Shobhaa De's extra terrestrial people

My heart went out to Narain Karthikeyan last week, as he stumbled, stuttered, licked his dry mouth and almost burst into tears, out of sheer nervousness.
Maybe, just maybe, the man can drive at top-speed (even if his bosses at Jordan doubt it), but when it comes to delivering a speech... he needs to change gears.
In any case, with the sort of power gathering on the lawns, anybody would've frozen ��� and even run in the opposite direction.
It was a major "wah wah" moment, with such high net-worth individuals around, one could almost smell the money.
Each time I turned around, it was to meet the "richest," the "smartest," the "sharpest" etc.
Phew! Going by the successmeter at the ET Awards for corporate excellence, it was possible to delude myself that India was only made up of super-fabulous billionaires, who jetted around the world, snapping up companies, gobbling the competition and hosting grand soirees at the Versailles Palace.
Marie Antoinette would have blushed at the opulence! But not us desis. Every award winner that night displayed endearing and unmistakably Indian traits.
This is what makes our tycoons so special, and also, so likeable. Place them anywhere globally, let them earn impressive titles, acquire honorary degrees, become curry-Lords and Knights.
But scratch the surface, and you're likely to hear a bhangra accent saying, "Ki haal hai?" More comfortable with pakoras than pate, our amazing achievers are truly a breed apart, as they established with finality at the awards.
Each one had an inspiring story to share. And each one displayed sly humour while taking pot-shots at rivals! The only disappointment that evening was the ponderous trio of IIM dons, who went into professional mode, while quizzing Laxmi Mittal.
Laxmi salvaged the situation by adlibbing effortlessly and lifting the pedantic tone of the proceedings with his homegrown wisdom and even a sharp retort or two.
He asked the Three Wise Men to take a fresh look at the syllabus and jazz up the boring teaching environment. That needed to be said ��� and as bluntly.
My special admiration goes out to the three lovely ladies from ICICI.
Mr Kamath beamed when he was flanked by Chanda, Kalpana and Lalita ��� extraordinary women who've headed various divisions of the bank and motivated several thousand other women to follow suit. Congrats! And well done ET, for letting a few sarees flutter at a suits-dominated function.
Alas, avid voyeurs this year were deprived of the special thrill that last year's awards provided ��� remember that brilliant photograph of the Ambani Brothers shaking hands with the caption, "Hello Muks, Hello Boss"? That was the photo-op which said it all ��� and how distant it seems already!
Says Shobha:
* I urge you to see Rituparno Ghosh's Antar Mahal. It is savage, brutal and strangely lyrical.
As cinema, it works brilliantly, as a commercial movie, it's a disaster. Why? Because audiences prefer masala of the garam variety.
Never mind that the two male hotties (Akshay and John) generated zero heat in a foolish remake of Boeing, Boeing.
One had a grey stubble and other looked plain goofy. Antar Mahal, with all its brutality was as striking and memorable as a haunting Renaissance painting. Definitely, Ritu's moment of glory, despite the goring his labour of love has received.