Over the years, it had become something even our neighbours looked forward to during the festive season, the strange sounding but fabulous tasting combination of a hut made of dark chocolate which would open up to reveal a generous portion of dry sevaiyan inside. It was a nod to India’s syncretic culture and a celebration of both Diwali and Eid, and it came with the season’s best wishes from Habib Rehman, who had turned it into something of a legacy for ITC Hotels. In the long span of his association with the group, its experimentation and representation of regional cuisines and menus reached a high point, and is something of a culinary benchmark that he has left behind for his colleagues to measure themselves against.
Next week will mark two watershed points for Rehman, but neither has to do with cuisines, or food, though no doubt there will be evidence of that too. Both, expectedly, are intertwined, and it is difficult to make sense of one without the other. And yet, on the face of it, they appear to have little in common. In fact, the only thing that ties them together is Rehman’s pet, deceased five years ago, and the reason for the twin celebrations.
At the start of this year, the intensely personal Rehman asked me to help him organise his thoughts about his years spent with his pet dog, Gori. I was sceptical, but volunteered to sort through the notes in the hope that a sleight-of-hand in arranging the memoirs of his dog could be twisted into his memories of the extraordinary experiments conducted in ITC’s kitchens that had led to its domination in that segment of the market. Rehman saw through the ploy quickly enough, and I found myself with nothing I could share with friends and family who wanted to know how my weekend afternoons and workday evenings with the foodie-extraordinaire were being spent. “You spoke about his dog, that’s all?” my wife choked over her pudding. “It’s not like it’s a live dog that you can play with,” jibed my daughter. “Dad, man, get a life,” said my son.
By now it was too late: I was involved with Rehman’s inexplicable but very special relationship with Gori. Having first rejected the pup, he later developed a bond that was difficult to describe, speaking to her over the telephone when he travelled — which was frequently — saving for her special Mughlai treats from his table that had been prepared for his guests, and finally, nursing her in her ill-health with a compassion and dedication rare to find even among humans.
Gori’s story, now turned into a book, will be released next week at a housewarming party, which is where the twist in the tale lies. Rehman buried Gori in a park down the road from where he lived; retirement was now imminent, and he hoped to shift to a farmhouse in Gurgaon. But with Gori’s death, he could no longer bear to be parted from her burial mound, the spot marked by a tree he had planted there. So he bought the house overlooking the grave, pulled it down, and has now built a new home for himself that he has named — no surprises — Gori.
“What will I wear?” my wife asked, when she heard there was to be a party to celebrate both. “You really want to come?” I asked her, “It’s just a dog’s story,” earning a nasty look that could have set Gori barking her head off. My daughter wants to see where the grave is, and my son has come down from Pune specially to attend the launch. “Dad, man,” he still managed to gripe, “at least get yourself a dog’s life.”
