1 - Fighter plane has a low grade tool (5) - {SPAD}{E} [DD]
4 - Something one pays for to be in the sky! (7) - AIRFARE [E]
10 - Ignore the sanction cancelled (3,3) - {LET} {OFF}
11 - Warn the Danish character about the way of working (8) - AD{MO}NISH* Way of working appears again
13 - He is around this year, now at the mouth of an Indian river (8) - {MAHAN}{AD}{I} Mahan is the he? (Addendum - {MA{HA}N}{AD}{I} - Thanks to Sandhya see comments below)
14 - Finally the head teacher follows the book (2,4) - {AT LAS}{T}
16 - Establishment within the parish open campus (4) - SHOP [T]
17 - Twice speak in an evasive manner (6,4) - {DOUBLE} {TALK}
20 - Badly affected volunteers in Kenya leave New York in a shock (4,1,5) - {TA}{KE(-ny) A} {KNOCK}
21 - Keen singer will come back (4) - AVID <- )
24 - Overthrow Gore in the country (6) - REGION*
26 - Make a statement about the girl in front of the cheetah (8) - {ANN}{OUNCE}
28 - Head scarf for an old woman (8) - BABUSHKA [DD]
29 - Nine in the Chinese dynasty are recording music (6) - M{IX}ING
30 - Answers from peers upset 51 imprisoned (7) - REP{LI}ES*
31 - Part of body language, overheard (5) - THIGH (~thai)
DOWN
2 - Jumble in the scrap factory (9) - {PATCH}{WORK}
3 - Strongly resist the defined treatment regardless of an individual (6) - DEFEND(-i)*
5 - India is ready at last for the race (4) - {IND}{Y}
6 - Boundary of the developed fort in both sides of the racecourse (8) - F{R}ONTI{E}R*
7 - Girl covers a dish (5) - R{A}ITA
8 - Fasteners left in tents (6) - C{L}AMPS
9 - Revolutionary soldiers initially keep the horse (6) - {CHE}{TA}{K}
12 - Connects a disc jockey to pianos regularly (7) - {A}{DJ}{O}{I}{N}{S}
15 - Run away with the sailor in a jiffy out in the East (7) - {AB}{S(-e)COND}
18 - Can diva somehow sing without a note going forward? (9) - ADVANCI*{(-si)NG}
19 - Accountant spent the euros in Luxembourg on the spinning ride (8) - {CA}{ROUSE*}{L}
20 - Bee in short is irritated by the vibrations (6) - THRO{B}S
22 - Net on the machine (6) - DREDGE What is Net doing here?
23 - Refinement of officers, not engineers in the borders of Sharjah (6) - {POLI(-ce)}{SH} Poor clue Engineers would be CE's
25 - Chit-chat with the French actor (5) - {GAB}{LE}
27 - Something overhead on an eastern island (4) - {SKY}{E}
GRID
Last evening I attended the Bharatanatya arangetram of a young woman.
ReplyDeleteThroughout the lively performance, I didn't have to strain my ears to hear her body language:
Thai, thai, thakka dimi thai...
13 across: He is around this year, now at the mouth of an Indian river (8){MA{HA}N}{AD}{I}
ReplyDeleteMAN = He
HA = Latin hoc anno (this year) - Free Online Dictionary
AD = now
I =Indian
Good morning everyone.
ReplyDeleteLiked these clues: 4A, 31A, 7D, 25D AND 27D.
13a - Really got bugged by this. Indeed 'she' is 'mahan'! (p.s. Sandhya's explanation sounds plausible.)
29A - Interestingly, 'Eleven in the Chinese dynasty...' also works !
22D - Took it as DREDGE as a matter of guess. Foxed by the NET effect.
23D - Here too it was a guess. Usually, RE represents engineers (Royal Engineers).
@ Chaturvasi, you have taste, brother !
Richard
Good one Sandhya
ReplyDelete@ Chaturvasi, you have taste, brother !
ReplyDeleteRichard,
I notice that you have a space between the last word of this exclamatory sentence and the punctuation mark.
Actually, in some centuries ago I think this was the practice and I have seen some old books punctuated in this manner.
I don't know when the modern practice of putting the exclamation mark close to the last word came into being.
Come to think of it, the ancient usage seems to have some logic in it.
That infamous loooooooong list has
ReplyDeleteha this year
without any further explanation, which Sandhya has provided us. For which, thanks.
