Like pretty much nobody else I know, I spent January 2006 through January 2009 not going to the Jaipur Literature Festival. Only expert idiots do this; the rest of you should not try it at home. This year I redeemed myself by spending the whole week there, and I&rsquo;m here to tell you that the collective intelligence and creativity on display in Jaipur is second only to my regret at having denied myself the pleasure for four years.

Feasting at the Jaipur smorgasbord

Business Standard

If you have booked a Ferrari and are waiting for it, the Italian supercar manufacturer will send you a copy of The Official Ferrari Magazine every quarter. And they&rsquo;ll keep delivering four copies a year to you for the first three years you own the car. But if you&rsquo;d like to receive the magazine but cannot afford a Ferrari, you can always subscribe for it at 250 euros, or around Rs 16,000. Then there&rsquo;s the third option &mdash; get somebody who&rsquo;s intimately involved with Ferrari to send you a copy.

Marque my words

Tenzing Sonam and Ritu Sarin have been making films on Tibet for 20 years now.

Roots and wings

When I heard about a Royal Caribbean luxury cruise ship docking at a Haitian port &mdash; so its passengers could frolic in the sand &mdash; just a few days after the devastating earthquake, I was reminded of my favourite surreal movies from the 1960s: Godard&rsquo;s Weekend, with its wickedly funny digs at the empty-headedness of the privileged classes, even in the face of tragedy (&ldquo;You can&rsquo;t bear us screwing on the Riviera while you have no money!&rdquo; yells a rich young woman at a tractor-driving peasant after a crash between their vehicles kills her boyfriend); Bunuel&rsquo;s The Exterminating Angel, in which upper-crust sophisticates gradually turn into savages, slaughtering sheep and barbecuing them on a makeshift fire in a fancy dining room.

Helping Haiti

I am planning to buy a car, which most probably will end up with my father. My budget is in the range of Rs 10-13 lakh. Which one would you suggest &mdash; the Honda Civic or the Toyota Corolla Altis? He normally prefers a petrol, but if you think the new Chevrolet Cruze is much better than the rest, then I can convince him for the diesel also. I am also looking at a used, last generation 2007 Audi A4 diesel. It is working out to be more expensive even in terms of finance.

Altis ego

Alexander McCall Smith, creator of lady detective Mma Ramotswe and other good-hearted heroes, is as nice as his characters.

Subterranean frissons

There is no gainsaying Jim Corbett&rsquo;s place in Indian literature and folklore. The hunter-turned-conservationist&rsquo;s work in the jungles of India, especially in what is now the state of Uttarakhand, will never be paralleled. But it must be said that the real-life legend of Corbett would not have spread as far and wide as it has if it were not for his written narratives. They are special indeed. Even today, reading about his exploits in hunting the man-eating leopard of Rudraprayag makes one&rsquo;s hair stand on end.

Corbett, in other words

Just before the exhibition closed this weekend, I managed to go and view the Suite Vollard. That is a collection of 100 Pablo Picasso prints, mostly from the early 1930s, which made its sole India stop in Delhi this winter. The prints were commissioned by an influential Paris art dealer named Ambroise Vollard.

Picasso as storyteller

The first early example of what we can call a &ldquo;rational&rdquo; city, Chandigarh can be either loved or hated.

Is Chandigarh a model city?

And it is in this context that we think of the importance of Rajpath, the street where this annual event occurs. Aptly named for its national importance, Kingsway, as it was known, can be equated with the Mall at Washington or the Champs Elysees in Paris. Its journey from its imperial birth as Kingsway to its re-incarnation as Rajpath post-independence is an example of change, of changing meanings and identities.

From Kingsway to Rajpath

Ford has spent considerable time and energy (and scarce cash) to develop the Figo.

Figo-ing places

Sanjiv Bajaj wants to make a mark in consumer finance. The market may be tough but he has his plan ready.

Money trail

Over the last one and a half years, The Economist has used interesting campaigns to boost its presence in the country.

The fine print

Shivinder Mohan Singh, the managing director of Fortis Healthcare, is best known for his attempt to do a McDonald&rsquo;s in healthcare &mdash; large in scale and low in prices. The chain started from Mohali (in Punjab) in 2001. Over the years, it has bought hospitals (Escorts Heart Institute and Wockhardt Hospitals) and put up new ones across the country. That has helped Singh to build the country&rsquo;s second-largest hospital chain with over 5,000 beds. The ambition is to occupy the top slot in double quick time. The Singh family, of course, is flush with funds, having sold its stake in Ranbaxy to Daiichi Sankyo of Japan last year for almost Rs 10,000 crore. Singh tells Vandana Gombar and Joe C Mathew about the Fortis business model as it has evolved over time and the road ahead.

'We are moving towards a larger addressable market'

    Name the person and the name he gave to the theoretical proto-hypertext computer system he proposed in 1945. This has been referred to as the vision behind search engines.

Answers to last week&#39s quiz (#124)

Big Bazaar, the hypermarket of Pantaloon Retail, has come out with a breakfast cereal range under its private label, Tasty Treat. Big Bazaar already sells noodles, pasta, vermicelli, soups, namkeens, chips, toast, khari, papads, jams, pickles, carbonated drinks, ketchup and fruit beverages under the brand. It has now added breakfast cereals to the range.

Big Bazaar: Private label push

Twenty-five years after it brought Maggi instant noodles to India, Nestle has extended the brand to ready-to-eat pasta. It has come out with Maggi Nutri-licious (nutritious and delicious) Pazzta. There are two flavours: Masala Penne and Cheese Macaroni.

Nestle: Pasta time

    This fictional character is a $5-billion cash cow for its company. But its popularity seems to be waning and the company has plans to rebrand its personality by moving away from its clean image. The first project for this exercise has been code named Super Secret. Name the character.

The Strategist Quiz (#125)

The market for ayurvedic beauty products is growing fast. Many companies have entered the segment with branded products in categories such as skin care, hair care, soaps and essential oils.

KIT: The Indian market for ayurvedic cosmetics

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The top 10 business bestsellers

Pulsar&rsquo;s new variant, to be unveiled next week, will retain the looks of a big bike, but the engine will be 135 cc.

High on looks, low on power

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