Kamalika | Kamalika's Notebook

Shubho Bijoya! Let’s Talk About Some Sweets from Bengal

October 28, 2020 By Kamalika Leave a Comment

According to the Oxford dictionary, the word “sweet” depicts a kind of taste with the properties of sugar or something that is not savoury, bitter, or sour. To Bengalis “Mishti” means a dessert for which the main ingredient would be either or a combination of the following elements milk, chhana/paneer/cottage cheese, besan/chickpea flour, rice flour, puffed rice (Muri), flattened rice (Chire/Poha), popped rice (Khoi), coconut shavings and the sweetener will be either white sugar of or date palm jaggery (seasonal). Among all the ingredients, chhana is the most widely used, chhana is nothing but the Indian version of cottage cheese which is referred to as “paneer” by the rest of India and as Chhana, Chhena, Sana (Asam) by north-eastern India. Sometimes chhana is mixed with one or two of the other elements to create variations.

“Misthi” for Bengalis is not just a food item it represents their culture and tradition, whether it’s a get-together, puja at home or a celebration like a wedding, a temple feast “Mishti” is not only inevitable but the star of the show.

Here are some names of Bengali sweets that don’t use chhana as their principal component like Mishti Doi, Rabri, Payesh (Kheer for rest of India), Jilipi & Amritti (called as Jalebi otherwise), Dorbesh, Patishapta, Malpoa (Malpua), Narkel Naru (laddoos made of coconut shavings), Puli Pithe, Sitabhog, Mihidana. Some sweets are moist (“ros-er mishti”) and some are dry (like “Sondesh”), and some are a combination of both (like “Jolbhora”).

It is impossible to cover all types of Bengali sweets within the boundaries of one piece of a write-up, but I would like to talk a tad deeper about the ones that are my favourite!

Rasogolla

Despite the rows between Bengali and Odia communities on who made Rasogolla first, the World recognise it as one of the most extraordinary desserts from the Indian subcontinent. Primary ingredients to make Rasogolla are chhana and white sugar. Chhana made from full fat cow milk, and the sugar should be white refined fine-grained. Of course, Rasogolla by no means is health food no matter how dearly Bengalis promote it as one! Chhana once prepared and cooled to room temperature is mixed with sugar, semolina, all-purpose flour (secondary elements vary depending on the recipe) to create the perfectly round-shaped balls, and then more sugar and water are used to make the syrup (Ros/Chaasnee). There are other Rasogolla spin-offs like Rasmalai, Chom Chom, Rajbhog, Chhanar Payesh (even Pantua, Ledikeni, Langcha are Rasogolla improvisations). During winters there is a premium variety made with date palm jaggery instead of sugar.

In Kolkata Dhiman Das maintains that his ancestor Nabin Chandra Das who established a sweet shop in Jorasanko of North Kolkata back in 1864 had invented Rasogolla. In Odisha, they believe in a myth that says that Rasogolla was offered to an upset Goddess Lakshmi as bhog by her husband Lord Jagannath and they celebrate the ritual as “Niladri Bije”, Lord Jagganath’s return to Shree Mandir, the last day of Ratha Yathra in Puri. They marked the return of Lord Jagannath as Rasogolla Dibasa, to authenticate the foundation of Rasogolla ((the first celebration was on July 30 2015). Regardless, it is fair to say that no matter wherever the origin is Rasogolla prevails to be one of the most popular desserts of India.

Sondesh

Another Bengali dessert made with chhana and sugar/date palm jaggery depending on the season. Sondesh plausibly exists in the maximum number of variations across Bengal. There are distinct categorisations labelled as Koda Paak (hard knead) and Narom Paak (soft no-knead). Bengali sweet aficionados fancy Gur Sondesh (the one made with date palm jaggery) over other kinds. Kolkata Bengalis love their Koda Paak, especially the one described as Jolbhora it is a heart-shaped Misthi and at the centre, it has jaggery syrup filling, the 2018 film Dhadak, suggests several references to this one. Another well-known form of Sondesh is called Kanchagolla. Then there is Sorpuria, but Bengalis may debate deciding whether it is a type of Sondesh or a completely different “Mishti”. There is also Makha Sondesh usually available in smaller towns and villages. This type of Sondesh is a slightly grainy, soft no-knead almost Kheer like dessert.

