Is it the unseasonably warm weather — Britain is as hot as Morocco — which has made everyone so tetchy? Or have the good manners of the British become a thing of the past? Just look at British pop-soul star Adele fresh out of her six Grammy wins. At the Brit awards she won two more awards but then in the middle of her acceptance speech, drowning in accolades and applause, she was impertinently shoved off the stage by the compere who wanted to announce the next item. So she did what came naturally — and put up a finger in a rude gesture.

Pandemonium and controversy broke out with stars taking sides and defending her. English recording artist and fashion designer, Lily Allen, blamed it on the “suits” at the awards who don’t value women of talent. She may have a point; only a fortnight ago fashion designer Karl Lagerfield had patronised Adele by saying she was too fat.
The next thing you know is that bad manners have invaded the Palace of Westminster with Scottish Labour MP Eric Joyce arrested by Scotland Yard, for allegedly punching and head-butting a Tory MP, Stuart Andrew, among others, in the House of Commons bar in the evening. Honourable members are supposed to be just honourable and should not go around slugging it out. But Mr Joyce decided that a regular pub brawl in Parliament would be even more representative of the British people. The Labour Party promptly suspended the punch happy MP, who found himself in custody. No shelter was taken behind any excuses — if an MP had misbehaved he would have to be punished. But did the sudden hot weather have anything to do with Mr Andrew, a former shadow minister, losing his cool?
A punch of a sort has been now delivered by Cherie Blair who has joined the growing list of people suing Rupert Murdoch’s News International over the phone-hacking scandal. It is ironic only because it was Mr Blair who went all the way to Australia to woo Mr Murdoch while Mr Blair was the Leader of the Opposition. He made a pact with the Murdoch newspapers — the Sun, the News of the World, the Times and the Sunday Times — to get them to stop being anti-Labour. The gamble paid off. Labour won three elections under Mr Blair and everyone prospered — Mr and Mrs Blair and Mr Murdoch and his newspapers.
Alas! The Murdoch tabloids stand exposed as many have accused the tabloids of sleazy gossip obtained by somewhat irregular means. But the wages of “sin” are only large bonuses and salaries. As expected, Mr Murdoch is undaunted and has just announced that he will launch the Sun on Sunday to replace the News of the World.
But even after the redistribution of Mr Murdoch’s millions to aggrieved celebrities (including, perhaps, the upset Mrs Blair) will journalistic methods actually change? Or will tabloid hacks continue to use every trick in the book to grab the headline space?

Now there is some good news for the fans of J.K. Rowling. An even fatter sum of money awaits her as she just announced her first “adult” novel. Though she has changed her publisher from Bloomsbury to Little Brown, Rowling’s decision to write a grown-up book has created the expected ripples. But Rowling will have a lot to live up to. Unlike most other authors who come from nowhere her amazing success of the Harry Potter series, which sold more than 450 million books worldwide, means that everyone will be agog. The one noticeable factor is that as Harry Potter grew older so did Rowling’s desire to introduce maturity into her writing and her characters. No matter what she writes, the millionaire author’s next book is bound to become a literary sensation.

And talking about books, a new tome on gardens has raked up a controversy over whether the lawns around the Taj Mahal were as originally intended or had they been messed up by Viceroy Lord Curzon who had his own view on what the Mughal gardens should be like?
Eugenia W. Herbert, in her new book, Flora’s Empire, has carefully shovelled up the obsession of the English with their gardens during the Raj in India. Her research shows the vegetation around the Taj Mahal was rather more dense during the Raj than it is today, and the culprit who ordered the chopping down of trees which partially obscured the view of the Taj was none other than Lord Curzon. He did not know about the Mahtab Bagh or the Moonlight Garden on the other side of the Taj. And, perhaps, what we see of the Taj lawns today, regrets Ms Herbert, is not exactly how Shah Jahan intended us to do.
But is that another reason to punch up the Raj or shall we acknowledge that Lord Curzon gave us our millions of Taj photographs — unencumbered by large trees and other vegetation? His “formal” landscaping has given the Taj its present setting. The only question is: Would Shah Jahan’s rather unruly vision of dense vegetation around the monument provide more shelter and shade for visiting lovers?

The writer can be contacted at kishwardesai@yahoo.com