MithaiMate may have your mom on Facebook this Diwali

On Diwali one trip to the mithaiwallah per household is culturally mandatory and www.MithaiMate.com wants a sweet piece of the action.

These are the shops of mithai makers, a best-eaten-fresh, extra sweet Indian dessert variety made of cooked sugar, condensed milk and often ground nuts too. The sweet is then distributed to families, friends and the poor during religious ceremonies and festivals to sweeten the soul, so to speak. But Mithai shops are a nightmare on Diwali. Crowded and competitive, often only the loudest, pushiest housewives get their way along with various foot soldiers of the rich. And the problem is mithai is best eaten fresh. 

If you're neither old enough or loaded enough to have your own Man Friday or you aren't married to a happy homemaker or you just don't have the time, MithaiMate.com might be your new best friend this Diwali. And you can even be friends on Facebook.

Started by an entrepreneurial 23-year-old from Mumbai, Akhilesh Bali co-founded MithaiMate.com which delivers mithai to your door in under 24 hours. He tells the Indian Express newspaper how he and his college mates tied up with the 90-year-old Punjabi Ghasitaram Halwai as their Mumbai mithai wallah, pooled in Rs 25,000 for the website, and suddenly had an overnight business in the business of delivering overnight.

Calling themselves "the next generation Mithaiwalas," they have fresh mithai hand-delivered in three cities (Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore) and at "honest prices," and you know they're with it because they have their own blog and Facebook application for those who want to send each other mithai with minimal effort.