Misthi Doi

Ah, the little too sweet variety of curd only ever available in Bengali dessert shops and nowhere else! Yes, though nowadays there are some brands like Mother Dairy, Epigamia offering “Misti Doi” but then the unadulterated taste can be only be felt (yes, you read it right, you have to feel the taste!) when served in an earthen bowl called Matir Bhanr (Kullad). Main elements consist of milk, curd culture, and sugar or jaggery. Of course, the milk has to be full fat and sugar has to be white refined fine-grained and if jaggery then the date palm. The fermentation process is much longer than that of regular curd, and it also varies depending on the weather conditions.

Bhaja Misti

“Bhaja” is a Bengali word which means fried, ingredients of Bhaja Misthi are chhana, sugar, semolina, all-purpose flour. They are a moist variety of Bengali dessert, soaked in thick sugar syrup (Ros) after deep frying. Other variations of Bhaja Mishtis consist of Pantua, Langcha, Ledikeni, Kalojam, Chitrokut, Sorbhaja. Rest of India has only one variety of Bhaja Mishti called Gulab Jamun!

Khir Kadom

A variety of Bengali desserts that appears like a Sondesh, and is kept moist inside, it like Rasogolla wrapped in a Sondesh skin. Little too sweet and has Sev like garnishing. The popularity of this one is debatable as many Bengali dessert connoisseurs don’t fancy “Khir Kadom” and consider it as overrated.

Dorbesh

The Bengali variant of Boondi Laddu made using gram flour, sugar, ghee/vegetable oil, and tastemakers like cardamom, cashew along with edible colours. Sumptuous when consumed fresh and mildly hot but little greasy and hard if kept in the fridge (not the ones made with ghee!).

Mihidana and Sitabhog

Mihidana and Sitabhog both originated from a place called Burdwan, West Bengal. Primary elements of Mihidana are rice flour and sugar syrup, a distant cousin of Boondi where Mihi means fine, and Dana means grains. Sitabhog is also made using rice flour, sugar syrup, and has vermicelli like shapes. Authentic

Mihidana and Sitabhog both may contain miniature Gulab Jamun like balls called “Nikuti”, for Sitabhog they are mandatory and optional for Mihidana.

Epilogue

These days Kolkata city is filled with premium/branded dessert shops who offer boutique-style Bengali desserts or “Mishtis” and the townships around Kolkata like Chandannagar, Kalyani, Krishnanagar continue to produce the traditional varieties of Bengali desserts. While city-based premium stores focus on variety and improvisation semi-urban, village shops are about authenticity and genuineness.

Bengali desserts have travelled beyond Kolkata and West Bengal, nowadays every prominent city in India has many Bengali dessert shops, and they are savoured by millions of Indians whether Bengali or not.

Happy Father’s Day – Why Should You Know Your Parent

June 22, 2020 By Kamalika Leave a Comment

It is a personal note which I thought of sharing, in memory of my deceased father, I hope it makes some sense for all of us.

The Monologue

My father and I were never close, at least that’s what I thought. Now, what does closeness/friendliness to your parent mean? Probably it means that you can share/discuss anything and respect one’s value addition to the other’s life decisions. I remember always fighting/debating with him over matters like which field of study should I chose, what political party should vote for, which politicians are worth our trust, how should I behave with a particular person even if I dislike him/her, when should I express my opinion and when not. While he was never a typical chauvinist, but his attitude towards my mother often seemed like one, but his female friends/colleague were gung-ho about the helpful and open-minded person he was. One of our most significant issues was his indulgence towards my younger sibling, I was always of the opinion that he should be stricter towards her for her good, but he would be biased and overlook every mistake she did. He was a simple, peaceful person who would generally not prefer to be part of any disagreement, but he was a person of opinion, especially about things that concerned him, or people close him. Was he a loving and doting father? No, his expressions would never say so, he was an idealist busy in his world of thoughts. He was someone who would smile only when his friends/colleagues were around. He was not an ideal father we read in books or see in movies. Did all of these make him a bad father? Now, what is the definition of a good parent? I believe there is no definition or pattern. I wouldn’t have the capability or courage of doing what I did with my life or the decisions I took if he was. He was a person who never made us feel that every Indian family needs a son. His daughters were more than enough. He wanted his children to be girls because he believed women have better compassion than men and that they were emotionally more powerful. He taught me to read books and watch movies without inhibitions and encouraged that I have my opinion about everything I see or learn, but I need not be getting into an argument to prove my point, I must choose my battles carefully. He never tried to become my teacher; he would talk about things randomly like a friend and encourage me to pay attention and remember/learn them for life. He was the most honest person I have ever seen in life; he would never ask for favours, won’t take gifts from clients and help them in every possible problem they had, and most of the times going beyond his way. He was a food enthusiast who hated spending money in restaurants but wanted my mother to cook all things possible at home, and he would read and talk about food/recipes from across the globe. He became so sickly before his demise that everyone thought it would be only fair to him to rest in peace, but I fiercely wanted him to stay, and he knew that. I never thought I would be, so grief-stricken after he was gone because we never had an apparent loving relation. Most of the time, I would be angry with him for not being fair to me or not listening to me for innumerable reasons. I wanted the grief to go away, but my every such attempt would push me to a fresh episode of depression. After almost a year of internal fighting, reasoning I realised, it is not possible to get rid of the grief of losing a parent because whether I want to admit it or not, I loved him, and he loved me too but in his unconventional ways. In many ways, I became the person he taught me to be, I inherited his emotions, his integrity, his intellectuality. We don’t get to choose our parents but whether we like it or not we become the product of our parent’s behaviour/nature and education. Like every child is not the same, and they need the upbringing suiting their specific needs, in the same extent, every parent isn’t the same. Like our parents give the effort to make us better, worthier similarly we also must invest in understanding our parents. I wish there shouldn’t anyone out there who understood the feelings for her father after he was gone. In my defence, while most of my life, I kept fighting/debating/arguing with my father over various matters I did protect him like my son. I lost my emotional intelligence after he was gone and still struggling to get my composure back, but one of my life’s most important lesson that it is crucial to emotionally invest in knowing your parents better otherwise we may have to lament for a lifetime. It took me almost two years (after his death) to pen down a memoir like this but, belatedly I did it defeating my ego to accept the biggest fallacy of my life. I thought it was essential to share because many from our generation would have similar differences with their parents without even being cognisant about the same.

