On September 10^th, India saw its first ever menswear week, organized by The Fashion Design Council of India¹. There were mixed feelings about this move and the event was not expected to be too successful. On day one of the event, Indian Cricketer, Virender Sehwag, walked the ramp.

I can see why critics were skeptical about the event’s success.

There have been accusations of Salman Khan physically abusing Aishwarya Rai while dating her. Apparently, in a television interview, he refuted the claims by saying, “Obviously in a fight, I am going to be angry. I am going to go for whack and I want to give it my best shot. I don’t think that she would have survived it.”²

Aishwarya Rai, and now Katrina Kaif. There’s no justice in this world.

An international Chess tournament recently took place in Kolkata. Indian player, Praveen Kumar, probably had the easiest win of his career when his French opponent, Vladislav Tkachiev, fell asleep after arriving drunk for the game³.

I don’t blame him though. I would have fallen asleep without the alcohol.

Despite what most would have thought would have been a tournament-ending misdemeanor, Tkachiev was let off with a reprimand and was allowed to participate in the rest of the tournament.

I guess losing without making a move can be a sobering experience.

In the wake of the terrible drought situation in India and in an attempt to cut costs, the ruling Congress party has asked its politicians to go on an austerity drive. Sonia Gandhi, the President of the Congress party, recently flew economy class while her son and politician, Rahul, took the chair car while traveling by train. However, traveling in this manner has security risks and so Sonia Gandhi had 18 of the seats in her flight taken up by security personnel while Rahul had 200 policeman for his security at the train station⁴.

I’ve got to give it to them, they’ve managed to make being austere expensive.

In light of this austerity drive, Shashi Tharoor, the Minister of State for External Affairs, was asked on Twitter if he too would be flying ‘cattle class’. He responded saying ‘Absolutely, in cattle class out of solidarity with all our holy cows!’⁵ This did not go down well with the Congress and their spokesperson condemned the tweet saying it was not in sync with their political culture⁶.

Yep, the Congress did not LOL @shashitharoor.

It wasn’t surprising to hear the opposition party, the BJP, question the Congress’ real motive behind their austerity drive. BJP leader, Rajiv Pratrap Rudy, felt that the entire drive was political tokenism at work. When questioned on what austerity really means, he said, “Socialist (and ally) George Fernandes never traveled by first class and never even ironed his clothes”⁷.

Wow, it looks Iike I have more in common with India’s former Defense Minister than I thought.

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