'Rich'ession in Hyderabad

The rich in Hyderabad (especially the Banjara Hill/Jubilee Hill types) face a peculiar problem. Quite surprisingly, the poor too face the same problem, which is- of not having enough food to eat at home. So, the poor, being what they are, hit the streets to either beg or steal. Likewise our Jubilee Hills rich too hit the streets but in search of a suitable joint to stuff themselves. But they don’t have to go too far as they have an embarrassing (that is, embarrassing for us) number of eateries to choose from.

I don’t know what it is about Jubilee Hills that attracts people to open fancy restaurants. There might be more number of restaurants in Jubilee Hills than there are homes there. Not a week passes by without reading about the opening of a new joint. Sometime last week I read about the gala opening of Zara somewhere in Banjara Hills. Then there is the hoarding of Sanjeev Khanna at Liberty crossroads inviting us to have lunch and dinner at Yellow Chilli which is again located somewhere in Jubilee Hills. Of course, I’m very happy for the rich in Hyderabad because they don’t have to agonize like us where to eat and what to eat because they can simply drop in at any of the numerous joints and hog on Italian, Spanish, Mexican, Thai, Mediterranean… until it begins to come out of their ears.

Whatever fancy restaurants there are I guess the real eating in Hyderabad happens in joints like Paradise, Abhiruchi, Astoria, Garden, Niagara, Shadaab and a million such places where the only sound is the crunch of bones and the clatter of plates. In such joints the focus is solely on food and only food. In the fancy places one also gets pretty crockery or murals hanging on the walls. But I guess the rich are lucky, for if the food is not good at least they can do something with the décor. Eat it, maybe.

At the same time economists should look at this development with positive concern because while the rest of the world is talking of recession and shutting down firms, people are actually opening new hotels and that too in upscale places. Which goes to prove only one thing- that for the rich in Hyderabad there is no word like ‘recession’ in their dictionaries.