Friday, 6 March 2015

No 11335, Friday 06 Mar 2015, Afterdark


HAPPY HOLI

WOW4


ACROSS
1   Many violent Nazi gunmen initially secured this erstwhile German city-state (6) DANZIG {D}{NAZI*}{Gu...n}
5   Throaty channel has Arnab escape ban (6) HOARSE {HO{ARnab}SE}
10 Devised action to grasp C language (7) OCCITAN {OC{C}ITAN*}
11 Democrat joining English party, on getting power becomes corrupt (7) DEPRAVE {D}{E}{P}{RAVE}
12 One who avoids the First Lady, has a date with redhead (6) EVADER {EV{A}{D}E}{Re...d}
15 Rebecca's heart set on cocktail with oriental model in a creek (6) BECKET {reBECca}{cocK}{E}{T} Definition ot clear
16 Thieves ravaging barbershops remove hasp (7) ROBBERS BaRBERshOpS*
17 Firstly, a real man yearns to be a force (4) ARMY Acrostic
18 Coordinates of artists inside given by electromagnetic radiation (1-3) X-RAY {X-{RA}Y}
19 Blended a daiquiri, mead, icariine, xerez for starters, in front of Edward (7) ADMIXED {A}{Da...i}{Mead}{Ic...e}{Xe...z}{ED}
20 Country's bad air leads to fever (4) IRAQ {AIR*}{Q}
22 Test for queen you orally administered on independent Zambia (4) QUIZ {Q}{U(~you)}{I}{Z}
25 Engineer to resign for taking drug and stay silent (2,5) BE QUIET {BE} {QUI{E}T}
27 King's subject releases article on infidel (6) KAFFIR {K}{AFFaIR}
28 Creating a barrier for princess preceding the ruler (6) DIKING {DI}{KING}
31 Remove ant from watermelon juice, leaving a nematode (7) EELWORM WatERMELOn*
32 War office at Japan with faulty aim is behind one island (3,4) IWO JIMA {1}{WO} {J}{AIM*}
33 Wild cats' vocal chords emit Argon (6) LYNXES LarYNXES
34 Figure of oriental females is girlish, young primarily (6) EFFIGY {E}{FF}{Is}{Gi...h}{Yo...g}

DOWN
2   Applause for hen escaping from mechanical trap (7) ACCLAIM MeChAnICAL*
3   Spot that lady's instrument (6) ZITHER {ZIT}{HER}
4   Firearms acquired last evening at sunset (4) GUNS {e...nG}{SUN*}
5   Jihad quelled, I am leaving for a pilgrimage (4) HADJ JiHAD*
6   Fruits procured by requests made out of Italy (6) APPLES APPLiES
7   Speakers place a point upfront for a follower (7) STALKER (+s)STALKER(-s)
8   Caught out kleptomaniac, ordered to leave Milan for an American city (6) TOPEKA  KlEPTOmaniAc*
9   It's good to leave Lima for a place abundant with shrubs (6) HEATHY HEAlTHY
13 Strangely, weirdo on reaching Romania turns more unruly (7) ROWDIER {WIERDO*}{R}
14 Devious, double-quick arrangement to evict duck (7) OBLIQUE dOUBLE-QuIck*
15 Hurried and brewed beer with a bit of zing to place in front of journalist (7) BREEZED {BEER*}{Zing}{ED}
20 Printer type in Kampuchea's black (3-3) INK-JET {IN}{K}-{JET}
21 Hideously, but legally dismiss leader (7) AWFULLY lAWFULLY
23 Gun I dismantled, earns money in welding (7) UNITING {UNI{TIN}G*}
24 Almost look back at unknown police officer in front of snake (6) ZIGZAG {Z}{IG}{eZAG<=}
25 Bio contains juicy bit on union leader's unknown trinkets (6) BIJOUX {BI{Ju...y}O}{Un...n}{X}
26 Insider information received on match turned sour (3-3) TIP-OFF {TIP<=}-{OFF}
29 Uncle to come back after 10 for a festival (4) XMAS {X}{MAS<=}
30 To live, Victor's wives lost weight and dumped son (4) VIVE {V}{wIVEs}

