Ballots, floods, and Bollywood blunders
and a new section starting this week!
Hello DoorDesi,
Remember all those instances when you walked past another desi looking bloke and started looking anywhere but at him? Why do we Indians do this? Happy to nod at someone who looks foreign but someone who looks like us - full on panic!
My theory is that deep down somewhere we feel some sort of a guilt for having left home. This person who looks like us is a reminder of that. A reminder of all the friends back home we are not showing up for.
Since starting DoorDesi, I’ve been less awkward. My Saturday dosa runs now come with smiling at desi strangers in the queue. And from your feedback, many of you want the same — more ways to connect. Some asked for get-togethers, some asked for digital spaces to interact with each other, and some asked to read what other DoorDesis are up to.
So we’re launching a new ‘Community Feature’: each week, one of you sends a postcard to the rest of us. A glimpse into your DoorDesi life, before we move on to bigger community plans.
Scroll down to find the ‘Community Feature’ section!
Sorry about the long intro this week! I clearly have a lot of thoughts.. :/
Also also, we are 5 subscribers short of our two-month goal of 100 subscribers. Would you be so kind to share DoorDesi with just one friend of yours who you think would like it? That will go a long long way to help us meet our goal! Thanks! ❣️
Just the gist
🔗The most bullied boy of the class has something to say
Rahul Gandhi has accused the Election Commission of teaming up with the BJP for what he calls “institutionalised chori”. In a YouTube video (which I HIGHLY recommend watching), he points to his party’s investigation into Mahadevapura, Karnataka, where he alleges over 1 lakh votes were “stolen” in 2024 through five tactics: duplicate voters, fake addresses, bulk registrations, invalid photos, and misuse of Form 6. He says this isn’t an isolated case — over 100 seats may have been affected, enough to change the general election outcome. The EC, meanwhile, has asked him to cough up names and proof and the BJP is pointing at Nehru because… old habits die hard?
➡️ This is a developing story. So the facts of this story will evolve in the upcoming days.
Now here is a sincere request from me - if you travel to India regularly, plan your trips around election dates - general as well as state election. I don’t care who you vote for but please remember but it is your fundamental right to vote AND every vote counts if Rahul is to be believed.
📝Bihar Assembly elections are coming up - dates TBD but between October and November. If you are from Bihar and are eligible to vote book that round trip. It is also litti chokha season, as an additional perk to showing up for democracy!
🔗Raining on our ‘Viksit Bharat’ parade
Like every year, this year’s monsoon also brought devastation in many parts of the country. Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand having been in the news the most. This comes on the heels of a World Bank report that says India needs to pour at least $2.4 trillion into climate-proofing its cities by 2050 because doubling the urban population to 951 million will also double the headaches from heatwaves, floods, and rising seas. Without massive upgrades to housing, transport, water, and waste systems, weather damage could cost $30 billion annually by 2070. Current spending? Just 0.7% of GDP, with private finance barely at 5%.
➡️ Despite AI, 5G, ‘smart’ cities, and all the other fluff, urban infrastructure in India is lacking of the most basic safety needs of the people living in it. While there isn’t much we can do from abroad, for those of us looking to invest in real estate in India or looking to relocate our parents to new properties - do what you can to find out how those properties are built, where they are built, and how resilient their surroundings are to acts of nature.
🔗The mountains are calling… for help
Right on cue is our next story. The Uttarkashi mudslide that flattened parts of Dharali may not have been a cloudburst after all - weather data shows barely a drizzle. Experts now suspect a glacial pond burst, where overflowing mountain ponds trigger a domino flood of water and debris. Old Dharali, built on safer ground, survived; newer, unplanned hotels and homes did not.
Unplanned construction has plagued our prized mountain regions for years now. While older parts of towns and villages in these parts often survive thanks to traditional knowledge of the land and its perils, newer constructions that defy river routes, cause deforestation, and compromise on quality for the sake of proft margins claim lives.
Five people are dead, scores missing (including 11 soldiers), and rescue teams are battling blocked roads and fresh landslides. The tragedy has reignited the debate: in the fragile Himalayas, does rapid, concrete-heavy “development” bring prosperity, or just make nature’s next disaster deadlier?
