In this ChaiTime show we celebrate Asha Tai's 80th birthday and her journey of 65 years in Hindi music Industry. This show is inspired by an article by Shreya Sethuraman in Hindustan Times, in which Asha Tai shared her favorite songs and little background about each one of them.

Enjoy the melodious and mesmerizing voice of Asha Bhosle.

Enjoy new Hindi songs from bollywood.

In today’s ChaiTime, we will be covering the event organized by Stanford India association, Stanford University. As you all know, Shri Anna Hazare is currently visiting United stated to spread his message on anti corruption crusade and trying to increase awareness towards the cause, not only in India but all over the world. The aim is to make this non-violent movement a global cause.

Anna’s familiar voice which reverberated all through India and is still going strong is now here in United States. Shri Anna Hazare visited Stanford University to have a question and Answer session on August 24th 2013.

This event was sponsored by Center of South Asia, Stanford University and was organized by Stanford India Association or SIA.

Kishore Kumar is one of the legendary singers from Hindi cinema. Anyone who has grown with Hindi movie songs is bound to have moments in their life when Kishore Kumar’s voice and songs have touched the right cord.

August 4th was his 84th birthday and in today’s Chaitime we celebrate the genius of Kishore Kumar and listen to some of his memorable songs.

In today’s Chai Time show we invite Bernadette White. Bernie is currently working as an Outreach Coordinator at the Center for South Asia at Stanford University. The other hat she wears is that of a doctoral student at Syracuse University, studying Sociology. Her research focuses on rural India, and more specifically, the social and political issues surrounding the discussions of farmers’ suicide. Her research has allowed her to gain experience conducting research internationally- with research trips to India. She has travelled to a lot of different cities in India and has done her fieldwork in the Vidarbha region in Eastern Maharashtra, India.

Farmers in India became the center of considerable concern in the 1990s when the journalist P Sainath highlighted the large number of suicides among them. Official reports initially denied the farmer suicides but as more and more information came to light the government began to accept that farmers in India were under considerable stress. It is a very serious issue and our guest today has been doing an extensive research in this field.

We will talk about this sensitive issue, plus we will talk to Bernie about how she got interested in India and Indian culture. We will also like to know about her hobbies, favorite movies and of course her favorite Hindi movie songs. We will listen to what Bernie likes to listen.

Everybody has dreams, mostly for themselves, and almost always the fulfillment is personal. However, the people who dream for others, who put aside their own needs and want to help others, are the ones who make the biggest difference. Their effort not only enriches them but all the people around them.

Today’s guest, Malati Nimonkar, is a resonating example of this. She runs a unique place Gurukul Ashram, run by Omkar Trust, in a small town in Maharashtra, India to help orphan and underprivileged. Her approach to this social problem is different in a way that she believes that providing for such children needs to go beyond the work done by usual charities. She firmly believes that the feeling of belonging to a family and feeling safe goes way beyond the general need of food and shelter. She equally cares for the education of these children and specially the girls.

She has had privilege of working at Anand Van very closely with Baba Amte and his wife Sadhna Amte. She sincerely believes that the time spent in Anand Van has given her the outlook which she tries to use in her day to day work.

Today, we will learn of her life, her upbringing, and her contribution to the world.

Mrs. Nilu Gupta is Professor of Hindi language at DeAnza College, Cupertino, CA and is very active in Indian community in Bay Area promoting many social and cultural causes. She is a writer, speaker and a poet. Her book “Jeevan Phoolon Ki Dali" has won many hearts and will be available on Amazon.com soon.

She is founder and president of UPMA (Utter Pradesh Mandal of America). She has been also accociated with ICC (India Community Center), Vishwa Hindi Jyoti and Vishwa Hindi Nyas. All of these organizations are very active in bay area fostering various heritage, culture and social causes.

In today’s show we talk to Niluji about her life, which included being a CEO of a textile company in India and later moving to USA and related experiences. We will also listen to her poetry.

Our life in today’s world is full of contradictions. On one hand the humanity is coming closer , people are interacting more, they know more about each other but on the other hand there are incidents of hatred and violence. Be it recent shooting at a Gurudwara in Wisconsin or killing of US ambassador Christopher Stevens, it makes you step back and think and try to find answers which are not easy.

The problems due to religion, caste, inequality are not new and there have been great people who have tried to understand this from different viewpoints. In today’s Chai Time we explore the theme of tolerance and love through music of recent times as well as music which is motivated by writings of Kabir, Meera bai, Rumi, Narsi Mehta and others.

"Bharat Ratna" Lata Mangeshkar turned 83 on Sept 28th, 2012. In this show, we will listen to Lataji’s solo songs from the golden era of Hindi Music. Send me your request at www.facebook.com/chaitimeradio and I will play your song.

Next week we will listen to memorable duets by Lata Mangeshkar and other legends of that era.

“Bharat Ratna” Lata Mangeshkar turned 83 on Sept 28th, 2012. In this show, we will listen to Lataji’s duet songs from the golden era of Hindi Music.

Thank you all for sending your requests to me.