Madhur Bhandarkar receives Lifetime Achievement Award from Nari Hira

Madhur Bhandarkar and (centre) Nari Hira with a friend

For a man who for years has shunned the limelight preferring to shine it on others, media mogul Nari Hira was sure in for a lot of attention at the awards presentation ceremony of one of the leading glossies from his stable on Sunday night. Hira had put the zing into celebrity coverage way back in the Seventies with his film magazine.

Madhur Bhandarkar, the National Award-winning director, received a Lifetime Achievement Award from Hira. Bhandarkar narrated how he used to save money to buy his copies of the film magazine from the raddi walla; while Ashutosh Gowarikar stated that the reclusive workaholic publisher was 'the real media mogul', saying it was Hira's Hiba films which had introduced the culture of watching video movies in India.

But it was producer, director Subhash Ghai, who raised the most laughs when he enquired why Hira had stopped hosting his famous wall-to-wall Bollywood star and society queens' parties and how he missed attending them now. Immune to all this unsolicited commendation, a source said, "Typically, Mr Hira just heard them all and maintained a stoic silence, unaffected by the praise that was being showered on him."

Incidentally, besides the aforementioned, the other leading lights awarded were Atul Dodiya (Art), Gautam Singhania (Business), Pallavi Jaikishan (Fashion), Sonu Sood (Entertainment) and Ujjwal Nikam (Law).

What, no Dylan?
If there is heightened coverage of Arundhati Roy these days, put it down to the inevitable cranking of the publicity machine in the run up to her new novel.

The Rolling Stones

Recently the Booker prize-winning author, whose activism made her something of a polarising figure, was featured on that hoary old British institution, BBC Radio Four's Desert Island Disc, as the castaway, who gets to pick their favourite tunes or listener's pleasure.

The Beatles

No surprises then that Roy, a child of the Rock and Roll Gen, had chosen songs from the Beatles, (George Harrison's sublime, While My Guitar Gently weeps); the Stones' Ruby Tuesday; Janis Joplin's Summertime, and that evergreen favourite of left leaning liberals, Paul Robeson's Ol Man River amongst others. The only surprise in the list of this card holding member of the Blowin In The Wind Gen, was the absence of Bob Dylan.

Arundhati Roy

But then he's such a polarising figure himself!

Runa Laila in town
There was a time when Indians had enjoyed the unique stereophonic pleasure of the popular Sufi song 'Mast Kalandar,' crooned by gypsy songstress Reshma from Pakistan, and the delectable Runa Laila from Bangladesh on the radio. Both these artists had captured the popular imagination and had sold many albums in India.

Manjeet Kriplani and Runa Laila

This weekend Runa Laila was in Mumbai as the special guest of the Bangladesh Deputy High Commission in Mumbai for the 46th anniversary of the Bangladesh Independence and National Day celebrations.

Amruta Fadnavis

The chief guest was Amruta Fadnavis, banker and wife of current Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who is fast becoming a much sought after VIP guest in her own right, while Maharashtra Chief Secretary Sumit Mallick was the guest of honour. Among others who attended were the effervescent and erudite Manjeet Kriplani, who runs Gateway House, one of the city's leading think tanks.

Dubai calling
Word comes in that the lovely Dubai-based yummy mummy Faarah Mehta Shewakramani, daughter of Rita and the late Karl Mehta, and granddaughter of the swashbuckling Russy Karanjia (who incidentally was India's first celebrity editor), has launched her first enterprise.

Faarah Mehta Shewakramani and Sagar Shewakramani

The former society journalist who had a glamorous destination wedding in Greece a few years ago, had helped her mother launch a glossy that was eventually sold to Vijay Mallya, before settling down in Dubai.

Now we learn she has set up the region's first elective adult education academy to deliver Master Classes in art, culture, current affairs, etiquette, food, wine, poetry, and the enigmatically titled 'Social Know How.' Named Maison Imperiale and held at Dubai's Four Seasons, it promises to put 'the joie de vivre back into daily living.'

Rita Mehta (left) with Rishi Kapoor and Rita Vaswani

"Learning will never be more fun! Or more rewarding," says proud mom Rita, who also lives in Dubai, and is a doting (and glamorous) yummy grandmummy to Faarah's daughter.

Cutting out noise headphones
There is nothing wrong in wanting to appear more intelligent than one really is. The means and methods employed by those who like to cover themselves with scholarly feathers are as common as they are numerous: degrees collected from prestigious universities, opinions culled from credible sources, invitations caged to lit fests, and intellectual seminars and so on and so forth.

But recently, at a high-profile talkathon which attracted its fair share of glitterati aspiring to be literati, a ripple of silent laughter ricocheted across the room, when it was discovered that a few amongst the audience had forgotten to remove their headphones, which had carried the translation of an earlier lecture which had ended and had them on, while a completely different speaker addressed the crowd. What's worse is that some of them had been nodding in agreement while their headphones were on to give the impression that they'd been following it all assiduously.

A little like pretending to have read a highly praised book, when all one has done is read a review of it. As for those caught enjoying some down time while simulating great intellectual engagement with the speech from the podium - it's OK, it was a boring one in any case, and everybody needs a bit of silence now and then.