Justice prevails

When you choose to be sincere in your work ethic maintaining an extremely high level of quality and standards and when your integrity is attacked by malicious lies you know you have to stand up for yourself says interior designer Sussanne Khan in response to news that the FIR lodged against her by a client had been summarily dismissed by the High Court of Goa yesterdaySussanne Khan with colleaguesI would not have been able to rest until justice prevailed says Khan who had been accused of misrepresenting herself as an architect The belief in good triumphing over evil and having the support of my family my associates at work and my resilient lawyer Hitesh Jain and his team of lawyers at ALMT Legal has vindicated my position she saysFurther more it happened on this beautiful auspicious day of Janamashtami says the feisty lady who has been known to march to her own drumbeat in other areas of her life tooFeast for the sensesEach year almost like rites of season we find ourselves at a Manish Malhotra fashion extravaganza And though expectedly the fashions change what doesnrsquot is the overall feel of the experience enchanting fairy lights a kingrsquos ransom of exotic flowers jewel colours exquisite embroideries and a truckload of film folk on the ramp and in the seatsA model in a Malhotra creation PICAFPAnd so it was at the Manish Malhotra WinterFestive 2016 on Wednesday night at a fivestar And with the petite and pretty Shraddha Kapoor in a resplendent deep green velvet lehenga as a show stopper accompanied by the sleek Sushant Singh Rajput in a black bandhgala and the likes of Sushmita Sen Shilpa Shetty Sophie Choudhury Neha Dhupia Dia Mirza and Zayed Khan sporting Malhotrarsquos new line and being drenched in an abundance of rose petals mdash the showing as expected was a feast for the sensesBawling over BollywoodTo say we have been witness to the blossoming of author and columnist Aatish Taseer would not be wrong From the time he was a preteen living with his mother the author columnist Tavleen Singh as our neighbour in a Delhi apartment block in the nineties to now as a celebrated author living in New York we have followed Taseerrsquos journey with fondnessA scene from Sultan right Aatish TaseerNo surprises then that the latest offering from the thirtysomething hunk who had courageously come out to the world when he wrote about his marriage to lsquoa tall white man from Tennesseersquo named Ryan in an essay in the Wall Street Journal last month had us delighted Called lsquoWhy Do I Love Bollywoodrsquo the personal essay begins with the author bawling his lsquoguts outrsquo in a movie theatre in Times Square while watching lsquoSultanrsquoThere is something about a big popular art form that dramatises a societyrsquos deepest tensions that I find desperately moving he wrote But the most significant takeaway was Taseerrsquos POV about who Bollywood chooses to demonize The Bollywood villain is the embodiment of what India believes ails India he says arguing that from Ajit to Pran to Gabbar Singh and Mogambo onwards itrsquos the bad guys who serve as the benchmark for Indiarsquos angstNiceTheatre on a plateAll the dishes are pretty much close to my heart but I personally love lsquoAstronautrsquos Lassirsquo and the lsquoDamsel in distressrsquo dessert as itrsquos quite theatrical with a fairy tale ending says our friend the Cardiffbased award winning Chef Stephen Gomes about the 10 course tasting menu to be offered to 16 fortunate guests every night from the first week of September at the newly launched Chemistry 101Stephen GomesIt will be Mumbairsquos first tasting menu by an awardwinning chef says a spokesperson We have been at the receiving end of Gomesrsquo unbound creativity in the past which consists of astonishing aural olfactory visual and aesthetic enhancers to his delicious dishes all dreamt up by the affable young man son of the legendary Chef Gomes responsible for giving the Sun N Sand its culinary edgeMy dad is my biggest critic he says when asked about his fatherrsquos influence on his work He has to taste the food first before I put it on the menu Unfortunately he is not a great advocate of molecular gastronomy mdash for him itrsquos all about the flavours he laughs And our personal favourite on his new tasting menu The lsquoTribute to Bruce Leersquo And no wersquore not giving away the surpriseHot kitchensThere is a thin line between being inspired by anotherrsquos work or concept and lifting or copying the concept altogether in any field be it music movies art or even hospitality And though it happens everywhere around us it usually goes unnoticed under the radar and so a big hooha is avoidedBut word comes in that one successful Mumbai restaurant has taken grave offence about another smaller restaurant that it feels has lsquoblatantlyrsquo copied food dishes menus and even staff uniforms from them Personnel from the offended establishment took to social media in an attempt to show their displeasure at their lsquohard workrsquo lsquocreativityrsquo and lsquoRampDrsquo being lsquoripped offrsquo so openlyAnd though well wishes reminded them about Charles Caleb Coltonrsquos famous saying that lsquoImitation is the sincerest form of flatteryrsquo the offended restaurant in question seems to have had enough and doesnrsquot see it as flattery any longer but a pain in the behind We arenrsquot experts in this field but maybe it would help to have some clear laws and guidelines in place But until that happens a delicious storm in Mumbairsquos most popular kitchens is certainly whatrsquos cooking these days