Eat happened that night!

In a time when the essence of a wedding is how many ministers and how many wanted criminals you can invite, the wedding of Virender Sehwag, the boy with India''s most remembered mother, was refreshing. For me personally, the reception was perhaps as classy as an affair it could be.
The magic of this wedding, I guess, began with the card itself.The card simply said, ‘Latika and Sumit Khaneja invite you to a dinner reception to meet the newly-weds, Virender and Aarti for a dinner reception.'' No mention of Sehwag and none of the ostentatiousness that one generally associates Indian weddings with.
I arrived with my usual fastidiousness for time: on the dot of 9 pm and was amazed to see the barrage of press corps waiting to see who they could possibly catch for that ubiquitous sound-byte: camera crews and ardent journalists easily blended with what must have been a huge crowd within the lobby. But one was quickly ushered into the Kamal Mahal, the banquet hall at the Maurya and easily transported to a world quite surreal but very tasteful nonetheless!
The wine was French which one had in substantial measure and around me were some familiar faces that are today part of India''s cricketing world: there was Subroto Roy (whose sponsorship of the Indian cricket team (and perhaps an enduring penchant for weddings surely earned him a place at the reception) engaged in parochial bonhomie with Sourav Ganguly, who looked much at ease in a kurta pyjama, making all of us heave a sigh of relief since it would take a lot for him to strip from this sartorial combination. There were a lot of people from the cricketing establishment: from India''s eternal star Kapil Dev to Irfan Pathan to Rahul Dravid to Mohammed Kaif and such like. I did glance at Laxman as well. There was the affable Amrit Mathur, who in my book is even more powerful than Jagmohan Dalmiya when it comes to helping you out with match tickets. There were some really bony and anorexic women who came in quite up close and personal with Ravi Krishnan of IMG so it didn''t take rocket science for me to figure out that these would be the mannequins for the Fashion Weak!
Taking sips of French wine along with the delectable chapli kababs can be quite heady. The flood of people began at about 10 pm. The usual suspects still hadn''t arrived and we were all the happier for it. I spoke to Pawan Munjal and asked him why he was leaving. He had another dinner. Everyone always does. I believe the next social paradigm shift for Delhi is to invite people only for drinks. Forget dinner. In the times of Shikha and Atkins, food is such a curse. But not for me.
Arun Jaitley arrived with his family: his nephew Nipun is my favourite too and there was no doubt that we all would certainly eat. Which is why we then proceeded to the Bukhara even though I have rarely seen such a magnificent spread of food almost skirting the entire perimeter of Kamal Mahal! In between asking Kaif what he felt about the Pakistan tour and biting into the sumptuous burras and kurmi naan, I was quite horrified to hear from Irfan Pathan that the biggest dilemma facing him was whether he should complete school. With a vigorous shake of my burra-filled mouth I told him how unnecessary it all was. See how the uneducated in this world do. But then Jaitley obviously disagreed. I was also delighted at Jaitley''s ever-expanding knowledge about cricket and it was a delight to be sitting at a table in Bukhara where the subject was seam bowling and not the succulence of the kababs.
We had our dinner amidst several hundred requests for photographs: with the cricketers, that is. They were truly India''s pride. They spoke with equal joy about the adulation of the fans in Pakistan. We were coming to the end of our meal when I couldn''t but help lean over and ask both Pathan and Kaif whether they''d ever join politics. They hemmed and hawed; looked at Arun and smilingly said, "We are made only for cricket." I wish Hema, Dharam, Nafisa and their ilk is listening.
The evening dedicated to Virender and Aarti was as simple as the beginnings of this young and talented cricketer. This was at least one wedding at which you met the bride and the groom as also the respective parents unlike those where you just swipe a security card and gawk at film stars instead!