It was not supposed to end this way. I was destined for greater things.
I am but a humble button samosa, a corn and broccoli button samosa to be precise. But I was meant to play a small but key role in building ties between India and America, the two great democracies of the world.
Donald Trump was visiting Ahmedabad. He had “hi-tea” there. A menu had been drawn up by Fortune Landmark chef Suresh Khanna with cookies and tea and coconut juice in tetra packs. Representing Gujarati cuisine was the spongy khaman dhokla.
And then there was me, hands down the most exciting thing on the menu. Something new yet traditional. A samosa with broccoli and corn in it. Broccoli would be something POTUS would recognise even if the samosa looked forbiddingly “foreign”. Americans love broccoli, with the late President George H.W. Bush being a notable exception. I was excited about what Donald Trump might say as he bit into an exotic samosa and encountered the familiar taste of broccoli and corn.
But the tukde tukde gang tore me apart before I could serve my nation. Bengalis who cannot stop talking about the delights of a cauliflower singhara during winter turned up their noses at a broccoli samosa. And these are the people who mash up beetroot with aloo and shape it into croquettes, deep fry them, call them vegetable chops and serve them to guests. They have the audacity to call broccoli samosas a sacrilege.
Someone called me a fake samosa. Someone created a hashtag #samosaruinedforever. Someone even said “I doubt this unappetising menu will prompt anyone into giving any kind of deal to India. #broccolisamosa.”
Soul of a samosa
Broccoli or not, I am a samosa. Hath not a samosa dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same chutneys, subjecting all to the same indigestion, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as an aloo samosa? If you prick us do we not break?
Even those people who blockade roads in the name of minorities who they say were wronged by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, mock us, the poor broccoli-corn button samosas. Are we not a minority too lost amidst the aloos? Are our rights not worth defending? Why are they demanding that we prove we belong in the great diverse family of the Indian samosa, which has accepted gobi samosas and keema samosas and packets of ready-made cocktail samosas but somehow questions our legitimacy.
Go check out broccoli samosa recipes online (they exist) but hum bhi kaagaz nahin dikhayenge to prove our samosa roots.
From my lonely spot on the hi-tea table I have watched this historic visit unfold. I have seen how India rolled out the red carpet for the POTUS. Nothing was too good for him. The Yamuna has been given an IV injection of gangajal to make it look fresher, adding a new meaning to Ganga-Yamuna tehzeeb . The tombs of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal got their first claypack deep cleanse in 368 years. Twenty-five thousand flower pots were placed along the presidential route. Langurs were pressed into service to scare away ordinary monkeys. Entire walls were built because Donald Trump loves walls.
And one humble button samosa got stuck in your collective gullet? Isn’t that kind of petty?
A sad fate
Forgive me if I sound bitter but what did you get for all that hoopla? A trade deal? The President mangled the name of your most famous cricketer. He forgot to mention Mahatma Gandhi in the visitors’ book at Gandhi’s ashram. Oh, yes, he did give the gays a boost by tweeting “Great” about that new rom-com Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan .
If he had been given the chance perhaps he would have tweeted “Great” about me too. Or called me “cute as a button (samosa)”. He could have praised it as an example of Indian innovation and vitality, a Bharat-Amreeki tehzeeb , proof of a country that could balance modernity with tradition yet be proudly and wholly Made in India.
But that was not to be because you could not see beyond the aloo. How is India supposed to chart new frontiers if we cannot learn to reinvent ourselves? The samosa could have been a good place to start. In hot sultry weather, a broccoli samosa could have been the perfect antidote to the heaviness of aloo. I could have been the Trump-approved cocktail canapé for the new India. I could have made history on a “historic” visit.
Instead mocked, dissed, bullied, I ended up unloved and untouched. The Trumps ate nothing while Twitter trolls chortled with glee at my tragic fate. Journalist Barkha Dutt tweeted, “Nobody had the broccoli samosa.” That was pretty much the epitaph that summed up the short and unhappy life of a broccoli-corn button samosa.
As Trump would say, “Sad”.
The writer is the author of Don’t Let Him Know , and like many Bengalis likes to let everyone know about his opinions whether asked or not.
