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The committee room on the first floor of the hotel was
buzzing with activity on Wednesday morning with Dhiman Chattopadhyay,
editor of BT More, the special monthly supplement of Business Today, firing
last minute instructions to his staff. Smartly dressed wine stewards of
the Shangri-la were awaiting instructions from their bosses to…uncork.
Mr. Andrew Steele, General Manager of the hotel was discussing with Sourish
Bhattacharyya, executive editor of Mail Today, (which is also a part of
the India Today empire) a few points regarding the tasting.
This was the first judging of Indian wines organised
by the magazine. As Dhiman explained to the judges in his opening remarks,
the majority of who were Indians or quasi Indians, this would become a
regular annual feature of the magazine. What he needn't have explained
was that the organisation of the event and wine service that would follow
would be very professional and totally blind. No one seemed to know or
care 'who' was in the bottles behind the mask.
Thirty eight labels were there for tasting, with each
judge tasting all the wines, in 2 panels. The competition was open to
all wineries from India. It might not have been possible 'to collect samples
from all the wineries but a start was being made today for such competitions
in the future.'
The results will be announced in the forthcoming edition
of BT More and will be available along with the details of the judges,
comments and other interesting information on www.indianwineacademy.com
too, on 16th May, when the latest issue of BT More is released. Declining
to comment on the outcome of the results, Dhiman did hint that there were
a few upsets.
There are always some surprises in such competitions.
It is heartening to note there has been no exception to that rule here
too.
What was not very surprising also was the impeccable
wine service by the Shangri-la staff. Not that it was poor before Andrew
came in; wine seems to have been the big winner at this hotel after his
arrival.
Subhash Arora
May 02, 2008
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