Forget the grammar (which doesn't come so easily) but if you want to know how certain components work in this compiler's work, get a copy of that list.
@ Chaturvasi
ReplyDeleteYou are a keen observer. But, it was no 'pregnant' pause. Leaving a space in such places makes smooth reading on the monitor.
At least, I have made it a regular practice, having been a regular contributor to websites for many years.
Besides, space comes free, you don't have to pay for it, you know. :)
Richard
@Sandhya, I was trying to figure out how ha meant this year until I saw your explanation
ReplyDeleteRichard. Dredge according to freedictionary is An implement consisting of a net on a frame, used for gathering shellfish.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Suresh.
ReplyDeleteRichard
@Suresh,
ReplyDeleteIt says 'An implement consisting of a net on a frame' so I do not know how NJ can expect anyone to believe that 'Net on the machine' can lead to dredge. Basically I put in Dredge as nothing else fits there
How many more days to go for the next setter ?
ReplyDeleteNJ will go on till the 4th of Mar, she contributes 10
ReplyDelete@chaturvasi: I do know the French always have a space before ?,! etc. It's not a regular space (it's called une espace insecable) and is tough to produce on keyboards.
ReplyDeleteAlso, a small but of trivia: Until the '70s most typewriters didn't have !. So people had to type a full stop, go back and then type an apostrophe. I remember spending a lot of time looking for the ! in my my grand-dad's Remington from the '50s.
@Pip,
ReplyDeleteThat's an interesting bit of Trivia, must have a look at my Dad's old typewriter next time I go home.
@ Pip
ReplyDeleteYes, after reading your post, I too could faintly recall doing the same exercise on an old typewriter we had at home to produce an exclamation mark (!). Thanks for providing scope for a bit of nostalgia.
Richard
Pip
ReplyDeleteI certainly remember keying in the exclamation mark that way in an old portable typewriter that my elder brother (Bhargav is my younger brother) had. My elder brother at 77 still reads fiction but he will not come anywhere near crosswords.
I am not much of a typist but my brother and more so my uncle used to type really fast.
And in Indian Express among my colleagues there were many terribly fast typists: I could only gape at them going bang-bang at the machine with fingers flying in the air.
28A BABUSHKA
ReplyDeleteThis brought to mind an interesting episode related to the 1963 assassination of the American president John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babushka_lady
This link gives you the story. It will interest movie buffs and those who have been following international politics also.
Richard
Today is a holiday. Came back soon . Got the whole crossword mainly by fluke or call it inspired guess.Mostly through Concise Oxford Dictionary
ReplyDeleteSo four more days of NJ to be endured :-(
ReplyDeleteHi All,
ReplyDeleteHappy to have solved all save 28A and 27D; and it is just 13:30. Was forever reading 'overhead' as 'overheard' in 27D. Must be the influence of 31A.
@Colonel. Is a note = si in 18D? How?
A search in www.morewords.com with b?b?s??? for 28A gave me Babushka. But it came along with a hundred others and so I didn't bother to go further.
@Suresh
ReplyDeletesi is apparently a variation of ti and is of Italian origin. So it says on freedictionary.com
I would have definitely cleared 28A as a DD if 'Russian' had somehow figured in the second definition. Bad NJ.
ReplyDeletethanks @suresh. thanks @suresh.
ReplyDeleteThe second thanks is for your help on JUDEA of 9775.
Actually Babushka only required a visit to the Dictionary (not online) once the crossings were in place particularly the two Bs
ReplyDelete23D - Refinement of officers, not engineers in the borders of Sharjah (6) - {POLI(-ce)}{SH} Poor clue Engineers would be CE's
ReplyDeleteThis should have been {POLI(-ces)}{SH} because of plural of officer
@svemuri
ReplyDeleteOfficers and Polices are not synonymous they have different meanings
well done jaggu bhai! you are an expert in inspired guessworks!
ReplyDeletecolonelji, anno for MO in ADMONISH?
ReplyDelete@vck
ReplyDeleteWay of working = Modus Operandi = MO
@VCK, "Way of working" = "Modus Operandi" = MO
ReplyDeleteI think we had this same thing couple of days back.
Is "mouth" needed in 13A?
ReplyDelete@Vijay,
ReplyDelete'Mouth of an Indian' is for taking the first letter on Indian which is the I in MAHANADI