Being a dyed in the wool (now a 'dead in the water' ) bureaucrat, I have never been the life and soul of any party. But strangely enough, hostesses kept inviting me frequently to dinners, I suspect because of my village idiot qualities, because I could keep a conversation flowing in the silences when everyone else had their snouts buried in the main course.

But since 2015 or so, the invitations have dried up, like the mythical Saraswati river: divergent political perceptions make the breaking of bread with me an uncomfortable experience. Most of my erstwhile friends, colleagues (those not yet brain dead, that is) and those sharing the Shukla genes with me, are of the view that Mr Modi's arrival has been like the Second Coming, whereas I see it as Paradise Lost or the arrival of the False Messiah.

This suits me fine. In these twilight (not yet sunset, folks) years, one cannot wish for more of an evening than a single malt at hand, a contented pooch at one's feet, smoke rings framing one's face like a Henri Matisse painting, and the sounds of Beethoven's Emperor concerto wafting through the house, a voice-over, as it were, to the sounds of the city.

Which brings me smoothly to the media frenzy about the invitations for the dinner/banquet for Mr Putin recently. It was made out that Rahul Gandhi's omission from the guest list was a well deserved snub for his hostility to Modi and the purchase of Russian oil by India.

To which my response is: HUH? Being invited to dinner with a war criminal, a fugitive from an ICC arrest warrant, a killer of half-a-million Ukrainians and a........

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