• There is a bunch of related surnames that exist in different forms in various parts of the country – all over North India, South Kanara district of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu. Perhaps more, if I do more research.
  
• It is not immediately apparent that the surnames are derived from the same source. But once I mention it, it will sort of “pop out”.
  
• The people bearing the surnames aren’t really related, nor do they think of themselves as belonging to the same caste.
  
• But typically, they belong to the business class.
  
• The surname comes from a Sanskrit word, meaning “merchant”
  
• One of the North Indian surnames is also a generic Hindi word which sort of means merchant.
  

Give me the bunch of related surnames. Just giving me the North Indian or South Indian versions will not do. I need at least one of both.
Bonus points if you can give me the Sanskrit word also.

MSNBC – Being bilingual may keep your mind young

Two languages are better than one when it comes to keeping the brain young, Canadian researchers reported Monday.
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Older adults who grew up bilingual had quicker minds when tested than people who spoke only one language, the researchers found. They showed less of the natural decline associated with aging.(via Jivha)

I grew up learning five languages (Kannada, Hindi, English Marathi and Tulu) in my childhood. I can read all four out of the five. (Tulu has no script, so no one can read it) I can speak 3 out of 5 fluently (Kannada, English and Hindi) and write 3 out of 5 well (English, Hindi and Marathi)
I am not bragging. Just saying…

Having successfully turned Jivha’s comment thread into a flame war by making sexist comments at feminists (Well? Can you resist making sexist comments at feminists?) I will now post a serious rejoinder to Jivha.
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So I got into a rather nit picky argument about whether an argument I made was ad hominem or not. The debate is here.

Here is a kind of preparatory test for Cartel membership. Which of the following arguments are ad hominem fallacies?
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(The story starts thus)
The moral of the previous part is
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When I said three consecutive posts, I was apparently not clear about the concept of “consecutive”.

Anyway, the moral of the previous story was
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I saw the transition of Venus a few minutes back. If there was a guy selling sunglasses to use while viewing, what would you call him?
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In honour of
Yazad who’s started a blog exclusively for PJs, I hereby present the worst PJ ever made. It is actually in three parts, so there will be three consecutive posts.
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Defeated can’t lord it over – The Economic Times

In what holds ominous signs for rejected members of Vajpayee’s ministerial team, particularly Murli Manohar Joshi and Yashwant Sinha, the BJP leadership is veering round the view that defeated leaders should not be rewarded immediately with Rajya Sabha nominations.

I didn’t like it when the BJP lost (for reasons that must be clear by now), but some good seems to be coming out of it, viz. they did badly in Gujarat, the Tam Bram RSS lobby were made to look like fools in TamilNadu* and Moron Joshi is being purged!

*Look no offence meant to Tam Brams, but the most hardcore and the most sanctimonious lot among the RSS now seem to be coming from among them. Given that they have made no inroads at all in their home state, they have no business blabbering about how the BJP lost because it abandoned its core principles.

What started me off on this goose-hunt about India invading other countries? (The answer I was looking for was Ranjit Singh’s general Zorawar Singh’s invasion of Tibet. Sandeep got the answer correctly.)

Believe it or not, this was occasioned by me thinking about the question of who will lead the BJP after Vajpayee/Advani. Let me explain.

It is an article of faith among us Indians that disunity is the Indian disease. We were attacked and conquered time and again because our kings squabbled among themselves and failed to put up a united front when invaders attacked us.
But it occurs to me that this belief is not only mistaken, it is also counterproductive.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not claiming that we weren’t disunited, but that we were no more disunited than the others. Also I am claiming that our disunity was not a source of our weakness, instead when we were weak, we were disunited.

I’ll explain.
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Long long back I had asked a really badly phrased question on whether India has ever invaded another country. It was really badly phrased because all the words in the question, i.e. “India”, “invaded”, “another” and “country” are ambiguous, as many of you correctly pointed out. Actually, the problem was that I had a specific answer in mind, so I framed the question in a way I thought would leave only the answer I wanted, but it turns out that it didn’t.

Yup Sikkim is a good answer (congrats Yazad and CCG). If I know history correctly, Indira Gandhi’s invasion of Sikkim was completely unprovoked. She was playing some kind of geopolitical game with China and Sikkim got caught in the process. Other answers are at least debatable. Remember that I was giving the maximum amount of leeway to a supporter of Akhand Bharat, so I wouldn’t consider our Bangladesh adventure to be a good answer (not because it was not an invasion, but because a believer in Akhand Bharat would consider it an internecine battle. Chola kings’ incursions into Sri Lanka was already mentioned in the article I linked to – I had asked for other examples. Our actions in modern day Sri Lanka and Maldives cannot really be considered invasions can they? We had gone there at the invitation of recognised governments of those countries.

Look I don’t want to argue on this okay? I know that there are ten sides to this issue and you can corner me by asking me to define all my terms. For example, I wouldn’t consider an attack on Nepal an “invasion” because Nepal is kind of culturally part of India (The only reason it isn’t politically a part of India is that the British left it a semi-independent monarchy rather than make it a dependency.) But I know that I have made a hash of my argument, so I won’t press it further.

Rather, I will ask you to guess which incident I am thinking of by narrowing it thus:
1) It took place in the 19th century.
2) The place invaded is outside undivided India.
3) The place has never been ruled by the British.

What am I talking of?
If you want a lateral hint, it is:
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Whatever your views on Kaizad Gustad’s arrest, can we all agree that by stopping his film in its tracks, providence has done us all an unexpected favour?