Who's the nicest of them all?

One of the most interesting exercises in financial reporting has been Forbesrsquo The Top 100 Celebrities of India list In a nation obsessed with celebrityculture itrsquos an idea long overdue Because unlike other lists of this nature Forbesrsquo Top 100 celebrity list has as much to do with fame as it has to do with money lsquoFame is defined as visibility in print television and online plus social media powerrsquo says the magazine lsquoAmish Tripathi who penned mythologybased fiction novels earned almost three times more Rs 10 crore than Chetan Bhagat Rs 32 crorersquo says the editorial despite Bhagatrsquos fame rankings being nearly 30 points higher than Tripathirsquos u00a0u00a0 George Clooney Shah Rukh Khan and Mahendra Singh Dhoni lsquoIn the literary world you may have fame but it doesnrsquot necessarily translate into higher earningsrsquo However call us crazy but in the potent brew of fame and money wersquod like to add another hitherto unrecognised quotient likeability We say this because glancing through the first five names on the Top 100 celebrity list we stumbled upon the fact that whether they deserved it or not the likeability factor was common to SRK Salman Khan Dhoni etc In fact the likeability quotient appears to play a significant link in the next five personalities too Sachin Tendulkar Kareena Kapoor Virender Sehwag Virat Kohli and Katrina Kaif If this off the wall theory of ours gains currency perhaps it will influence the way the high and mighty conduct themselves in private and public In a recent Christian Science Monitor we read how Hollywood actor and star George Clooney picked up a fellow dinerrsquos 135 bill because the star had been afraid that he and his party had been too loud the irony being that the diner said in fact the starrsquos table had behaved perfectly decentlyWill this add to Silver Foxrsquos celebrity What do you think Funny food Saturday night saw us witnessing the Times Foodie Awards presentation in the company of not only the stalwarts of the food industry but three of Indiarsquos leading comedians Not only was the redoubtable Kunal Vijaykar MC of the eveningrsquos proceedings after all he is Mr Foodie on TV but also in the audience was Boman Irani and Cyrus Broacha u00a0 Kunal Vijaykar and Boman Irani Vijaykar who could make audiences crack up if he read the Mumbai telephone directory out had us in splits by flubbing his teleprompter lines Great comic artistes donrsquot need fancy scripts and can get a laugh out of the slightest thing or just by a raising of an eyebrow Incidentally though Irani had been invited in his capacity as a star his attendance could have just as easily been secured on the basis of his 20 years experience in running one of the cityrsquos legendary chip shops Golden Wafers at Grant Road ldquoUnfortunately we sold the business five years agordquo said Boman when we enquired about his culinary past Family reunion ldquoIt was taken in December 2012 when 26 relatives on my motherrsquos side 20 from other parts of the world descended upon Bandra for Christmasrdquo says noted journalist and award winning author of Taj Mahal Foxtrot Naresh Fernandes Author Naresh Fernandesrsquo family together for Christmas ldquoMy grandmother Beryl Rodrigues is in the front row Aunts and uncles and cousins and siblings travelled in from Auckland London Detroit Stanford Albuquerque and Cupertino to be there My relatives do a fascinating range of things Matt is a sports medicine specialist Ashok test drives cars for Ford Scheleece is a linguist who studies Native American languages Joanna is a social worker in London and Prakash works for an organisation that monitors the implementation of child rightrsquos policies in the UK The ages of the people in the photo range from three to 96rdquo said the writer ldquoItrsquos like the United Colours of Bandrardquo We like The perfect storm ldquoIt was a thrilling derby as it was a very open race I was of course cheering for my soninlaw Riyad Oomerbhoyrsquos horse New World but alas it did not win even after he ran a good racerdquo said racing aficionado Zinia Lawyer about Sundayrsquos Derby a bigticket event on the cityrsquos social calendar Cyrus Poonawalla ldquoWe had a record crowd of near 28000 this year which is an increase by almost 20 per cent over last yearrdquo said Vivek Jain who heads the RWITC media and marketing committee Meanwhile bloodstock consultant and our crazy friend Gautam Kotwal is said to have acquired added sheen in racing circles since then by challenging the breeding supremacy held over the last three decades by Cyrus Poonawalla and Ameeta Mehrarsquos stud farms ldquoChaudhary Nirmal Singhrsquos the Haryanvi former cabinet minister Hazara stud struck gold through Kotwalrsquos judgment with his stallion Rebuttal sire of this year lsquoderby winner Super Stormrdquo says a source Meanwhile we still have to report on the outstanding hats spotted on the occasion Bollywood subset We loved her in Midnightrsquos Children in which she reprised the role of Amina mother of the bookrsquos protagonist Saleem Sinai And of course as Debbie in Rock On she charmed her way into peoplersquos hearts Amartya Sen with Nandana Sen But we wonder how many know that Shahana is the daughter of noted Indian economist Omkar Goswami of Oxford the Delhi School of Economics Harvard Tufts Jawaharlal Nehru University Rutgers University and the Indian Statistical Institute Delhi u00a0 Omkar Goswami and Shahana Goswami The penny dropped when we met them together at the Blue Frog on Monday night Interestingly they are not the only fatherdaughter combo of economist and Bollywood actor Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and his daughter Nandana Sen have claim to the distinction too