Video OTT Streaming Platforms, The La La Land of Modern Media

December 11, 2019 By Kamalika 1 Comment

What does OTT (over-the-top) mean?

OTT or over-the-top is an application service that transmits data over the internet that circumvents conventional mediums of delivery like telcos or cable tv networks. There are fundamentally three types of OTT services; content OTT, number-based messaging OTT (WhatsApp, WeChat), and number-independent messaging OTT (Facebook Messenger). The extent of this article is limited to the discussion of over-the-top content that refers to the distribution of film and television content directly to the users bypassing cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms which typically controls the rights of distribution for such content. A content OTT not only allows on-demand round the clock access to content but it further disrupts stereotyped billing models resulting in better customer engagement and satisfaction. Content OTT providers offer streaming media as the product that combines both video and audio.

How it all started, who came first Netflix or YouTube?

We are in love with YouTube for ages, and content lovers cannot think of living their life without Netflix, but who is the true pioneer of streaming?

On February 14, 2005, Chad Hurley a designer and Steve Chen, Jawed Karim both engineers bought the domain and launched YouTube beta in May 2005. It was not until December 2005 when Saturday Night Live streamed a video clip called “Lazy Sunday”, and YouTube became an online phenomenon overnight. Unfortunately, it was not all good news for YouTube because popularity brought in traffic and a huge bandwidth cost. At that time, they only had $11 million from Sequoia Capital VC funding and $1 million bandwidth cost per month and the majority of the user-uploaded videos were copyrighted content. YouTube founders were trying to cope between bandwidth bills and fear of copyright lawsuits, meanwhile, mighty Google stepped in and purchased YouTube for $.1.6 billion on October 9, 2006. By far YouTube acquisition has been proved as one of the most profitable for Google, and apart from being one of the biggest OTT streaming players, it is the second-largest search engine.

Reed Hastings and software executive Marc Randolph started Netflix in 1997 to offer online movie rentals, and in 1998 they launched the first DVD rental and sales site netflix.com. At that time, their foremost competitor was Blockbuster LLC, which offered traditional VHS tapes rental service. In later years Hastings approached Blockbuster a couple of times, with the idea where Netflix becomes their online streaming service, but Blockbuster didn’t budge. In 2007 Netflix finally introduced streaming and revolutionised the world of streaming. In 2013 they produced their first original series “House of Cards” followed by “Orange is the New Black” to date one of their most loved shows.

In the same year, Netflix launched its streaming service, Hulu.com also launched its private beta website. Hulu was a Yahoo venture along with a couple of other online giants back then like Facebook, MSN, AOL, Comcast, and Myspace.

In September 2007 Prime Video was launched as Amazon Unbox in the United States. Later, it was renamed as Amazon Prime Video and launched globally. This year (2019) Disney+ and Apple TV+ was launched as part of Disney and Apple’s online streaming offering. Other global players include HOOQ, YuppTV, Mavshack.com, Viu.

