At 89, conductor Zubin Mehta doesn’t make things easy for himself. Since taking on the role of the Los Angeles...
Blog Articles
Ashdeen Lilaowala Redefines Parsi Heritage with Contemporary Gara Embroidery
Ashdeen Lilaowala ‘s relationship with Parsi Gara embroidery began long before it became his life’s work....
Parsi Culture and Cuisine at the Sofitel Mumbai: A Review
It is not very often I am happily surprised by a personal experience. As a native Mumbaikar, I’d think I’ve seen quite a bit. But I got mine late last week in the most (again) surprising of places....
Can The Cure for Migraine Come From The Parsi Community ?
Migraines – debilitating and agonising, there’s not much that can be done about them. Science is still looking for an effective way to prevent these recurring headaches. The answer to what can help...
Everyday Parsi: Firoze Jungalwala
Our third author in the Everyday Parsi 2015 series is Dr. Firoze B. Jungalwala My recollection of Muktad in Surat during the Late 1940s I vividly remember the Muktad days at my grand father’s home...
Hormusjee Jamsetjee Rustomjee of Karachi
OFF I went to another memorial meeting yesterday, February 13, with no moans involved, to commemorate a patriarch of the family who died one hundred years ago to the day. We, his descendants, now...
Bombay Parsi Punchayet Announces Schedule for 2015 Trustee Elections
Owing to the vacancies created upon the completion of the term of office of Trustees Mr. Dinshaw Mehta, Mrs. Arnavaz Mistry, Mr. Khojeste Mistree, Mr. Yazdi Desai and Mr. Jimmy Mistry and the...
Everyday Parsi: Niloufer Mavalvala
Our second author for the 2015 Everyday Parsi Series is Niloufer Mavalvala Muktad Recollected: Then and Now Childhood memories can be sweet and not easily forgotten. I grew up in Karachi amongst a...
Professor Almut Hintze Speaks about the movie “The Path Of Zarathustra”
Professor Almut Hintze, renowned Zoroastrian scholar endorses ‘The Path Of Zarathustra’.
Everyday Parsi: Ervad Kayomarz Yezdi Sidhwa
Our first author for 2015 Everyday Parsi series is Ervad Kayomarz Yezdi Sidhwa. Kayomarz writes Thank you Parsi Khabar for giving me the opportunity to write what Muktad days have meant to my family...
The Everyday Parsi in 2015
August 8, 2015 is the first day of Muktad or to call it correctly “Farvardegan” per the Shehanshahi Parsi Calendar. Parsis around the world and especially in India remember the dear departed of...
Making Muktad More Meaningful
Muktad are the 10 days starting from Roj Ashtad of Mah Spendarmad and ending on Vahishtoisht Gatha, when, according to Zoroastrian tradition, all Fravashis and souls collectively descend every year...
Nell Freudenberger: In Conversation
Nell Freudenberger talks from Mumbai about the dwindling population of Parsis in India. The word Parsi refers to followers of the prophet Zarathustra who came to the west coast of India from what is...
Reformist Parsis get a funeral prayer hall of their own in Worli, Mumbai India
Barred from prayer halls inside Doongarwadi for opposing the traditional method of disposing of dead or for marrying outside the community, the liberals build their own space to pray for the dead....
Feroze Rangoonwalla: Collector for all seasons
Well-known film chronicler Feroze Rangoonwalla has passed away. A remembrance by Khalid Mohamed Suddenly the brownstone colony he lived in, bang opposite the Mumbai Central Railway station, was...
The Worli Prayer Hall For Parsi Irani Zarathushtis
In Febrarury 2014 we had informed you about the allocation of land at the Worli crematorium to build a prayer hall to be used for Parsi and Irani Zarathushtis who opt for cremation upon death. The...
The Amesha Spenta or the Divine Attributes of God
Here is a very good commentary on the teachings of Zarathustra and the Divine Attributesof Ahura Mazda by Scott Nelson who is an instructor on comparative religions & philosophy....
Aapro Jall Cowasji: Help This Young Parsi Filmmaker Fulfill His Dream
If you have seen the film Qissa-E-Parsi, you know Jall Cowasji. He is the cinematographer of the excellent film co-directed by his sister Divya Cowasji and Shilpi Gulati. The film has won various...
