Fareed-style and substance

I am pretty certain the first time I met Padma Bhushan Fareed Zakaria (well-known journalist, author and columnist), he was wearing half-pants. He was a schoolboy living in his parents’ home in south Mumbai, and we were friends of the Zakarias (Rafique and Fatima).

- SHOBHAA DE

The handsome, suave and very refined young person we subsequently ran into over the years is today a global figure, and at 59 carries off his multiple international awards and accomplishments most elegantly. Fareed self-identifies as a “çentrist and a secular, non-practising Muslim”. His father was a prominent politician from a Konkani Muslim family, and was an Islamic theologian, who was known for his advocacy of traditional Islam. Fareed’s mother was an editor, and gave me my first major break as a national columnist. Our ties go back decades.

This time, we were meeting in Udaipur, at the wedding of my god-daughter Malika, Fareed’s niece. Tasneem Vikram Mehta, Malika’s mother and Fareed’s sister, is one of my dearest friends. The occasion was emotionally charged and deeply sentimental, as all the invitees to the three-day celebration in the magnificent Mehta family