Delhi’s Belly by Malavika Sangghvi: Your weekly round-up of the Capital’s cabbages and kings

Yesterday once more

Sotheby’s was the first international auction house to hold an auction in India in 1992, when they mounted a sale of Indian, European and Oriental paintings and art in New Delhi. “Our relationship with Delhi goes back a few decades,” says the auction house’s newly-appointed managing director — Mumbai-based Gaurav Bhatia — about the two-day course on international contemporary art in New Delhi, in collaboration with Sotheby’s Institute of Art designed for collectors and art enthusiasts to be held later in February.

Bhatia, who is essentially a Mumbai boy (via New York), with his heart in Kolkata and Lucknow, and who previously marketed luxury wines and spirits for an international brand, seems keen to befriend the City of Djinns. “It is a historic and artisanal city with a strong collector’s gene. One that celebrates culture, art, textiles and jewellery and wears it beautifully on its sleeve. We just had to bring Sotheby’s Institute to Delhi,” he says.

The course is said to encompass ‘classroom’ sessions as well as interactive panel discussions, lectures with market experts and guided visits. “Lunches with the speakers and specialists are included, providing a unique opportunity to discuss and debate key issues,” says Bhatia.

In the room the women come and go, talking of Tyeb and Krishen and Co?

Of memories and medu vada

I first met Padma Lakshmi in New York at Tina Brown’s ‘Women In The World’ conference a year or two ago,” says Barkha Dutt about her interview with the Indian-born model, television host and author, who is in India on a multi-city tour to promote her memoir — Love, Loss, and What We Ate. “Since she’s (Padma) a friend, I hosted an intimate dinner for her and Adam Dell at Rohit Khattar’s Indian Accent,” says Dutt “I admire her feminist spunk.

She is deeply political, and is determined to fight for her beliefs in Donald Trump’s America,” says the television journalist, who put together an eclectic bunch of people for Lakshmi to meet this past week, including author Patrick French along with his publisher wife Meru Gokhale, Priya Kapoor of Roli Books, bureaucrat Vikas Swarup and wife Aparna, BBC’s Justin and Bee, lawyers Manik and Raian Karanjawala and media maven Shekhar Gupta.”

As for Lakshmi, whose memoir has been called “a meld of memory and medu vada”, in addition to being a feisty and unflinching recollection of some of her past challenges (including former husband Salman Rushdie), we were told that she found the food at Khattar’s restaurant ‘outstanding’. “She seemed to particularly like the dahi batata puri,” said Dutt. 

On a magic carpet ride

It’s always stimulating to use ones developing thumbprint in collaborations that allow you to use your vocabulary and develop a new direction for a different genre,” says leading Delhi-based designer Tarun Tahiliani, the Doon and Wharton-educated son of a four-star Admiral of the Indian Navy, about his outing earlier this week in New York to launch a new rug collection in collaboration with the Big Apple’s iconic ABC Carpet & Home store.

The enterprise was part of the ongoing ‘From India with Pride: A Celebration of the Craft Culture and Design of India’ initiative. According to an attendee, it was “a very international and sophisticated crowd; and in addition to the beautiful carpets artfully displayed on the 6th floor of the building, models were dressed in Tahiliani’s latest ensembles with a few of his other designs on the racks, taking up the entire length of the store.”

“I think it’s time to put the maharaja and the tiger to bed, and for India to show herself in a modern avatar,” texted Tahiliani about his latest success, as he boarded a flight from New York to Rome.

The disruptive quotient

The uncertainty of elections does strange things to people’s heads. Take the case of this ubiquitous political commentator who has a penchant for the ‘big picture kinda stuff’, especially when he’s cradling a glass of whiskey in his hand, with a TV camera on him. The combination propels him to sound byte fluency (predicated on a heady mix of pop sociology and part pointy head waffle).

“Modi, Kejriwal, Trump and Goswami,” he was overheard muttering, before adding: “Goswami, Trump, Kejriwal and Modi”. Since this was a grouping of individuals that defied conceivable logic, we asked the UPC to explain what he meant.

“The disruptive quotient,” said the ubiquitous political commentator. “All of them have it in spades, especially Goswami,” he added.
Assuming that by Goswami he meant Arnab, and not Bindiya, we asked the UPC to elaborate. “There’s havoc in the TV industry these days. The young staffers at all news channels seem to be sending him their applications for jobs,” he said, adding: “What’s more, they’re even ready to jump ship for as low as a 20% hike. That’s how desperate people are in the industry. And, he’s the cause.” We asked him if he’d care to elaborate, he said: “His ability to turn the nation’s eyes away from other channels. They may have dissed him in public, but they’re queuing up to join his Republic. It’s the age of the ‘great disruptor’ — Goswami, Trump, Kejriwal and Modi. “Think about it,” the UPC said as he settled in for another evening of Scotch and sound byte.

Breaking news?

This news comes straight from the Salim-Javed school of dialogue-baazi. We were told that this delicious exchange allegedly took place in the central hall, after President Pranab Mukherjee’s address to the joint session of both Houses of Parliament. Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, in the presence of former finance minister P Chidambaram, allegedly told Prime Minister Narendra Modi in good humour: “Hamen toh laga ke rashtraptiji ka bhashan sunte waqt aap peet peet kar table tod dein (by the way you were thumping the table during the President’s address, I was worried it would break)”. PM Modi, who has a witty bone, allegedly said: “Azadji, abhi toh aur bahut kuch tootna baki hai (Azadji, there’s lots that remains to be broken)”. That this exemplary example of the art of robust repartee allegedly took place in Hindi, it reminded us of Bollywood films of yore. Picture abhi baki hai, mitron.