Parsis battle threat of extinction
The government has sponsored schemes for assisted reproduction so that Parsis increase in number. Article by Vinaya Deshpande | The Sunday Guardian Twelve hundred years ago, we fled to India for our...
Parsi Portal: Android App Launched
Parsi Portal is a new and interesting app for Android smartphones and tablets that’s just been launched recently Jamshir Goorabian, one of the creators of the new Parsi Portal app writes in…...
Are you bawa enough to act?
The golden age of Parsi-Gujarati theatre may be long over, but a few drama-loving bawas are determined to revive it. Theatre veteran Burjor Patel, his daughter Shernaz Patel, lighting director Sam...
Bawi Bride Kitchen Brings Parsi Food Festival to J W Marriott Hotel in Mumbai
Good friend Perzen Patel, the powerhouse behind the namesake Bawi Bride Kitchen informs us about the upcoming Parsi Food Festival at the J W Marriott Hotel at Sahar, in Andheri; Mumbai. Spread over...
Head To Udvada Before Prime Minister Modi Does.
Visit Udvada, a Parsi town, before Narendra Modi does Article by Kermin Bhot | hindustantimes.com Two giant stone statues guard the main entrance. They hold a sword to their chest and stand at...
Who really owns this Bangalore Parsi burial ground?
Three acres of prime land in the heart of the city which has been used as a burial ground by the Parsis for 123 years has turned into a conflict zone. The community has filed a case against the...
All is not well in the high corridors of hospitals
Are patients being given an adequate say in the treatment they receive? Almost one year ago, Jehangir Cama, a respected hotelier, who was the former President of the Federation of Hotel and...
Amicable End to Stalemate at Doongerwadi
An Interim Settlement has been reached between the Mumbai Mazdoor Sabha and the Bombay Parsi Punchayet. Via Parsiana “All is well that ends well”. The Parsi community can heave a sigh of...
Pairing a Parsi with food
She started helping her mom in the kitchen when she was 10 years old and by the time she was 13 she started cooking in her free time after school. “By then I knew that I wanted to be a chef,” says...
Why Are India’s Parsi People Going Extinct?
There are less than 60,000 Parsis in India today. That fact itself is so alarming that it demands measures to help the community from fading away. Despite their low numbers, their contribution in...
New Film Debuts: The Path of Zarathushtra
A feature film ‘The Path of Zarathustra’ will be released at Mumbai in PVR theaters on Friday September 3, 2015. It will also be released at theaters in Delhi, Bengaluru and Pune. The...
Sleepy Udvada Will Spring to life with first-ever Parsi festival
It’s where history meets hearty Parsi cuisine. Udvada, a coastal town about 200km north of Mumbai and a place of pilgrimage for Zoroastrians, is as beloved for housing the community’s...
Ratan Tata inducted into Automotive Hall of Fame
Other automotive heavyweights inducted include former Ferrari chariman Luca di Montezemolo Ratan Tata has been inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame for his contribution to the automotive...
Food Picks in Udvada
While Mumbai and Pune are the first two cities people think of when it comes to good Parsi food, they forget that Udvada is really the heart of this cuisine. Udvada is home to the Iranshah, a sacred...
House of Fire: Can India’s Parsis survive their own success?
Fali Madon was looking for a bride. A boyish twenty-seven-year-old with twin passions for physical fitness and expensive cars, Fali was the chief priest of a Parsi fire temple in the Colaba district...
3,000-yr Parsi tradition of final rites threatened by strike
The Bombay Parsi Punchayet received a notice of a strike by the Mumbai Mazdoor Sabha, which also includes workers who lay the community’s deceased to rest; the notice came after negotiations for a...
Parsis Aflame Over Snoop Dogg Video Featuring Sacred Symbol
A new video, “King,” featuring rapper Snoop Dogg and Iranian American singer Amitis has raised the ire of the worldwide Parsi community, including the Indian American community, for its use of a...
