Sir Vidia sparks few mutinies at literary fest

new delhi: prime minister atal behari vajpayee referred to him as sir naipaul and unconsciously echoed george w bush in saying "make no mistake", but even that didn''t take the smile off the face of the guest of honour at the five-day international festival of indian literature which began in the capital on monday. sir vidia naipaul was clearly the star of the galaxy as some of india''s finest writers gathered at vigyan bhavan and listened patiently to the nobel laureate''s description of indian writing in english as being "done entirely abroad" and his gentle admonition to the bhasha writers."the prime minister spoke movingly of indian writing in languages but writing depends on readership," he said. "and it cannot be helped if they are not read enough. it would be nice if it weren''t so," he said almost sadly. he also caused some grumbling when he singled out writer pankaj mishra, who embarrassingly for the organisers is not a participant, for being the only critic worth his salt in india. "he''s a brilliant man," said sir vidia, adding, "you can''t have good writing in india unless you have good critics." almost as many cameras focused on sir vidia as they did on his wife, lady nadira, as her compatriot, pakistan high commissioner to india, ashraf jehangir qazi, sat quietly in a back row. interior designer sunita kohli sat with the us ambassador''s wife, wera hildebrand, who determinedly carried off a placard that was blocking her view. two former prime ministers, p v narasimha rao and inder kumar gujral (with wife sheila) watched quietly, as a voluble l m singhvi cornered former president r venkataraman, no doubt for some tips on life in rashtrapati bhavan. congress veteran natwar singh rubbed shoulders with minister of external affairs, jaswant singh, and foreign secretary chokila iyer. rumblings of controversy continued to be heard as writers — would-be and otherwise — checked with each other about who had been invited to the three-day retreat at neemrana. two of the festival''s supporters, in fact, spent the evening simmering because their names had been called out in the vote of thanks despite their resignations from the organising committee in protest against the way the guest list had been devised. old friends amitav ghosh and mukul kesavan spent the evening in great amusement, while vikram seth sat with his parents. khushwant singh and this year''s jnanpith winner indira goswami brought up the front row, along with all the bhasha greats, among them u r ananthamurthy and vijay tendulkar. the page three set looked somewhat subdued to be in the company of true celebrities: from cigar man chetan seth to dancer sharon lowen, as they waited patiently in a serpentine queue, to be frisked by extra-stringent security personnel. there were several no-shows, most notably of arundhati roy, but then perhaps all that to-do about one-novel writers not being invited to neemrana had put her off the event. one of the world''s finest travel writers, pico iyer, kept a low profile as did publisher and novelist david davidar, as some bookshop owners grumbled about last-minute invites. but clearly all were grateful that sir vidia had seen it fit to leave "my boy" — his cat augustus — at his wiltshire home to be back in india after two years.