In India, there is a rise in regional streaming platforms like Hotstar, ALTBalaji, ZEE5, Sony Liv, Voot, Hoichoi, Jio TV, Vodafone Play, Airtel TV, Sun NXT. There is also a new player called DocuBay which only streams documentaries.

OTT Challenges

Understanding the target audience

The biggest challenge in OTT is understanding the target group or audience. User demographics, geography, content genre, socio-economic dynamics everything needs to be taken into reckoning while creating content or acquiring licenses for an OTT platform.

Content creation, licensing, and maintaining production value

Understanding the target group may be the biggest challenge but using that knowledge to attract new users and retaining existing users hooked to the platform requires a rich content bank. OTTs acquire new content by either buying licenses or producing original content, both of which happen with hefty investments.

Using the right technology and people to build the OVP

The technology behind an OTT ecosystem is supported by an OVP (Online Video Platform) which is an end-to-end tech-based solution to create a website/app, managing UI/UX of the website/app, uploading videos, transcoding/encoding videos, compressing videos, video playback, in-video advertisements, user & subscription management, video analytics, content distribution over the internet for both VOD (Video on Demand) and live streaming. All the mentioned functionalities require advanced technologies and experienced professionals. There are many off-the-shelf solutions available in the market like BrightCove, Evergent, Accedo using which we can build an OVP quickly, but they entail a substantial amount of capital as well as operational expenditure. It is also feasible to build an OVP using inexpensive and pay-as-go cloud services, and AWS (Amazon Web Services) offers an array of services like Elemental Media Convert & MediaTailor, S3, ACM, CloudFront, Lambda, API Gateway, Elasticsearch, Elasticache, RDS using which an experienced software architect can design and build a DIY OVP. Since OTTs are all about playing video content on various screens, building an OVP requires extensive front-end technology expertise like ReactJS, AngularJS, BrightScript, Android (Java/Kotlin), iOS (Swift).

User experience

UX or user experience is the key to retention and stickiness of the OTT. How fast the video plays, what are the playback options like fast-forwarding and navigating between segments, how is the video experience in fluctuating bandwidth conditions, how much bandwidth it consumes to play the entire movie or a single episode, how great is the content even if bandwidth quality is poor, how many renditions are supported, will the content work well in low-end devices, is the video buffering too much.

Generating revenue

Driving an OTT business can be quite challenging considering the amount of investment it requires in terms of both money and people, hence having a compact and efficient revenue strategy is a must. These days OTT platforms are using three significant revenue models namely TVOD (Transactional based VOD), AVOD (Advertisement based VOD), and SVOD (Subscription based VOD) there are also brand partnerships and contextual advertisements.

Making the right business decision using analytics

As they say, “data is the new oil” and only an analytics solution can help accumulate relevant data from a software-based platform. As far as video analytics is concerned, YOUBORA offers a best-in-class video analytics solution but comes with a humongous cost which can be well afforded by larger OTT players but not the smaller guys. The other way is to develop a DIY solution using Video.js for the playback, which will need significant people investment.

OTT Revenue models – SVOD, TVOD, AVOD

Among the three top revenue channels, SVOD is the one that is being implemented by almost every OTT service provider, some providers also go for a mix of SVOD, and TVOD and some rare ones use all three to make revenue.

In SVOD the user and the provider enter into a time-bound subscription agreement which only ends if the use unsubscribes either involuntarily or voluntarily. Netflix, Amazon Prime Video both run on the SVOD revenue model.

In TVOD user typically pays for a particular piece/set of content for a limited period. Like we can buy and watch movies on YouTube or Google Play where we pay for each movie independently.

In AVOD in-video advertisements are played to generate revenue. It works for demographics where users are not willing to pay for watching content.

Conclusion

I tried to keep this article relevant for all sorts of readers like OTT consumers, media personnel, business guys, as well as engineers who are already building or aspiring to develop OTT platforms. Here I would humbly like to mention that as a company (Ebullientech) we had the opportunity to create the video backends for a couple of products/platforms like Dance with Madhuri, KidzByte, Hoichoi TV (Vodafone, Idea, Airtel integration) where we used AWS Elemental Mediaconvert in combination with S3, CloudFront as storage and CDN respectively.

Reference Links

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Over-the-top_media_services
https://www.techopedia.com/definition/29145/over-the-top-application-ott
https://www.stateofdigitalpublishing.com/digital-platform-tools/what-is-ott-over-the-top/
https://www.news18.com/news/tech/regulation-is-inevitable-for-ott-services-such-as-whatsapp-and-facebook-messenger-in-india-2116587.html
https://media.thinknum.com/articles/a-brief-history-of-video-streaming-by-the-numbers/
https://tedium.co/2017/01/05/first-streaming-service-itv-hong-kong/
https://media.netflix.com/en/about-netflix
https://www.pacetechnical.com/brief-history-streaming-media/
https://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2013/mar/01/history-streaming-future-connected-tv
https://variety.com/2018/digital/news/netflix-streaming-dvds-original-programming-1202910483/

Who is a business analyst?