Navroze Godrej: 4th-gen Godrej ushers in new culture at Godrej & Boyce
Navroze Godrej, the son of Godrej & Boyce Manufacturing (G&B) chairman Jamshyd Godrej, and who is the only member of the fourth generation of the Godrejs so far to be inducted on the...
YouTube withdraws Snoop Dogg video
Readers of Parsi Khabar might remember that we had broken the story of the video featuring Snoop Dogg and Amitis, that had questionable and disrespectful use of the Farohar in it. The story then got...
Khandias: The Keepers of Doongerwadi
Among Parsis, Khandias are a group of people spoken about only in hushed tones. It is their job to bathe and carry the deceased of the community to the Towers of Silence for vultures, and then tend...
How India makes Parsi babies
The Parsis of India are a unique community, but their numbers are declining fast. In an effort to change this, the government is spending $1.5m to encourage them to have more children. Persis Aspi...
Udvada gets Rs 20 Crore boost
Gujarat’s tourism ministry has sanctioned Rs 20 crore for the development of Udvada, home to the Iranshah Atash Behram, the highest order fire temple for Parsis. Article By Jyoti Shelar |...
Prime Minister Modi and Ratan Tata set to grace International Udvada Utsav in December 2015
Parsis from across the country and globe will participate in the first ever ‘Iranshah Udvada Utsav’, beginning December 25 in Udvada, Navasari. The Iranshah Udvada Utsav is jointly...
Ervad Dr. Parvez Bajan Earns Doctorate In Ancient Avesta Pahlavi Script
Rustom House in Grant Road is home to an elderly priest who is a veritable storehouse of Iranian history . Ervad Parvez Bajan has six cupboards for books on Irani and Persian culture and just one...
Open Parsi dokhmas to kin, says protesting workers’ union
The Mumbai Mazdoor Sabha, representing the Bombay Parsi Punchayet’s (BPP) 220 Class IV workers, has asked the trust to allow relatives of the deceased into the roofless towers where dead...
Parsis volunteer to turn corpse-bearers
BPP Trustee Scopes Out Substitutes If Khandias Strike About 25 Parsis, normally employed as plumbers, engineers and businessmen, will don crisp white uniforms and work as pallbearers or khandias if...
Chalo Udvada: The First Iranshah Udvada Utsav 2015
The Foundation for Development of Udvada & the Udvada Samast Anjuman are very pleased to announce that the first ever ‘Iranshah Udvada Utsav’ will be celebrated on December 25-26-27, 2015...
Indian Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh Meets with UNESCO PARZOR Team
“Though very small in number comprising a minuscule fraction of India’s total population, the Parsi community has consistently and remarkably enriched the Indian society over the years”. This was...
Mumbai’s Parsis fight to preserve the city’s greenest space in Dadar
The Parsi colony in Mumbai’s Dadar neighbourhood is unique. It is the world’s largest concentration of Parsis, now down to its last 80,000 despite the community’s wealth and education. Article by...
Surat’s Garda College’s lost glory to be restored
A new governing body in S B Garda Trust, one of the oldest Parsi educational trusts in south Gujarat, has brought to an end differences simmering for two decades and also controversies involving its...
Police Orders Fresh probe into cash at Bombay Parsi Punchayet office
In May, cops submitted a report concluding investigations. Community activists, four trustees smelt a rat. Police Commissioner Rakesh Maria has ordered a re-investigation in the case of Rs 21 lakh...
Spotlight’s on khandias, the Parsi ‘untouchables’
Sam Vesuna was 19 when he became a pallbearer at the Parsi Towers of Silence at Malabar Hill. Today, bodies laid to rest in the roofless towers putrefy below solar panels, but at that time, hungry...
The curious case of the vanishing Parsis
“I’ll grow up to be a math teacher,” declares Delicia Billimoria. Looking at the ease with which she demolishes a complex multiplication assignment on a canvas blackboard hung in her living room at...
Kolkata Parsi Zoroastrians file petition in high court against Snoop Dogg video
The Parsi Zoroastrian community in Kolkata is up in arms against a video uploaded on YouTube that they feel is blasphemous and shows disrespect to the ‘Faravahar’, a symbol held sacred...