GRID

Posted by at
Labels: , ,

39 comments:

  1. Rengaswamy6 March 2015 at 08:38

    Adhya chatvari panagrams santhi. Looks like 4 pangrams today, seeing four x,y,z,q,j etc.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Deepak Gopinath6 March 2015 at 08:39

    Will upload the solution grid after someone comments suitably

    ReplyDelete
  3. Raghunath6 March 2015 at 08:40

    Second the "WOW" X 4!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Rengaswamy6 March 2015 at 08:43

    Colourful Grid. Happy Holi to all THCC members.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Raghunath6 March 2015 at 08:54

      Don't know whether you meant to connect both your sentences.

      Happy & colourful Holi to all.

      Delete
  5. SandhyaP6 March 2015 at 08:44

    Quite a feat by AD!

    ReplyDelete
  6. SandhyaP6 March 2015 at 09:03

    Happy Holi!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Prabhanjan6 March 2015 at 09:05

    Wonderful.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Mukundala Balasubramanyam6 March 2015 at 09:10

    Colourful !

    ReplyDelete
  9. Aakash Sridhar6 March 2015 at 09:15

    The grid fill is absolutely crazy!
    And Happy holi to everyone :) ...

    ReplyDelete
  10. Lakshmi Vaidyanathan6 March 2015 at 09:15

    Happy Holi everyone!
    @AD :)

    ReplyDelete
  11. Mukundala Balasubramanyam6 March 2015 at 09:18

    20 Country's bad air leads to fever (4) IRAQ {AIR*}{Q}

    Q for 'fever'? Not getting it. Help pl.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 09:28

    What a Holi ! What a CW!! Any no. of vows will not be sufficient. Great job. Col. matched it with a stunningly colourful gridfill. Nice start for the day. Thank you AD.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Mukundala Balasubramanyam6 March 2015 at 09:38

    It was a ZIGZAG puzzle with a mix of XYZ etc. Keep it going, AD! Enjoyed it. :)

    ReplyDelete
  14. Ramani6 March 2015 at 10:36

    Really wondering how much,time, work, strain and stress would have gone into this grid! Simply superb!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Richard6 March 2015 at 11:27

    Nice crossword and equally amazing splash of colours.

    Happy Holi to you all.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Richard6 March 2015 at 11:32

    10A With my limited proficiency in Arabic, I can decifer the legend on Iraq' s flag as Allah Akbar (God be great). Mohsin and others may confirm this.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nadathur Rajan6 March 2015 at 11:45

      The tricolour is charged with the takbīr (Allahu akbar, "God is great")

      Delete
    2. Kishore6 March 2015 at 15:04

      Besides that, there is reference to Kaffir, Jihad and Hadj in today's crossie ...

      Delete
    3. Richard6 March 2015 at 21:00

      Read 'decifer' in my 11:32 post as 'decipher'. When I was in a hurry, Lucifer might have had his influence...

      Delete
  17. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 11:50

    Now that you mention it, I tried to recollect the little Urdu I learned while at school. I am able to make out the start of the 2 words-A and the end bar (the dot at the bottom being the difference between pa & ba.
    I am reminded of a joke I read years ago.
    A detergent manufacturer made out a huge hoarding for advertising their new product and they wanted it to be clearly seen as a visual without going into a lot words. So they put 3 pictures- the first one of a dirthy cloth, the 2nd it being dipped in soap water and the third that of a sparklingly clean cloth. Lo & behold! Their sales slumped immediately thereafter. It was a big puzzle for them. While checking with a local dealer they understood the problem and the hoarding was immediately removed.
    Can you guess?
    They forgot that Arabic/ Urdu was written and read from right to left!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. mohsin6 March 2015 at 12:38

      @Richard sir, you are correct. That's indeed what's written on the flag.

      Btw, there's no 'pa' in arabic!
      Which reminds me, a can of Pringles (the chips), when branded in Arabic, reads Brinjals!

