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Family rift disappearing country’s favourite summer drink Rooh Afza

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Rooh Afza, Ramzan, Ramadan, Holy month of Muslims, Iftar, Roza, Hamdard, Business news

New Delhi: An epic family battle has reportedly taken its toll on a favourite summer drink – Rooh Afza. With Hamdard Pakistan jumping into the fray arguing that it can provide backup for the holy month of Ramadan where Rooh Afza appears to have vanished from kirana shops, it makes sense to track the reasons behind the halted production.

The Rs 400-crore rose flavoured brand has enormous salience and is a pan-Indian favourite in the summer months. Hamdard Labs which is the company behind the brand is facing a shortage of key ingredients which, it claims, is behind the supply bottlenecks.

 

Rooh Afza, Ramzan, Ramadan, Holy month of Muslims, Iftar, Roza, Hamdard, Business news

 

Hamdard founder Hakim Hafiz Abdul Majeed’s grandson Abdul Majeet, it is beleived, is in a conflict with his cousin Hammad Ahmed. This is taking its toll on the business. Speculation is rife that the 450,000 retailers who stock the popular indigenous drink are in a panic because its maximum sales take place during ‘iftari’ or the breaking of the fast. Production has been stopped since last November.

Hundreds of tweets rolled in about the drink being an integral part of an iftar. Tweep @vrishtibeniwal posted: “Breaking the fast in the evening, iftar, has traditionally consisted of pakoras (fritters), fruit chaat (fruit salad), dates and Rooh Afza. An iftari without Rooh Afza is just not the same.” While, Twitter user @Tanima wrote about the sentiments and memories attached to the drink: “I don’t think I like Rooh Afza as much as I like the nostalgia attached to it. It tastes of school summer vacations and those hot afternoons when there was no AC and these simple respites were enough to keep us happy.”

Dismissing any rift within the family, Mansoor Ali, chief sales and marketing officer at Hamdard, according to a report by The Economic Times said, “We are facing supply constraints of certain herbal ingredients. We hope to fix the demand-supply gap within a week.” But the drink with a history of uninterrupted supply disappearing from the shelves has led to major speculation which cannot be without truth.

 

Rooh Afza, Ramzan, Ramadan, Holy month of Muslims, Iftar, Roza, Hamdard, Business news

 

Gulf News in June 2016 had traced the geneology of the drink — In 1908, in the bylanes of Old Delhi, Hakim Hafiz Abdul Majeed decided to create a herbal mix that would help Delhi’s masses stay cool in summer. Selecting herbs and syrups from traditional Unani medicine, he created a drink that would help counter heat strokes, bring down palpitation and prevent water loss. He named it Rooh Afza, which in Urdu literally meant something that refreshes the soul.

Mirza Noor Ahmad, an artist, prepared the labels of Rooh Afza in several colours in 1910. Such colourful prints could not be processed in Delhi then. It was, therefore, printed under special arrangement by the Bolton Press of the Parsees of Bombay (Mumbai).

 

Country’s favourite summer drink Rooh Afza disappearing due to family rift:

 

A few decades later, Abdul Majeed decided to turn this medicament into a drink. The reception to the first batch ever made of Rooh Afza was an indicator of its future. “When they actually made Rooh Afza for the first time, the flavour and the smell were so enticing that a crowd began to gather around asking, ‘Ho kya raha hai?’ (what is happening?). The whole batch got sold off within an hour,” Abdul Majeeb, the great grandson of Hakim Hafiz Abdul Majeed, told Gulf News. Today, he is the CEO of Hamdard India, continuing the family’s work in offering affordable medical care to the masses.

The partition of India was the turning point, which went on to divide not just the family but Rooh Afza as well. “In 1947, most of the family travelled to Pakistan. Only my grandfather, Hakeem Abdul Hameed, and his two sons stayed. Even as his younger brother, Hakim Mohammad Said, went to Pakistan, my grandfather said, ‘I will not be able to leave India because it is my motherland’,” Abdul Majeeb said.

 

Rooh Afza, Ramzan, Ramadan, Holy month of Muslims, Iftar, Roza, Hamdard, Business news

 

With one brother in India and the other in Pakistan, they both continued to carry on the legacy left behind by their father on their own. While the business was already established in India, Mohammad Said faced a lot of hardships launching Rooh Afza in Pakistan.

Sadia Rashid, chairperson of Hamdard Laboratories (Waqf) Pakistan and president of Hamdard Foundation Pakistan, told Gulf News: “My father (Mohammad Said) migrated to Pakistan, on January 9, 1948. The challenges of a fledgling country and a lack of means posed difficulties … he laid the foundation of Hamdard Pakistan in two rented rooms in Karachi’s old area of Arambagh, with Rs 12 (Dh0.42) worth of rented furniture.”

 

Rooh Afza, Ramzan, Ramadan, Holy month of Muslims, Iftar, Roza, Hamdard, Business news

 

In 1953, Hamdard Laboratories Pakistan finally became lucrative, and it was converted into a waqf or a Muslim endowment entity. According to her, the brand name was “taken from the poetic book ‘Masnavi Gulzar e Nasim’ by Pandit Dia Shankar Nasim”. Rooh Afza was a character in the book.

Apart from the India and Pakistan, Hamdard also has a presence in Bangladesh. Rashid said: “My father (Mohammad Said) had opened a branch of Hamdard in former East Pakistan. After the creation of Bangladesh, instead of winding up that office and plant, he gifted that to the people of Bangladesh to be run and managed by its workers.”

 

Business

Apple is giving a huge discount on its gadgets: Details inside

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If you want to buy an iPhone and were waiting for a nice offer, then we have a piece of good news for you! Amazon Summer Sale May 2022 has begun and they are offering major discounts on various smartphones, laptops, and smart TVs, among others.

The sale is live now on the e-commerce platform with no-cost EMI options and exchange discounts on various products. In addition to this, Amazon has also partnered with several banks including ICICI, Kotak Bank, and RBL so that customers get instant discounts of up to 10% using their cards and EMI transactions.

Customers can easily enjoy this summer sale and get massive discounts on iPhones. They can also compare prices on Flipkart Big Saving Days Sale 2022 before making a purchase.

 

Amazon Summer Sale May 2022: Discount offer on iPhone 13 

Apple’s coveted phone model iPhone 13 in the 128 GB storage model will be available during the Amazon Summer Sale May 2022 for Rs 64,900. The MRP of the phone is Rs 79,900. This means that the customers will be able to enjoy a discount of up to Rs 15,000 on the purchase of the iPhone 13.

If you have an old iPhone in working condition then you will also be eligible to receive another additional discount worth up to Rs 17,000 on the iPhone 13.

Buy at Rs. 64,900 (MRP – Rs. 79,900)

Features of Apple iPhone 13 

The iPhone is powered by an A15 Bionic processor with 6 core CPU. Apart from this, it has 16 core neural engines. With the iPhone 13, up to 512 GB of storage will be available. The iPhone 13 has a 6.1-inch Retina XDR display with 1000 nits brightness.

The iPhone 13 has a 12-megapixel dual rear camera setup. This time a new wide-angle camera has been given, whose aperture is f/1.6. With this, there is support for sensor optical stabilisation. Night mode has been made better than before. The second lens is also 12 megapixels ultra-wide and has an aperture of f/2.4.

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