Did any of these people who proclaim to be Sunanda Pushkar's friends do any thing else but listen at the time that they were faced with their friend's anguish, asks Malavika Sangghvi
Going by the amount of people crawling out of the woodwork and claiming to have been recipients of poor Sunanda Pushkar's final confidences, the troubled former minister's wife seems to have had spent most of her time crying on people's shoulders.
There they are on television, recounting those moments of her despair and disquiet when she unloaded a series of revelations on them, ranging from her husband's alleged infidelity to her own supposed fragile health and her misperceived role in the Indian Premier League.
Of course, these many and varied recounts are all lapped up by an eager media and public, and may even assist the authorities with insights into the unsolved mystery of her murder.
However they beg the question: what did these worthies do at the time that they were faced with their friend's anguish?
Listening to a troubled friend, of course, is an important requisite to their healing, but these were powerful, resourceful people, well connected and famously blessed with worldliness and savoir-faire.
Did any of them do any thing else but listen? Was there any suggestion on their part of aid in the form of counselling, therapy or psychiatric intervention? Did any of them take the trouble to reach out to Pushkar's husband or family, to say, "Your wife/daughter is anguished and needs help?"
And if they didn't do this or, at the very least, ensure that the lady was not alone with her demons, would they like to respond with their reasons for not doing so?
A high-profile wife of a diplomat I know, who once lived and moved in the same circles in Lutyens' Delhi and now describes it as "a golden bowl filled with scorpions", once said to me that the last bit of advice she received after she had been scorched and almost devastated by her experience in India's Capital (she's resettled abroad and has happily built her life all over again) was from an upright army man. "I hope you learn never to trust A-listers in your new life," he had told her while dropping her to the airport for her final flight out.
What he was alluding to was the fact that for all her high-flying days in the city, hosting the most-sought after parties and being the toast of the city, he had been the lone friend who had made the time to see her off.
"It was strange," she says "towards the end, when my world was falling apart, the people I could count on were few and far between. It was a bit like living in a maze of whispering walls and deadly doublespeak, where everyone knew everything about each other's lives but no one ever wanted to take sides or be seen to offer any help."
Since this lady's travails (they occurred five years ago), Lutyens' Delhi has gone on to acquire a life and personality of its own. There are gossipy websites named after it, articles written about it, and this evening I am attending a talk on "The Rise and Fall of the Lutyens' Elite".
From a small geographical location that gets its name from the celebrated architect, Lutyens' Delhi has come to signify something far more sinister and potent.
As for my friend, the lady who survived it all and is now many miles away, rehabilitated and much wiser, she is now watching the daily line up of people who proclaim to be Pushkar's friends and confidantes during her most difficult time. All she says with relief and wisdom is: "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