      Delete
  18. Kishore6 March 2015 at 13:06

    I am amazed! With AD's Wow^4 performance! Kudos, Shri! Also, with a clue in the Guardian Quickie today: Sanskrit language (4). The answer seems to be URDU!

    As one who has studied Sanskrit and Urdu, I am truly overwhelmed for not having realised it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 14:07

      Answer IS Urdu. But I fail to understand. From what you say, it seems acceptable,but how?

      Delete
    2. Kishore6 March 2015 at 14:57

      My take is: Pure Urdu is predominantly based on Persian/Farsi, 'Textbook' Hindi is predominantly based on Sanskrit and the spoken Hindustaani, as it was called during the times of the Raaj, is a delightful blend of the two. Most persons speak the last named. It is to the credit of writers like Dr Rahi Masoom Raza, who inspite of being an accomplished Urdu poet, brilliantly wrote the script and dialogues for the Hindi serial Mahabharat, taking extreme care to see that Persian origin words were not used since usage of those words would be anachronistic.

      Delete
    3. Kishore6 March 2015 at 15:02

      I never said it is acceptable! Zameen aasman ka farq hai, janaab. Bhoomi-gaganasya antaram bhavati, shrimaan.

      Delete
    4. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 15:29

      Thank you Kishore. Exactly what I thought. I failed to understand the true meaning of 'overwhelmed'.

      Delete
    5. Kishore6 March 2015 at 16:03

      Run over by a steam roller

      Delete
    6. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 17:12

      :-) So was I.

      Delete
  19. Arvind Ramaswamy6 March 2015 at 13:45

    Wow AD! Lovely grid :-) Was able to complete an AfterDark puzzle after ages! Jinx broken for me :-) Happy Holi to all...

    ReplyDelete
  20. Padmanabhan6 March 2015 at 14:13

    This is what Wiki has to say about Urdu-
    There have been attempts to "purify" Urdu and Hindi, by purging Urdu of Sanskrit loan words, and Hindi of Persian loan words, and new vocabulary draws primarily from Persian and Arabic for Urdu and from Sanskrit for Hindi. This has primarily affected academic and literary vocabulary, and both national standards remain heavily influenced by both Persian and Sanskrit.[22] English has exerted a heavy influence on both as a co-official language.[23]
    But to call it a 'sanskriy language'?

    ReplyDelete
  21. VMA Nair6 March 2015 at 15:38

    Happy Holi everyone and AD woww !!

    ReplyDelete
  22. PKPSwami6 March 2015 at 18:11

    Nice puzzle. Really a good teaser. But interestingly,I could crack even words hitherto unknown to me thanks to indicative type of clues.eg.27a ,32a &2d. Thank you AD.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Anonymous6 March 2015 at 18:36

    Thanks folks for all your wishes :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Unknown6 March 2015 at 23:21

      Sir, first time on this page - and I daresay this might get in too late for a dekko. I enjoyed your puzzle; so thank you for rounding off a great HOLI-day. However, the urge to get online was apropos your comment of yesterday on synonyms. For us green-horns, the glory of your art lies more in mind-plays and less in bland derivations from a thesaurus. You draw us 'in' when your words throw up vivid, associative images...and in this, some of the words you chose probably missed the mark. Many of us solve your puzzles 'on-the-move' with paper and pen, without the means to immediately refer to a thesaurus. Your skill lies in ensuring we don't have to...and still being cryptic...Today was perfect, and yet you could probably have had a re-think on Apples - should the plural have remained 'fruit' in the clue - or was that the result of a setter's rules? And applies = requests(?)...well, the thesaurus does say yes...

      Delete
  24. raju umamaheswar6 March 2015 at 23:27

    DG: happy and a colourful HOLI to ye- all !! Its a day of madness and splash of colours but our grid fill expert has created a methodical madness of magicube of multifarious colours !! Congrats. Made my Holi-day very enjoyable.

    Afterdark: Rename yourself as BEFORELIGHT !!!

    ReplyDelete

deepakgita@gmail.com

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)