Mumbai Diary: Sunday Dossier

Aye, kya dekhta hai!
Did fiesty director Farah Khan catch an ogler as she passed a bus stop on her way out from lunch in Versova on Saturday? Pic/Satej Shinde

West Indies cricket legend Sir Garfield Sobers in his playing days. Pic/Getty Images

When Sobers blazed his way to Mahalaxmi Racecourse
Racing fever is high in Mumbai what with the Indian Derby to be staged at the Mahalaxmi Racecourse today. Cricketers love their horse racing too and that includes the greatest living among them - Sir Garfield Sobers. There is a fascinating story about the former all-rounder when he was leading the West Indies on their 1966-67 tour of India.

During the Bombay Test of that series, West Indies were set 192 runs to win on the final day (on December 18, 1966). They didn't have the most ideal of starts and Sobers walked in to join debutant Clive Lloyd with the scoreboard reading 90 for four; the men dismissed being Conrad Hunte, Robin Bynoe, Basil Butcher and Lance Gibbs.

Sobers blazed away and slammed six fours and one six in his unbeaten 53 as fellow southpaw Lloyd powered his way to 78 off 111 balls. It was learnt later that Sobers was in a hurry to score the runs because he wanted to get to Mahalaxmi on time. He did, but not before guiding his side to a six-wicket win.

Pic Courtesy/Humans of Bombay via Facebook

Bombay gets a secret sponsor
Humans of Bombay, a photography project that started in 2010 on social media, and which has now become synonymous with poignant and inspiring stories of people from across the city, might have some explaining to do. The project has been receiving a lot of flak of late, for sharing "sponsored content". Fans seemed particularly upset when HoB recently put up a story on actor Kirti Kulhari's journey into the movies, ending it with a line that promoted her new Amazon Prime show. "HoB should change its name from 'Humans of Bombay' to 'Sponsorers of Bombay'!" a subscriber quipped. When this diarist reached out to HoB's founder and CEO Karishma Mehta, she said she didn't want to comment. We still love some of the stories, but fans would like it if they kept them real.

It's showtime for Dhruv
Once an inspiring cricketer who shared the pitch with Virat Kohli, Dhruv Davar had to put his cricketing ambitions at bay following an illness. Davar then founded Inextis Events, an event management company which has taken aback the events industry by winning eight awards in a row. But thanks to Super Star Celebrities League, he has now made a comeback by co-owning the Mumbai Game Changers team. When this diarist spoke to him, the Delhi-born cricketer said, "When I got the opportunity to get back to my first love, I jumped at it. It has been a satisfying experience. We have even won five games!"

Gurleen Judge

Making students less miserable
These days, annual school plays have grown-up ambitions. This week, about 240 students of Jamnabai Narsee International School are going to stage a non-musical version of Les Miserables, directed by Gurleen Judge (Dohri Zindagi, The Hunger Artist). Of the massive crew, Judge says, "Fortunately, the school is full of extraordinarily talented students, so our job became very simple. Since Les Misérables is a story about the students of Paris fighting to instate democracy in their country, the play was an easy fit for the senior students. The whole process of adapting it to the stage was extremely collaborative, with the students even contributing to the dialogues, stage design and so on. So what we have is a beautiful, young people's story with elements like rap, contemporary movement and dance and a lot of devised ensemble work. The idea was to give the students have complete ownership."

Of Mr India's food habits
When we visited Anil Kapoor's home for an interview this week, the gracious actor insisted we have lunch with him. The time was well spent as he told us stories about how Mr India, which is this diarist's favourite Bollywood movie by the way, was made. "There was no CGI, so all the special effects were done in camera," he said. He then told us hilarious stories about how he always eats with his hands, even when he visits fancy restaurants all over the world, and how he went through the 25-course meal at celebrity chef Gaggan Anand's Bangkok restaurant.

"I used my celebrity status and asked for two-three portions of each course! I was then done at the 15th course as I was so full. And my wife Sunita said, 'If you would have had only as much as you had to, you could have made it to the end.'" We found that hard to believe as he kept away from the rice and roti at our lunch table, while we helped ourselves. No wonder he defies age.

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