Masal Vadai Vs Falafel

I am a big fan of Food network Channel. Particularly like the shows on  cookies, cakes, toppings, frosting, salads, soups, the list go on and on...

When I was watching a show yesterday, something very familiar caught my eye. Pleasantly surprised to see our own masal vadai in its middle eastern avatar called 'Falafel'.
A couple of our friends frequent a Italian restaurant nearby. And used to rave about the wonderful falafel they had. Very happy to see our humble beloved Vadai being adored here.

Definitely should be a connection between both recipes, either our ancient Mama, Mami's suttu-fied (copied) the recipe from Arabs or Arabs suttu-fied from our Mama, Mami's.
Personally I would like to believe that its from us :))

Anyways, here are the facts from Wikipedia

Vadai, could not find much history about the vadai. Still found some details. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idli
The earliest Tamil writings are traced to about 300 BC, but references to edibles and food habits abound in literature between 100 BC and 300 AD (Idaicchangam). 'Dosai' and 'Vadai',were popular.

Falafel an middle eastern recipe, Falafel is an Arabic word, meaning fluffy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falafel This food originated in Egypt first, It has been theorized to a lesser extent that falafel has origins in the Indian subcontinent where it and other chickpea-based dishes are also popular. Israelis were the first to spread falafel to Europe and the United States sometime in the 1970s.