti.org

East Coast Durga Puja Association, New York 

The East Coast Durga Puja Association (ECDPA), the oldest Bengali community in North America, is recognized for their celebration as the best of all New York Durga puja events. Mayor Eric Adams presented them with a citation in 2019 recognizing their contribution towards creating a platform for themselves and other ethnic communities in the borough of Brooklyn. Like previous years, the ECDPA Durga Puja 2023 has a lineup of cultural programs, including a kids talent show.  

• Dates: October 14 and 15
• Venue: Gujarat Samaj Hall, 17315 Horace Harding Expy, Queens, NY 11365
• Contact: (516) 308-2246 or ECDPANY@gmail.com 
• Website: ECDPAnewyork.com

New York Kali Mandir Durga Puja, Baldwin

One of the most traditional Durga Puja events in New York is organized by New York Kali Mandir in Baldwin. Inspired by the Dakshineswar Kali Temple of Kolkata, NYKM is home to Goddess Kali worshiped by Bengalis and other Indian communities. Founded in 2005, the temple doubles up as a community organization and helps preserve the age-old Bengali cultural traditions in New Yok Metropolitan Area. Located close to NY JFK International Airport, the temple has a well-stocked library for all age groups. Those interested in volunteering can serve the temple this Durga Puja.    

• Dates: October 21 to 23
• Venue: 614 Seaman Ave, Baldwin, NY, 11510
• Contact: nykmdevotee@gmail.com, +1 516-771-5254
• Website: Nykalimandir.org

Also read: Sanyal Brothers Offer Best Kolkata Street Food with Chai in New York

Durga Puja at Ramakrishna Vivekananda Center of New York

Durga Puja at the Ramakrishna Vivekananda Center of New York for the followers of the Ramakrishna order is among the best Durga puja celebrations in the Greater New York Area. Founded in 1933, the center organizes the puja to worship the Divine Mother and seek Her blessings for the humankind. The chanting of sacred hymns and the singing of devotional songs in chorus are the mainstay of their celebration without pomp and in strict adherence to the principles laid out by Belur Math, the headquarters of Ramakrishna Missions worldwide.   

• Dates: October 22
• Venue: 17 E 94th St, New York, NY 10128
• Contact: (212) 534-9445
• E-mail:  rvcenternewyork@gmail.com
• Website: Ramakrishna.org

East Coast Cultural Association Durga Puja, NY

The East Coast Cultural Association, one of the youngest communities in New York, is planning a large-scale Durga puja event this year to mark its second anniversary. Founded in 2022, the non-profit organization celebrates every event significant to Bengali culture in a grand way, bringing together the Bengali community in the New York, New Jersey and Connecticut areas. Their Durga puja celebration stands for cultural integrity and camaraderie. Their event schedule includes a Bollywood evening on OCT 20 with singer Vaishali Mhade of ‘pinga’ song fame in Bajirao Mastani. The ECCA Durga Puja organizers are yet to announce other cultural programs. 

• Dates: October 20, 21, 22
• Venue: Gujarati Samaj Hall, 17315 Horace Harding Expy, Queens, NY 11365
• Contact: eastcoastcultural@gmail.com
• Website: Eccany.com

Utsov Inc. Durga Puja 2023, Edison NJ

Utsov Inc. is known for one of the biggest Durga Puja celebrations in Edison, New Jersey. Utsov Inc. Durga Puja 2023 in East Brunswick has a number of ‘wow’ factors – delectable Bengali food, Sindhoor Kela, cultural programs, shopping stalls, art competition for kids and Dhunuchi dance competition for adults. Online or offline registration is mandatory to enter the venue. Raj Burman, a talented Hindi and Bengali artist (who won the “Best Bengali Playback Singer” in the Tele Cine Awards) will be entertaining the audience on a musical evening at the Utsov Inc Durga Puja in Edison.  