➡️ What can you do… hmm… as someone who spent many summers and autumns in the mountains, I have asked myself the same question. I don’t know. But borrowing from the Palestinian-led BDS movement, I think a good starting point is to use your vacations in the mountains as a love letter to those mountains. Choose homestays or ecologically conscious stays over commercial hotels, eat locally sourced food, do not litter, do like the locals do. Use your money to reward those who are trying to preserve our mountains.
🔗Calling bro to complain about the tariffs that keep coming
PM Modi and Russian President Putin had a friendly phone catch-up about Ukraine, trade, and keeping their “Special and Privileged” bromance alive. This comes days after Donald Trump doubled tariffs on Indian oil imports from Russia because he woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Again. Moscow obviously backed India’s right to choose her partner - something most Indian parents don’t seem to get. Am I right? 🫠
Modi says he won’t compromise on farmers’ interests, even if it costs him politically (anybody remember the farmer’s protest from 2020?).
➡️ How India navigates between the US, Russia, and China shapes her bargaining power - something that affects everything from our wallets to the perception of us globally.
Keeping up with the internet
🔗The national disappointment award goes to…
Right. Don’t come for me for saying this, I love the man as much as anyone but Shahrukh Khan did not deserve the national award for Jawan of all movies. Swades or Chak de India might have been his opportunity but Jawan? Really?
Turns out many people on the internet feel the same and not just about King Khan but most awards this year. Kerala Story, Rocky our Raani ki Prem Kahani (????), Mrs. Chatterjee vs. Norway, Jawaan, nobody thinks National Award when they see these names. One of the few deserving ones and everyone agrees is 12th Fail. If you haven’t watched it yet, please do. I watched it twice, at the theatre.
But but but, let’s not let the noise drown out the awards that did matter!
➡️ An opinion piece read “The kindest thing that one can say about The Kerala Story (2023) is that it is no Triumph of the Will (1935).“ Have we gotten to a place as a nation where we are using the National Film Awards to legitimise propaganda?
Desi culture
🔗 Investing in people, futures, and dreams
Our search for a story for this section brough us to Rang De. Rang De is India’s social-impact peer-to-peer lending platform where you fund farmers, shopkeepers, and students for modest 2–6% returns - more karma points than cash. RBI-licensed and working through vetted partners, it keeps defaults low, but your money is tied up until repayment. Recently, it caught a quiet RBI show-cause notice over possible P2P compliance hiccups - reads more like a bureaucratic hurdle they had to cross than a major scandal. We recommend you read up on it.
➡️ We are not recommending one financial service over another. But friend to friend, I came across this, think it is interesting, and might be one way to invest in building a better India with as little as a few hundreds. That said, I am not saying you should too but I want to point you in this direction in case you would like to. Do your research, talk to people, but do look into it in the least. Also, any finance mavericks in the Doordesi community? Got more info on this? Let me know and I’ll let the rest know!
💌 Community feature
Every week, one of you sends a little postcard from your DoorDesi life — a snapshot, a story, a moment worth sharing. Think of it as our way of waving hello across cities, countries, and dosa queues.
🏔️ This week’s Community postcard is arriving straight from Alaska! Uuuffff!
Ishika lives in Juneau, Alaska where she works as a researcher. Hi Ishika!
Wanna share a postcard of your own? Drop me a text or reply to this email and I will share the template with you. Let’s curate this space together, pretty please!
Tell us where you are
There is hardly a corner of the world one can go to and not meet a person of Indian origin. But here's the thing: there's surprisingly little data about where we actually are. We are on a mission to make the Indian diaspora visible, connected, and stronger.
Pin your spot, represent your city, and help us paint this map rangoli-style with our scattered-but-connected DoorDesi community. If you have already, send it to a DoorDesi living near you.
With love from two women who cringe at the mention of chai tea latte,
Sudeshna & Mili
Founders, DoorDesi 💃
P.S. Save us a chai if we ever end up in your city, we’ll bring the murukku.
Housekeeping
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