A business analyst is responsible for the functional design of system or application. S/he is the one who interacts with both stakeholders and subject matter experts and defines the system elements which further translate into software requirement specifications. Today’s analysts are the innovators who take the product to the next level. [Read more…]

My days in Mumbai… the awakening!

September 27, 2015 By Kamalika Leave a Comment

Before I begin my piece I would like to say, this is no travelogue or city tour guide or food guide. This is all about how I feel about Mumbai as a person or I should rather say as a woman. Do I love Mumbai? Well…

I don’t know but of surely there are places in Mumbai that I love. Do I belong to Mumbai? May be or may be not… but it is true that Mumbai is kind of infused into my blood. Am I uprooted from Kolkata and transplanted in Mumbai? I think no… may be because I still have the urge to go back to my roots.

The Background

I never wanted to move out of Kolkata just for the sake of it. I loved my life there, I was enjoying it to the fullest mostly because unlike other women around me I was not just doing a job rather building my career. My life was very human… driven by people. So it might seem like… “What went wrong that suddenly you decided to come out of your comfort zone and throw yourself into an unknown path?”… Well, let’s put it this way that something right happened in my mind and I decided that I need a change of scene to grow as a more mature and confident person and overcome the vulnerability I possess within my comfort zone.

The Beginning – journey of a lone soldier

“To win, you must first learn how to lose!”

Choice of the new destination was easy, rather I should say Mumbai was the only option I considered… Reason? Simple… endless possibilities. April 2010… I started my journey towards an unknown destination… and here I’m, still figuring out the equation between Mumbai and me… The place I’m too close to and too far away from. As I embarked on my life’s first true adventure, every step reminded me that it takes courage, discipline and resilience to survive in a place like Mumbai. Workplace felt like a battlefield and it was impossible to determine who was an enemy and who was not… “TRUST NOBODY” and “DON’T BE YOURSELF” was the call of the hour. Being a corporate trusting nobody didn’t seem very difficult but not being myself felt impossible to achieve and eventually I failed. “Trying and failing is better than not trying at all” so it was a positive start!

Ideas, events and people – welcome to Mumbai

“Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.”

Mumbai is full of ideas, though most of them die at the ideating stage but a lot of them do make it big. In any meeting if you don’t come up with a new idea then you may be considered as dull, non-productive, non-proactive, etc. etc. Initially I failed to understand how could I even think about new ideas if the job in hand is not yet done to perfection but then this is Mumbai, you can’t complain about work pressure or irregular work schedules, you can’t complain if you are asked to achieve something practically infeasible, you can’t complain if your boss’s or colleague’s educational qualification surprises you, you can’t complain if your colleague is misogynous! To be successful here in Mumbai all you need to do is ideate, be proactive and forget about your work life balance.

This is one place where community matters the most yet you must succeed in a diverse environment. Just like Marwaris in Kolkata the strongest community here in Bombay are Gujratis. I remember a friend saying that in India if you are working in corporate sector most likely you are working under a Jain, so very true, nobody understands business better than Jains (Marwaris, Gujratis, Rajasthanis, Sindhis, Kutchis, etc., even Parsis are half Gujratis!) and Bombay is the live example of that very fact. They are driven by the passion to grow, to make it big, to unleash the power within and in order to achieve their dreams they will break every barrier and rule.

Work hard, party harder! That’s the philosophy of a typical Mumbai corporates. There are two kinds of events that take place here in Mumbai namely meetings and parties. Even if it’s not okay to eat non-vegetarian in a party since you belong a vegetarian community but it’s completely okay to consume alcohol, as it’s “pure-veg” and comes with that green sticker! Apart of these there are extravagant weddings where you are very cordially served pure vegetarian food (apart from Bengali and Punjabi weddings!) and yes of course there is NCPA Mumbai where you get to watch interesting live International and national Music, Dance and Drama shows and there are other open air shows where Bollywood celebrities perform live.

Conclusion… the awakening

“Mumbai’s infectious. Once you start living in Mumbai, working in Mumbai, I don’t think you can live anywhere else.”

Never thought I would be staying any more than two years in Mumbai but it’s been half a decade and I’m still celebrating life in here!

It’s not yet over friends… “Picture abhi baaki hai mere dost…” stay tuned for the next instalment of this article.