• Dates: October 21 and 22
• Contact: 732 648 7461 or 313 338 8678, utsov@utsov.org
• Venue: Jo Ann Magistro Performing Arts Center, 200 Rues Lane, East Brunswick, NJ 
• Website: Utsov.org

Also read: Indian Food is a Pure Bliss at This Temple Kitchen in New York

Garden State Puja Committee: Durga Puja in New Jersey

One of the oldest and biggest Durga Puja events in New Jersey is organized by the Bengalis of Garden State Puja Committee, Jersey City. GSPC Durga Utsov 2023 will celebrate its 42nd anniversary over foot-tapping numbers of rock bands, Lakkhichhara and the Anupam Roy Band. Nostalgic renditions of  Rabindra Sangeet by Sahana Bajpaie, a contemporary vocalist, will lend the vibes of Kolkata to the venue during the festivity.

Bongobhoj – a traditional Bengali food fare – is the mainstay of their celebration. Garden State Puja Committee, Jersey City is a non-profit community organization bridging the gap between their life in the US and their roots in Bengal, and providing gharoa paribesh for all festive celebrations. The funds it raises through the concert will be used for charitable and educational causes.

• Dates: October 21 and 22
• Venue: William L. Dickinson High School, 2 Palisade Ave, Jersey City, NJ 07306
• Contact: +1 201-993-4577 | info@gardenstatepuja.org
• Website: gspcnj.com

New Jersey Kallol Durga Puja 2023  

Among the Durga Puja events in New Jersey, Kallol Durga Puja is an engaging celebration every year. Among the oldest Bengali organizations in the US, Kallol has grown from 24 members to a few hundreds now. Multicultural programs including musical performances by eminent artists from India are integral to their Sharodiya celebration. Prithibi rock band is all set to enthrall the audience with their electrifying performance on Friday, while Lopamudra Mitra, Joy Sarkar and Nirmalya Roy will take over the stage on Saturday.

Kallol Durga Puja 2023 will culminate with foot-tapping and soulful numbers by popular artists Shaan and Sandeep Bhattacharjee India. The four-day festivity is an absolute cultural and musical extravaganza at Kallol in Somerset, NJ.

• Dates: October 20 to 23
• Venue: Ukranian Cultural Center, 135 Davidson Avenue, Somerset, New Jersey 08873
• Contact: 732.290.5218
• Website: Kallol.com

Also read: Why Bengal worships living goddesses during Durga puja

Alor Benu Durga Puja in Edison, NJ 

The ‘Ekchala’ style Durga idol is the main attraction of this simple, humble celebration by a few Bengali families in Edison. This is more a gharoa (family) puja than a community puja. The festive evenings from 20 to 22 October will see various cultural indulgences by the organizers and their families. The puja schedule is chock-a-block with traditional rituals from the morning till family dinner in the evening.

• Dates: October 20 to 22
• Venue: 2 Farmhaven Avenue, Edison, NJ 08820
• Contact: aamantran@aalorbenu.net

New Jersey Ananda Mandir Durga Puja 2023

Durga Puja at Ananda Mandir in New Jersey is a most traditional one. Hundreds of New Jersey Indians throng the shrine to immerse themselves in festive revelries for five days. New Jersey Ananda Mandir is one of the few Hindu temples in USA that follows the Bengali calendar precisely for celebrating Durga Puja and other festivals. The temple that also doubles up as an Indian cultural center was commissioned in 1995 and completed in 2003. You may need to pre-register online for a slot. On successful booking of a slot, you would receive a confirmation email, which you can show to the volunteers at the temple complex.

• Dates: October 21 to 23
• Venue: 269 Cedar Grove Lane, Somerset, NJ 08873-5212
• Contact: (732) 873-9821 or info@anandamandir.org
• Website: Anandamandir.org

Garden State Cultural Association: Plainfield, NJ

Among Durga puja events 2023 in New Jersey, Garden State Cultural Association (GSCA) is in the 32nd year of the celebration. GSCA, a nonprofit Indian American organization of Bengalis in Plainfield, leaves no stone unturned to make Durga Puja a grand get-together of not only Bengalis but also other Indian communities over delicious food, shopping and cultural entertainment. The interesting lineup of events include talent shows and drawing competitions.

