Netherfield Ball – An Unexpected Mr Darcy Eclipsed Anuja Chauhan’s Husband’s Society Debut During Her Book Launch, Lady Baga City Parties by The Delhi Walla - May 19, 2017May 19, 20171 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He was good looking and gentlemanlike; he had a pleasant countenance, and easy, unaffected manners. And he was the novelist’s husband. But Niret Alva was not tempting enough to be a Mister Darcy. One evening The Delhi Walla attended the launch of Anuja Chauhan’s novel Baaz at Lady Baga in Connaught Place. The beautiful Ms Chauhan wore a long stylish gown the lower part of which was cut in the middle to discreetly reveal her shapely legs. But I’m in no humour at present to give consequence to the vanities of women writers when the evening saw such a fine figure of man. He was handsome. His moustache was handsomer. He was immaculately dressed
Netherfield Ball – Stranded in the Dream World of Diplomats at Israel’s Independence Day Celebrations, Hotel Taj Palace City Parties by The Delhi Walla - May 3, 2017May 3, 20170 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Warm-eyed ladies are moving around in formal costumes. The gentlemen pay tribute to the old-fashioned codes of chivalry by dressing up in suits and military uniforms. This must be the real true world of the fashionable class. It is evening and The Delhi Walla has walked into the Israel's Independence Day celebrations at the Shahjehan Ballroom in Hotel Taj Palace. These beautiful people, principally from the world of diplomacy, are the capital’s invisible multitude. They are barely seen anywhere else in the city but surface in a crowd in such elegant receptions. One woman, perhaps the tallest person here, is wearing pink. Another one, in a giant knotted scarf, is looking like a most formidable
Netherfield Ball – Arundhati Roy Sighting, Somewhere in Delhi City Parties by The Delhi Walla - April 26, 2017April 26, 20172 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Her wild hair was not tied back to look straight. A tiny diamond, however, did gleam in one of her nostrils. She still had absurdly beautiful collarbones. One evening The Delhi Walla sighted Arundhati Roy somewhere in Delhi. One of the many nice women and men mingling around her whispered that she is the author of The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, a novel yet to be born in the world. Ms Roy walked about in the flower-filled room like a summer night’s cool breeze. A hint of a smile, that was playing around the corner of her lips, momentarily undammed into a free laugh. At one point, everybody sat down on long tables.
Netherfield Ball – Wicked Babble on Narayani Gupta, Laila Tyabji and Meru Gokhale at TCA Raghavan’s Book Launch , India International Center City Parties by The Delhi Walla - April 12, 2017April 12, 20171 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] She is supremely enigmatic, and since she is a diva, she never allows herself to be photographed. You may Google for a clear portrait of her face and you shall be disappointed. This is no more the case. One evening The Delhi Walla unabashedly photographed historian Narayani Gupta for two long continuous minutes despite her severe censure towards your humble lensman. I had sighted her at the launch of TCA Raghavan’s book Attendant Lords: Bairam Khan and Abdur Rahim, Courtiers and Poets in Mughal India at the Fountain Lawns in India international Center. The elusive Ms Gupta now stands totally exposed to the voyeurs of the world. All the historiophiles are encouraged to circulate
Netherfield Ball – Jaya Jaitly’s Non-Journalistic Grey Sari Royally Snubs the Journalistic Saris of Supriya Nair and Sonal Shah at The Caravan Magazine’s Book Launch, Bikaner House City Parties by The Delhi Walla - March 10, 2017March 11, 20176 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He was gentlemanlike, with unaffected manners, and since he was an MA from the Columbia Journalism School, he was looked at with great admiration. The tide of Vinod K Jose’s popularity did not recede for a minute as more and more guests recognised the young founder-editor of The Caravan, that venerable political and cultural journal often sighted on Khan Market’s bookish Front Lane. One evening The Delhi Walla attends the launch of The Caravan Book of Profiles at the palatial Bikaner House. The hall is teeming with India’s best journalists, who, as we all know, write only for The Caravan. The most radiant smile belonged to journalist Ellen Barry of the unfailing New
