Yet another exhibition

Diwali in Mumbai turns into retail purgatory.

While traditional hubs for Diwali purchasing like Crawford Market and Alpha in Vile Parle, normally flooded with Chinese and Taiwanese imports, seem slow to get their acts together this year, the season's potential for wealth generation is being creamed by shrewd entrepreneurs hosting smartly-marketed exhibitions targetted at Mumbai's elite.

What began with the heavyweight Society exhibition, and continued with a string of motley sales, it's been a prolonged month of more or less standard SOPs "" the banquet room in a five-star environment, the two or three big-name designers, the standard product split between fashion and home decor, the sustained bling factor, and the "exclusive" previews complete with cocktails and hors d'oeuvres.

Occupying pride of place in shoppers' diary entries was the annual gala organised by the Ladies' Wing of the Indian Merchant's Chamber. Titled Gold and Marigold, it kicked off with a no less than a champagne brunch for special invitees.

More than 8,000 visitors thronged the 60 stalls in less than two days according to the organiser.

"This is by far the best pre-Diwali exhibition, because it's never the same vendors, and the organisers' selection procedure is more discriminating than the rest," said a visitor, her arms laden.

At Stylefile that's been a visitor to the city since 2002, the preview for "select" invitees turned into a sell-out, and the more popular stalls were left with gaping voids when the exhibition opened to the public the next morning.

Causing notable frenzy were the stalls belonging to Indian fashion's rising stars Anamika Khanna and Sabyasachi Mukherjee. And shoppers' appetities turned relentless when they realised that the mark-ups were considerably less than at their favoured designer boutiques.

The trick to ending up with the sari you covet? Grab. Even what you don't want. Exercise unabashed paranoia. Why pass up something you may not exactly love, but could possibly grow to love later.

Styefile even flexed its muscle by featuring home accessories designed by covetable contemporary artists Paresh Maity and Bose Krishnamachari, but for once it wasn't art that was the cause for frenzied buying. Outside, Krishnamachari, between a smoke, good-humouredly laughed and said, "This time it's this they're after (pointing to my clothes) not the art."

And while jewellery and apparel retailers are making the most of the seasonal delirium by launching their festive collections with representation from the Bollywood brigade and blitzing publicity buildup, it is the periodic exhibition that seems to get shoppers' adrenalin rushing.

Ironically, nobody seems to want to admit their agendas are predetermined by the dates of these sales.

"I don't have time for this madness," said an acquanitance only to rattle off her opinions on at least five show she called on.

The fact is that with the inescapable wedding season around the corner, nobody wants to give up the opportunity to grab a potential bargain.