3 min readMay 22, 2026 02:50 AM IST
First published on: May 21, 2026 at 06:04 PM IST
In recent months, public debate has repeatedly returned to the meaning of words, how they are used, and how easily familiar expressions acquire new meanings in new contexts. Language, especially in political spaces, rarely stays still. Words travel quickly, gathering associations along the way, sometimes stretching far beyond their original intent. Watching these shifts from a distance, I am reminded that meaning is often less stable in public discourse than it is in private life.
My childhood unfolded across transfers familiar to many defence households, where cities changed but certain markers of familiarity followed. In Bangalore, tucked into ordinary neighbourhoods, were Iyengar bakeries, modest spaces immediately recognisable by the warm aroma of freshly baked bread, sugar and butter drifting past their doors. Among the glass jars of rusks and trays of buns sat a triangular pastry filled with sweetened coconut and cardamom. It was neither quite a paratha nor quite a pie. The outer layer resembled something between bread and memory, firm enough to hold shape, soft enough to yield easily. I did not know its name then. I only knew its taste — gentle, balanced, without excess.
Years later, I would learn that it was called dilkhush. But I had carried the small astonishment of that bakery shelf in Bangalore with me wherever we moved. For me, it symbolised stability and belonging. Like many foods that belong to regional cultures, dilkhush was neither extravagant nor heavily advertised. It travelled instead through familiarity, repetition, neighbourhood presence, and the trust of everyday consumption.
Food often performs this social function. It binds communities without announcing that it is doing so, creating shared reference points that make places feel less distant. Taste becomes a small but enduring archive of belonging. Mobility, on the other hand, rearranges this sense of belonging. Across India, countless lives unfold through migrations, transfers, postings and outstation opportunities. Each move requires adjustment, but it also produces unexpected continuities. Everywhere we went, I sought out local bakeries in search of the flaky goodness that spelled comfort for me. Dilkhush felt like home when nothing else did.
It is striking how something as ordinary as a food memory can illuminate larger ideas about continuity and belonging. At a time when public language often becomes preoccupied with defining who belongs and on what terms, the small pastry from a neighbourhood bakery travelled across decades and regions almost perfectly intact in memory.
Policies and public institutions undeniably shape the direction of a country. Yet the experience of living in a society is sustained just as much by quieter forms of recognition, familiar flavours, shared references and everyday certainties. What endures in collective memory are the things that continue to affect how people live, move, access opportunities and experience dignity.
The triangular pastry from a Bangalore bakery may appear insignificant in the larger vocabulary of nation-building. Yet, its persistent presence across decades suggests, it is often the ordinary that remains the most dependable.
Mohanta is a Delhi-based writer