Registration is compulsory to attend the event. You can register on their website given below. Popular Indian singers Papon and Aditi Munshi are among the eminent guests this year. Kumari Puja is a not-to-be-missed event at GSCA Durga Puja in New Jersey.      

• Dates: October 28 and 29
• Venue: Plainfield High School, 950 Park Avenue, Plainfield, NJ 07060
• Contact: (908) 754-3079 or contact@gsca.us
• Website: web.gsca.us

Also Read: Payal Saha’s Kati Roll from Kolkata Rocks in New York

Bengali Cultural Society Durga Puja 2023: South Jersey

Of Durga puja events in New Jersey, Bengali Cultural Society’s celebration is a lot more than food, fun and frolic. Rather, it mirrors the rich cultural and literary heritage of Bengal on the American soil. Founded in 1978, Bengali Cultural Society is not just one of the oldest Bengali diaspora associations, but a philanthropic organization too. They publish their own magazine Sanskriti every year and run a Bengali language school for their young ones and those interested in learning the language. Each day of the puja will culminate in an authentic Bengali community dinner.

• Dates: October 27 to 28
• Venue: Indian Cultural Center, 820 NJ-73, Marlton, NJ 08053
• Contact: info@bcssj.org
• Website: Bcssj.org

New Jersey Bharat Sevashram Sangha Durga Puja

The New Jersey chapter of Bharat Sevashram Sangha celebrates Durga Puja to worship the Supreme Power of the universe. The chanting of slokas and hymns reverberates in the air of the ashram temple on the five days of Durga Puja. Devotees can soak in numinous vibes that the ambience is rife with this time of the year. Devotees are required to pre-register for the Durga puja event at Bharat Sevashram Sangha in New Jersey.

• Dates: October 20 to 24
• Location: 3490 Route-27 Kendral Park, New Jersey 08824
• Contact: 732 422 8880/ 347 735 2984 | devotees@sevashramsangha.org
• Website: sevashramsangha.org

Dakshineswar Ramakrishna Sangha Adyapeath Durga Puja 

Adyapeath in Edison, an extension of the Dakshineswar Ramakrishna Sangha Adyapeath in Kolkata, is a must visit for its atmosphere full of divine bliss during Durga puja festivities. Adya Maa (Primordial Kali) is the presiding deity of the temple where ‘Ekchala’ styled Durga idol is worshiped in the sabeki way. Established in 1995 in New Jersey, Adyapeath is dedicated to the service to the divine and humanity.       

• Dates: October 20 to 25
• Location: Kiddie Keep Well Camp, 35 Roosevelt Dr., Edison, NJ 08837
• Contact: 732-249-7077
• Website: AdyapeathUSA.org

Trinayani Durga Puja in Plainsboro, New Jersey

This is one of the most-anticipated Durga Puja celebrations in New Jersey. A not-for-profit organization established in 2022 with the aim to promote India’s rich art and culture, Trinayani’s inaugural Durga Puja was the first such event to worship an in-house protima (idol) created by the community members. It was also named third on the list of the best 25 Durga Pujas in Tristate in 2022. This year, Trinayani Durga Puja will give you a memorable year through cultural programs and Bengali feasts. The musical acts to be performed by famous urban folk music group, Bhoomi (on 28th), and Sounak Chattopadhyay, new-gen singing sensation, (on 29th) will immerse you in classic and folk tunes of Bengal. Registrations are already open on their website.

• Dates: October 28 and 29
• Venue: Community Middle School, Plainsboro Township, NJ, USA
• Contact: trinayaninj2022@gmail.com  
• Website: www.vibrnz.com/org/trinayani

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The post These Durga Puja Events in New York and New Jersey Turn Northeast Coast into a Mini Bengal This Time of Year appeared first on Travel to India, Cheap Flights to India, Aviation News, India Travel Tips.