A Field Day

The crowd at Calcutta airport didn't match up to his performance (just about 50 people turned up) but Saurav Ganguly didn't seem to mind. Not after being named Man of the Match in four out of five matches at the Sahara Cup in Toronto, winning Man of the Series and being christened the Prince of Calcutta by Geoffrey Boycott. Not when one commentator went so far as to say that things were going so well for him in Toronto, that "if he flapped his arms he might actually fly". Certainly not when the buzz is that county cricket beckons, with Sussex and Nottinghamshire eyeing him. But the old chap is as modest as ever. With the Bengali festive season round the corner, neighbourhood puja organisers began queueing up, asking him to grace their pandals. "But I am more comfortable on the field," cried the 24-year-old. India will settle for that.

Style File

"I had a ball making it," says designer Suneet Varma. He hopes we'll have a ball watching it. He's talking about Suneet Varma's Style Gurus, coming next month on Star Plus, where he chats up international hotshots YSL, Cartier (below, with Varma), Oscar de la Renta, Mary McFadden and some mighty others. "We've got the whimsical, the outrageous and the genius," says Varma. So he has. Snatch a glimpse of streetwear supremo Betsy Johnson's studio (above), which is the way it is because she loves "being surrounded by colour"; stop by the Metropolitan Museum, New York, where costume curator Richard Martin says the sari is the most versatile garment on the Earth. It's trans-world chic with an Indian twist, as the camera jetsets from Delhi to Jaipur, Mumbai, Milan, Paris and Hong Kong through 26 episodes. Says Varma: "The programmes we see today are downright foolish. I would die to have a fashion journalist come and ask me an original question." Okay guru, go ahead, teach 'em.

Air Fare

Next time a voice on your plane says, "This is your Captain Vijaypat Singhania ...", don't blink. It's the Raymond chairman speaking. Life was looking incomplete to The Complete Man. He'd flown a Microlite from London to Mumbai, was the only Indian in the 1994 Round the World Air Race ... yawn ... time for something new! Something like flying Boeing 737-200s for Alliance Air -- the Indian Airlines (IA) subsidiary -- since September last year. You might not know this, but he has earlier flown for East West Airlines and Damania Airways. So he did a refresher course, met the ia chief, and convinced him. Simple. Says the 58-year-old adventurer: "I'm not a regular Alliance employee, but once in my uniform, I'm like any other pilot." Except he's doing it for free. Now what would he do with small change?

First Poet

Once upon a time in a kerala school, a Class IX student penned a poem. It dwelt on the voices in the poet's mind, and when the Malayala Manorama published it, recalls K.R. Narayanan, "my happiness was much more than when I became President". On a recent visit to Kerala, Narayanan, now 76, was pleasantly surprised. Manorama had dug out the 61-year-old verses, set them to tune, and voila, they had a present for the President. Too bad they're not selling the cassette. They could have made a fortune.

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