But no one seemed to mind, for the Page One faces in the audience had had enough catching up on each other as they waited for the President. Seen in action: ex-prime minister I. K. Gujral with wife Shiela, ex-Lok Sabha Speaker Shivraj Patil, ex-ICCR czar (and now Congress Sandesh editor) Vasant Sathe, ex-foreign secretary Muchkund Dubey, ex-Planning Commission deputy chairman Madhu Dandavate, and ex-finance ministers P. Chidambaram and Manmohan Singh, engaged in an animated discussion, presumably over the dismal state of the economy.

Mayo Reunion
At this past week's other big book release, it was the turn of the city's babudom -- retired and serving -- to toast Not A Licence To Kill, a book on police reforms by V. P. Singh's CBI chief Rajendra Shekhar. Quite appropriately, the ribbon was cut by External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh, Shekhar's junior by six years at Mayo College. With due deference, the minister, known for his old-world flourishes, said he was ``honoured to have been invited by my senior at school.''

The re-union, though, was cut short when the minister had to rush for an urgent engagement, but not before he had showered his senior with ample praise the book, he said, was a model of ``personal endeavour.'' Others who shared the spotlight that evening included ex-home secretary (and IIC Director) N. N. Vohra, ex-foreign secretary J. N. Dixit, ex-BSF boss Hargovind Bhatnagar, and ex-CBI director (presently, Secretary, National Human Rights Commission) N. Karthikeyan.

Material World
If you've been wondering what the word `fixation' is all about, you should have been at the launch of yet another book on Osho. The release of My Diamond Days With Osho was billed as a ``meditative book launch,'' but it rapidly turned into a grilling session for the author and one-time Rajneeshee, Ma Prem Shunyo. Material concerns were very much in the air, as one member of the audience after another would talk of nothing else but Osho's Rolls Royces and other expensive habits.

In the audience we espied Kathak exponent-bureaucrat-author-Austrian Ambassador's wife Shovana Narayan, who obviously had better things to do than sit and meditate. She left even before the session started, as did Madhu Trehan, though hubby Naresh and sis-in-law Rekha Purie stayed on. So did stage artiste Sita Raina. As things turned out, those who left did well, for the meditation session became a good excuse for many in the audience to catch up on their sleep, apparent from the nodding heads and occasional snores in the auditorium. So much for the third eye!

Holy Smoke!
Now that the fall-winter fashion season is officially over, the great mystery that remains unsolved is the smoke alarm that went off in the stuffy innards of Hotel Imperial, where Rohit Bal was having what was promised to be the show to end all shows. Well, nothing much happened, except that the show was threatened with a premature end by fleeing guests who insisted they saw slivers of smoke slithering suspiciously in their direction. The hotel's staff, who looked as if they had ants up their pants, said it was nothing, just cigarette smoke that had set off the alarms. Anyway, the whole thing had one salutary effect -- we could breathe freely, finally, without feeling anyone else's hot breath on our shoulders.