Controversies abound Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week

The ongoing Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week has just got into another controversy.

The organisers of the event - Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI) received a lot of flak when Day One of the fashion extravaganza was canned because they did not get the fire license in time.

The body announced on Thursday that they were adding another day to the event as compensation to the designers including the likes of Ritu Beri, JJ Valaya and fashion house Satya Paul but it looks like some are not happy with the outcome.

FDCI confirmed to us that fashion house Satya Paul has backed out and are not going to show on the last day.

A highly placed source close to the development reveals, “Having a show on the last day means the designer loses a lot of buyer attention because the buyers don’t wait till the last day to see and place orders. So, some designers who have been given the last day aren’t happy at all. Puneet Nanda from Satya Paul has been the most vehement in expressing his discomfort. He did not come for the press conference in which all other designers showing on last day were present when FDCI was making the announcement.”

Sunil Sethi, the President of FDCI, confirms, “All other designers are very keen and we thank them for the support that they are giving us. Only Puneet Nanda has problems. He is not doing the show on the last day. That’s his stand, we have nothing to say. However, he still has his stall up here and is doing business from our venue. This is double standards. If he is so upset, then he should have also packed up and left the stall. Maybe he is upset because he did not get a night show. But we can’t please everyone. We are doing our best.”

Despite repeated attempts and requests, Puneet Nanda remained unavailable for a comment.

Meanwhile, gossip also is that the first day designers who like all others have to pay a registration fee for showing their line are being exempted from it.

A designer on conditions of anonymity says, “The picture coming to us is that maybe we don’t need to pay a penny because we lost out on Day One and we did suffer because of that. But all this doesn’t really matter because we have been already dented.”