What are the new trends in furniture? Abhilasha Ojha does a recce of some exclusive stores.

Crystal couch, arty chair

Business Standard

Anjaleka Kriplani has a taste for all things fine in life. An interior architect, she is VP, interior design and sales, at the firm Renaisaance Homez. Understandably guarded about one of her prized possessions, a painting by Bose Krishnamachari, she won&rsquo;t reveal its price to us. It&rsquo;s a piece, she says, she wouldn&rsquo;t even want to put a price to.

High heels, high art, and a high bed!

The Kolkata Open at the Alekhine Chess Club attracted global publicity for rather dubious reasons. In Round Three, French Champion GM Vladislav Tkachiev (a former Kazakh citizen of Russian origin and a noted bon vivant) arrived inebriated for his game against Pravin Kumar and sank into a stupor after 11 moves.

CHESS #605

Anyone who has ever attended, in any capacity, a panel discussion or a book launch or talk in Delhi has had to pay an awful price, even when the event is free, which it mostly is because we live in one of the most culturally subsidised cities in the world. (Pay attention, America, those warming strategic ties are just the thin edge of our evil Socialist wedge).

Suneet Varma dreams in stories, the whole shebang of noblemen&rsquo;s gardens and shipwrecks and desirable women in incredibly beautiful clothes, imagining the whole theatre of it &ldquo;like a flash of a vision&rdquo;, something he says is &ldquo;exhausting to live with&rdquo;.

The lovely, lonely world of the storyteller

Self-deprecating humour isn&rsquo;t something one sees too much of in this country (where making fun of others is held a nobler pursuit than laughing at one&rsquo;s own foibles), so I&rsquo;m always pleased to read Saad Akhtar&rsquo;s webcomic Fly, You Fools! (People are Mindless Cattle), a good-natured, witty take on some of the things we read about in the newspapers every day. It isn&rsquo;t brilliantly written or drawn (in fact, it mostly uses photos and mixed media rather than fresh illustrations) but it&rsquo;s goofy and perceptive, casting fresh light on (among other things) security checks at mall entrances (http://tinyurl.com/5s25pe), &nbsp;rich kids mowing down pavement-dwellers in their Mercs (http://tinyurl.com/mhpwep),&nbsp;and loud honking at traffic signals as a substitute for sexual inadequacy (http://tinyurl.com/kl7knc).

Bye bye, brand name

When journalists turn writers of books such as Aruna&rsquo;s Story or Bitter Chocolate &mdash; horrifyingly, if bravely, about incest and paedophilia &mdash; and write intense, argumentative columns that create cyber storms that let loose a fusillade of abuse, you can be excused for thinking of that person as a toughie, someone hard-nosed, sharp-edged, flint-lined. Pinki Virani surprises you with her softness and her humour, but also her incisiveness, her willingness to debate (rather than harangue) &mdash; and in view of the somewhat unkind perception that she is a publicity-seeker for her books &mdash; with her concern for both nation and society.

A hellish place in heaven

When President Obama reached out to the global Muslim population in Cairo in June, his speech was littered with references to non-Christian gods and stressed that &ldquo;the United States is not, and never will be, at war with Islam. In fact, our partnership with the Muslim world is critical ... in rolling back a fringe ideology that people of all faiths reject.

In the name of god

My fellow citizens! Lend me your ears. Of course, you have been doing that for years, but indulge me a little longer. I may have retired after serving as Chief Minister for two terms, but my political life, as is well known, started far from the capital. I owe my initiation into politics, as well as my writing life, to my mentor, M--------ji, a humble but public-spirited man. Few of you, dear readers, will know that I kept a journal throughout my career in public life. I recorded in it some of the innumerable amusing, enlightening, shocking and also routine events and situations in which I and my colleagues found ourselves. Fear not, dear colleagues, I have not selected stories to cause scandals or dismay friends, but to entertain and, I hope, educate ordinary readers. Each anecdote stands alone, but together I believe they convey a picture of the great excitements and responsibilities of a political life...
.

Prefaces

Abhilasha Ojha comes away mesmerised by a house in Lutyens&rsquo; Delhi that has been designed by interior brand Alchemy.

Pearls on their walls

Atul Bhalla&rsquo;s photography reveals water as an invisible chemical, an inhabitant of pipes and pumps.

City lights

The Frankfurt Motor Show kicks off on Monday. Here&rsquo;s a preview of the important cars.

Frank-ly speaking

One answer is the ease and convenience that it provides to the customers.

What makes eBay India tick?

Steve Jobs, who had been gone for nearly a year now due to health-related issues, has come back to announce the launch of new Apple iPods, including a 64GB Touch and an iPod Nano with a built-in camera and FM tuner, and new colours for the iPod Shuffle.

Pick your music box

Being a marketing graduate from Wharton School of Business and having worked with Saatchi &amp; Saatchi and then with Microsoft&rsquo;s online advertising division in New York, setting up an online classified advertisement booking service was a natural choice for 25-year-old Sharad Lunia.

Ad-ding business

The research, carried out by Hitwise, a global information services firm and a subsidiary of Experian, monitored how more than 25 million internet users interact with over 1 million websites across more than 160 industry categories. It collected internet usage information through a combination of ISP data partnerships and opt-in panels. Data were collected in accordance with local and international privacy legislations and were audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

'Facebook' floods search bars, tops list

Some call it the &lsquo;Air Deccan of the cosmetics industry&rsquo;, but India&rsquo;s biggest beauty brand is trying hard to go the premium way.

Lakme's makeover

1. If someone came up with it without fully understanding the real problem that the communication needs to address.

Not creative if...

The HTC brand has been known for its touch screens. Now it expects Google&rsquo;s Android-powered phones to add to its sales.

Touch, feel and go

Jagdish Khattar wants to fill the gap in the service infrastructure for cars.

Service satisfaction

Hindustan Unilever has entered the surface cleaning market with Cif.

Cleaning up

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