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News India Live, Digital Desk: Masala Chai Origin: Whether you want to wake up in the morning, gossip with friends or enjoy the rain… for us there is only one answer to every occasion – ‘a cup of tea’. Today tea has become such a part of our culture and our identity that the day seems incomplete without it. But have you ever wondered how this tea brought by the British became so popular in a country where there has been a tradition of drinking milk, lassi and thandai for thousands of years? And the biggest question – when people all over the world were drinking black tea or green tea, then why did we Indians change its entire form by adding milk, sugar and spices in it? The story behind this is very interesting and it is based on a ‘desi jugaad’ of Indians during the era of slavery. This was a business ploy of the British. The story begins in the 19th century. At that time China had a monopoly on the tea trade and the British were very upset with this. To end their dependence on China, they started planting tea plantations in the mountains of Assam and Darjeeling in India. Tea had grown, but now the biggest challenge was to make it drink to the Indians. No one liked the ‘bitter-astringent’ taste. In the beginning, when the British made the Indians drink tea, no one liked its taste. Well, who likes bitter leaves dipped in boiling water? The British promoted it a lot by calling it a ‘healthy drink’ and started ‘tea breaks’ in mills and factories so that the workers felt fresh. But the matter still did not work out. Then came the real ‘Indian Jugaad’. When the British were failing in their efforts, then the common shopkeepers selling tea on the roadside came up with a jugaad which changed the fate of tea. He observed that Indian people have the habit of drinking milk and are also fond of sweets. Simply, they mixed these two things in that bitter tea of ​​the British – milk and sugar. As soon as milk was added, the bitterness of the tea reduced and it got a creamy taste. The sugar completely covered its bitterness. This tea was no longer just a beverage, but became a cheap, filling snack for the working class. The calories obtained from milk and sugar gave them energy to work throughout the day. And then added the seasoning of spices. Indians liked this new taste very much. Now when the milk and sugar had dissolved, the Indians also added their traditional tadka to it. By adding spices like ginger, cardamom, cloves and black pepper, it was given the form of ‘masala tea’. This was the tea which every Indian immediately adopted. It was no longer the tea of ​​the British but had become ours, your ‘desi tea’. So next time when you sip tea, remember that it is not just a drink, but the story of the desi jugaad and taste which made a foreign drink Indian forever.