Hindustan: open for all licentiousness
Hindustan is a wide place; where there is an open field for all licentiousness, and no one interferes with another's business, so that every one can do just as he pleases.
Hindustan is a wide place; where there is an open field for all licentiousness, and no one interferes with another's business, so that every one can do just as he pleases.
Ecbar Shaugh [Emperor Akbar] … never denyed [his mother] any thing but this, that shee demanded of him, that our Bible might be hanged about an asses necke and beaten about the towne of Agra, for that the Portugals … tyed [the Quran] about the necke of a dogge and beat the same dogge about the towne of Ormuz. But hee denyed her request, saying that, if it were ill in the Portugals to doe so to the Alcoran, being it became not a King to requite ill with ill, for that the contempt of any religion was the contempt of God.
Young girl,
On this day of Holī
—Your breasts dusted with flour,
Your eyes red from too much liquor,
A lotus stuck in your hair
And mango shoots behind your ears—
You are a credit to our village.
The 1934 musical, Anything Goes includes the hit Cole Porter song titled, You're the top which includes the following lines of praise:
You're the top, you're Mahatma Gandhi,
You're the top! you're Napoleon brandy …
In the early 90s, the Indian government released specially-raised flesh-eating turtles into the Ganga to eat and clear the river of partly-burned corpses from the Varanasi ghats. The programme failed as poachers captured and wiped out the turtle population (again).
Gondwanaland, the Pangaean supercontinent that existed millions of years ago is named after Gondwana, a region in Central India. Gondwana comes from the Sanskrit goṇḍavana or the forest of the Gonds, a tribe spread across the area.
पोटा (pōṭā) in Sanskrit is a word that represents a masculine woman, or a bearded woman or one with other such masculine features. Alternatively, it can also mean hermaphrodite or simply, a female servant.
The Loo is a hot, debilitating wind that sweeps across Western India, particularly Rajasthan in the months of May and June. Heatstrokes are referred to as Loo lagna (लू लगना). Apparently, Hamdard's Rooh-afza is based on a unani recipe for a drink with cooling properties recommended during this time.
The word saffron, a colour often associated with Hinduism, is believed to have its root in the Arabic word, az-za'faran which is itself of unknown origin.
The name crocus, for the flowering plant and source of saffron, is very likely ultimately descended from Sanskrit kunkumam (कुङ्कुमं) by way of 'Semitic', Arabic, and Greek.
Fela Kuti, often called Africa's Bob Marley, had a spiritual advisor named Professor Hindu who had the power to "kill and wake"—to kill a man and bring him back to life. Kuti turned down a million dollar deal with an American record label on Hindu advice.