What a year it's been for the gossip columns! Scandal after scandal broke out almost before one had digested the previous one

The year in pictures

The modern generation may not remember those everlasting TDK tapes, that we oldies would go record tracks on. The Radia tapes on the other hand are bound to disappear even faster than Milli Vanilli.

With a cocktail of powerful bureaucrats, top industrialists and entire industry bodies likely to be pulled down faster than a telecom tower, Radia, we hear is getting a nose job and hair dye done and being whisked away into genteel retirement at a botox spa.

Meanwhile, the Deadly Yeddy decided to record his own annals in history and create lore in Bangalore. No other Chief Minister has been so consistently in the newsu00a0-- without his propaganda secretary trying even an inch. Land jams and mining scams, glycerine tears, protective seers and disgusted peers, this man single-handedly made opening the morning newspaper a whole new experience. It would have been fun and thrilling if it wasn't such a tragic travesty of democracy and justice.

The man who brought us IPL became the guy who made the biggest show on earth look tawdry compared to the histrionics that he put up. Having dragged a Cabinet Minister into the dirt with him, his army of lawyers are now allowing him to enjoy his tan on his private Caribbean island getaway, while his cheerleaders sadly look for alternate causes to go pom pom for.u00a0

From cricket to athletics, it is a universe away on the stadia stakes. Except that Suresh Kalmadi made it an even playing field with the crores he raked in. So what if the entire country's prestige was at stake: the initial hoopla of Sonia sacking him has died down, and his private relationship manager in Zurich is being kept rather busy. Chances are the money will never be heard of againu00a0-- until he gets his daughter married off.

Meanwhile, even before Lakshmi Mittal has lived down his daughter's horribly gross wedding, another industrialist made up with his brother before moving into the most obnoxiously showy modern residence ever. It isn't a treat to the architectural eye. It's a mark of a modern, self-centered man who hasn't given back to society even a fraction of the millions of crores he has made.

Typically, some who were invited to his home, must have slapped the portly owner on his back and in private shuddered at the nouveau-richness of it all.

A certain Mr Mallya, we hear, is rather upset at being upstaged as the flashiest industrialist of allu00a0-- and is now scheming to get back top slot in the bling stakes.

Stay tuned for 2011 snapshots.

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