As snarky desis, we use mirchi constantly, in both our writing and our food. However, there is a human face to all this heat:

In temperatures of over 45 degrees, 80 year-old Rajima sits under an asbestos roof preparing chillies for export to Britain.

For eight hours at a stretch her aching fingers pluck the stalks from the red chilli pods, releasing a pungent dust that fills her nose and throat making her cough and sneeze.

For this, she earns 30 rupees, the equivalent of 40 pence, or less than a third of the cost of a small jar of chilli powder in a British supermarket. Rajima and her 50 co-workers are the hidden face of India's spice trade. [BBC]

Think about the effects to Rajima's health from all of this exposure to pepper. Pepper farmers and processors go through alot and earn very little:

Watching his produce weighed at Warangal market, one farmer complains that the 800 rupees he's getting for each 40 kilo sack is too little to cover the growing costs.

"I took huge loans for agricultural investment - mostly pesticides," he says. "Now there will be no alternative for me but to commit suicide". [BBC]

Furthermore, demand for pepper is down, due to a recent food scare concerning a food coloring carcinogenic additive. Bad weather has spoiled much of the Indian pepper crop, causing desi farmers to lose business to those in other countries. It's a rough life for farmers from Andhra Pradesh.

According to state records, 4,500 farmers have killed themselves in the past seven years, driven to despair by poor harvests and financial worries, and that figure would be far higher if other family members were included.
The epidemic of suicide started with cotton farmers but it is now spread to spice growers. Ironically, most die by swallowing the pesticides that have helped get them into debt.[BBC]

I'd like to say something cute about how there should be increased demand coming from Assam where they use chili to ward off wild elephants --

In the past 15 years, elephants have killed more than 600 people in Assam... elephants cannot stand some pungent chilli varieties ... so chilli smoke bombs and ropes smeared with chillies may keep the elephants away [BBC]
-- but honestly, no jokes about how Republicans are allergic to spice can take the tragedy out of the story above.

So please, next time you add some mirchi, or even use it as a metaphor, take a moment to remember the people who make it possible.