It has finally been confirmed.
The on-again, off-again romance is official. Salman Rushdie, 56, is engaged to his love interest Padma Lakshmi, 31. Leila Kaufman, Lakshmi's assistant, confirmed the news to rediff.com
"They are in a wonderful place in their relationship and they are engaged. He has been legally separated for four years and legally divorced for two. They are planning a wedding," Kaufman said.
Rushdie has been married three times, but it will be Lakshmi's first.
No wedding dates have been announced, but Lakshmi walks around New York City wearing a big emerald-cut diamond on her engagement ring finger. The two were recently spotted at the Diane von Furstenburg show, part of New York Fashion Week.
"Salman is finishing up his book, probably the rest of the year, and she will start a film shortly that we are closing a deal on," Kaufman said, suggesting the wedding may take place after Rushdie finished his new book.
"Padma and Salman are thrilled about their engagement," Kaufman said from Chicago.
The two had been dating for "not quite four years," Kaufman added.
She would not say how and where the engagement took place. "It is personal. You know how every man proposes in his own way."
Rushdie and Lakshmi were in India in December and January. Kaufman said the engagement took place recently, suggesting Rushdie proposed to Lakshmi after the two returned to New York.
Kaufman said it is hard to pin down where the two will finally settle down. "Padma and Salman have always been bicoastal and international. Padma has her acting career and plus she has her home in New York. Salman goes to London often, since he has his sons there. Their lifestyle affords them to have multiple home bases."
The couple met in the late 1990s, at a Miramax party, to launch celebrity editor Tina Brown's (now defunct) Talk magazine. Rushdie made New York his home because of their relationship.
He dedicated his last novel Fury to Lakshmi, and created a fictional character tailored after her -- Neela Mahendra, a beautiful documentary filmmaker with a large scar, who is in love with a Rushdie-like, Mumbai-born and Cambridge-educated intellectual Malik Solanka.
"Being associated with Salman is the best thing by a mile that has happened to me," Lakshmi had told India Abroad, the largest circulated Indian-American newspaper owned by rediff.com, last year as speculation about their romance was rife in New York City's gossip circles.
"I have never been loved like this before by any person.I am extremely blessed. I must have been a saint in my last life, that I am reaping the benefits in this life. I can't even imagine what the hell I have done to deserve this. Maybe, I like to think I am good company," she said.
"It is wonderful to have him in my life," she added.