Run Roshan Run!

Achint Kaur & Mohan Kapoor

Pooja Kanwal & Roshan Abbas

Alex & Sweta Keswani

Raghav Sachar

Nigaar Khan (centre) & Shaheen (right)

Roshan Abbas with the cast & crew

Roshan Abbas celebrated the launch of  his TV Serial ‘Palampur Express’ on Sony Entertainment Television last night at Enigma, J.W. Marriott, Mumbai. Roshan has produced, conceptualized AND ideated the storyline. (He’s actually a really talented guy, we used to work together at a radio station in Mumbai and he’s one big cuddly bear.)

Palampur Express, Roshan Abbas’s first attempt  in fiction, is  an inspirational story of a young girl Pavni Dikshit (played by Pooja Kanwal) whose only dream is to be the fastest runner ever and achieve an Olympic gold medal for the country!

Roshan and Shaheen Abbas played host to the entire caste and crew of Palampur Express as they watched the live telecast on huge screens at Enigma. Pooja Kanwal in a light brown bandage dress walked in with fiancé and mom Anita Kanwal. The cast includes Aksshat Gupta, Ajay Singh Chaudhary, Adaa Khan , Rajesh B Asthana, Amita Udgata and Nitin. Also spotted Ronit Roy, Suresh Menon, Gurdip Bhangoo of Sony, model Khalid Siddhiqui, Shweta Keswani with boyfriend Alex, director Salim Arif with wife Lubna, Nigaar Khan, Achint Kaur with Mohan Kapoor, Sumit Raghavan, Naman Shaw and Raghav Sachar (he’s got a new video coming up too!)

Sanjay Divecha Strums at Daddy’s Wind Song.

As you know by now Daddy’s Wind Song Wednesday’s are becoming the stuff of lore. Every Wednesday Mumbai’s Juhu neighborhood is treated to an eclectic mix of music at Riyaaz Amlani’s rooftop respite Il Terrazzo. I’ve seen a motley crew of extremely talented performers there including, Anushka Manchanda, Ankur Tewari, Yana Gupta, Something Relevant (P.S. they’re back on stage at Blue Frog on June 17th see you there… woohoo!) Nikhil D’Souza, Shaa’ir & Func (and there have been many more which I have sadly missed…)

Last night the guitar maestro Sanjay Divecha (known for his folk, rock and jazz styles) strummed his heart out. By the way he has a new album out called “Full Circle” featuring a song in the epic voice of Kailash Kher called “Naino Sey”  which the evening show producer at my radio station, Avadhoot has totally flipped over. Seriously, he spent a good twenty minutes raving about the video to Sanjay who was in on Tuesday for an interview and put a really big smile on Mr. Divecha’s face. I’m glad because he seemed a bit bummed about how hard it is to give non-commercial music a voice in India. Thank you Blue Frog. If you haven’t seen this video yet, well you’re in for a treat!

(Randomly spotted Saif Azmi in the video who I feel like I met in another life when my roommate used to work for Prahlad Kakkar at Genesis nearly a decade ago. Saifi! Wazzup yo?!)

So back to last night, celebrity turn out included (the still yummy) Milind Soman, (boogie woogie bro) Naved Jafri, Shriya Sen, Reema Sen, Suvarna Jha, Shweta Keswani and Narayani Shastri and of course I have pictures!

Sanjay Divecha (far left)

Shriya Saran and Riyaaz Amlani

Jennifer Mayani

Milind Soman

Narayani Shastri and Reema Sen

Alex O'Neil and Shweta Kesvani