Coffee first came to India
in 1670, smuggled out of
Yemen and into southern
India by the Muslim Saint
Baba Budan. He planted his
stolen merchandise in the
hills of south India known as
the Western Ghats not far
from Bangalore, the current
Information Technology hub
of India. For centuries coffee
was a drink of the upper-class
society of India and was not
widely consumed by the
growing population. The
British controlled India for
several hundred years and
their palates were much more
indian coffee culture
concerned with the quality of
the tea being produced than
the coffee. But coffee was still
grown and its popularity
spread among the south
Indian states. Coffee drinkers
in India began flavoring their
coffee with heaps of milk and
sugar, and even today that
remains the trend.
But, as the disposable
income of the middle class
began to rise, so did the interest in the “café culture” which
had spread across Europe and
the U.S. The historic Indian
Coffee House was one of the
first companies to capitalize
on the rapid expansion of
coffee popularity. They
opened their first store in the
1950s, serving small cups of
coffee, again, loaded with milk
and sugar, for very low prices,
along with traditional Indian
snacks. But it wasn’t until the
1990s and the opening of the
first Café Coffee Day (CCD)
outlet that the café culture
had truly secured a foothold
in India.
With the rise of cafes,
college students and youth
could gather to drink coffee
and spend time together.
Instant coffee grew into much
more of a staple in homes and
gained a place at the breakfast