Netherfield Ball – The Invasion of the Bearded Men at Sanjay Kak’s Book Launch, India Habitat Center City Parties by The Delhi Walla - February 16, 2017February 16, 20172 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Even the mere thought triggers hair-raising pain. Were Kashmir to break off its marriage to India, and the Indian army were to quit Kashmir, our beloved motherland would lose its manly face. For what is Kashmir but India's beard? This anatomical reality became as clear as a hairy man's waxed chest when The Delhi Walla attended the launch of Sanjay Kak's book Witness: Kashmir 1986-2016: 9 Photographers. The evening offered a spectacle beyond belief—a great number of Kashmiri men and all of them with a beard. Mr Kak had a beard. Photographer Kaushik Ramaswamy, who, incidentally, is a true Indian—his father was Tamilian and his mother is Bengali—also had a beard. Even the
Netherfield Ball – Author RV Smith’s Kissing Escapades With Delhi’s Beautiful Ladies, Central Delhi Garden Party City Parties by The Delhi Walla - January 26, 2017January 26, 20171 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] He came, he saw, and he kissed one willing woman after another. This is Ronald Vivian Smith, Delhi's ultimate romantic figure. One afternoon, The Delhi Walla attended a garden party hosted by author Rakhshanda Jalil. Beautiful faces outshone the beautiful flowers. The principal attraction, however, was Mr Smith. The venerable author looked quite venerable in his advanced years, and that was a deception. Mr Smith’s heart still sustains all the inconstant buoyancy of his ancient youth when he would be walking around town writing newspaper columns about the lesser known charms of Delhi. During those days, if whispers are to be trusted, Mr Smith charmed—a little too intimately--many of our great society ladies
Netherfield Ball – MP Swapan Dasgupta Leads The New Right-Wing Elite at Hindol Sengupta’s Book Launch, Teen Murti Bhawan City Parties by The Delhi Walla - January 11, 2017January 13, 20172 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Their books will never be banned. They will never be called antinational. They are the beautiful anti-liberals of the right. These days, it is said, everybody in Delhi wants to be them. They are the new elite. One evening The Delhi Walla attends the launch of Hindol Sengupta’s book The Modern Monk: What Vivekananda Means To Us Today in Teen Murti Bhawan, a notorious mansion that mystifyingly continues to serve as memorial to an antinational called Jawaharlal Nehru. But we refuse to dwell on skeletons of the past, especially when venerable sights, such as the elegant visage of Swapan Dasgupta, are to be witnessed. The capital’s most profoundly patriotic thinker, he is still not
Netherfield Ball – Singer Madhumita Bose Awes All the Poets at Ghalib’s Tea Party Except for a Wahabi Short Story Writer, Ghalib Academy City Parties by The Delhi Walla - December 28, 2016December 28, 20160 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] All the men seem to be taken in with the stiff protocol demanded by the ritual of milky chai and two kinds of biskuts. Only an illusion, however. Actually, all the eyes are getting increasingly hysterical for the fairy-tale sight of Madhumita Bose, the ghazal singer with a respectable reputation to keep her admirers writhing in silent agony over tortuously long waits. One evening The Delhi Walla attends a tea party hosted to celebrate Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib's 219th birth anniversary at Ghalib Academy in Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti. The evening's most profound rumor is that the aforementioned biskuts have been ordered from a bakery in Bhogal. The men are attired very unprose-like. The most breathtaking
Netherfield Ball – William Dalrymple of Jaipur Literature Festival Exposes His Rumored Friendship with Namita Gokhale of Jaipur Literature Festival at Her Book Launch, The Taj Mahal Hotel City Parties by The Delhi Walla - December 2, 2016December 2, 20162 The party secrets. [Text and photos by Mayank Austen Soofi] Et tu William Dalrymple? The great historian who, in his usual modest fashion, brought ignominious Delhi to the notice of the wider world showed up shockingly late at the launch of Things to Leave Behind, and failed to mention the happy occasion on his very, very active Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts. Many were taken aback, and rightly so. After all, this novel is authored by his accomplice Namita Gokhale. The two of them are the very powerful co-directors of the authoritative Jaipur literature Festival. And, as everyone knows, Namita Gokhale and William Dalrymple also happen to be very, very close friends (chuckles). This was a pleasantly polluted evening in the terrace garden