Having been a US citizen since childhood, I finally acquired dual citizenship this past spring, becoming an 'overseas citizen of India'. As an OCI, I am entitled to all but a very few of the rights Indian citizens are born with, such as voting rights and the right to purchase agricultural land. This last came as a disappointing shock to me as one of my more recent whimsical ideas has been to buy a vineyard in Maharashtra, having indulged a minor fascination in the vastly improved state of India's wines since I arrived in Delhi a few years ago.
I moved to the nation's capital from New York city in the summer of 2005, having been contracted to write a memoir about the 'New India', in which I planned to use my search for a husband in emancipated Delhi as a way to tell the unfolding story of urban India and its young denizens.
Wine has played a large role in my new life in India, acting as both semaphore and synecdoche for what I saw happening around me.
| | | | A rum- and whisky- loving nation, India in the last few years has picked up a palate for decent wine. | | | | |
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That is to say, wine appeared as an ever more present visual signal in bars and lounges to suggest patrons' increasing affluence and sophistication, and the changes in the wine industry acted as a stand-in for the rapid development in lifestyle, culture and business. Semaphore and synecdoche aside, wine also helped me blow off some steam.
While the country had been steadily opening itself to the global economy in the last two decades, I witnessed in the last few years an acceleration in the process and a connectedness to the outside world I'd never imagined possible. Some of the more visible examples of this are Tata Motors' $2 billion acquisition of luxury brands Jaguar and Land Rover and the increasing cross-pollination between Hollywood and Bollywood. Sony Pictures may have been disappointed when its expensively-made
Saawariya flopped at the box office, pitted as it was against
Om Shanti Om, the blockbuster that kept on giving. But Sony and other Hollywood studios are going to continue to forge ahead in a film-loving country that they've been locked out of for far too long.
And what does this have to do with Indian wine, I'm sure you're wondering? On previous visits to India in the nineties and in the first half of this decade, I'd often be handed a glass of wine at a reception or an engagement ceremony. Out of curiosity and hope, not to mention courtesy, I'd always take a sip, thinking, "Maybe this one will taste okay." Invariably it had the vinegary kick, or rather full-body tackle, of wine that is considered corked in the West. In this case, though, it would have been inappropriate to send it back. Instead, knowing how much Indians hate waste, I would try to set it somewhere inconspicuous or pour it on the ground if we were outside, and then go hunting for some Old Monk. I've never considered myself much of a connoisseur of wine but of this I could be certain: Indian wine sucked big time. You can imagine my delight, then, when a few days after my arrival in Delhi in 2005, I joined a friend at the Imperial who was sipping on a glass of Sula sauvignon blanc that tasted remarkably potable. Not exquisite or complex or any of those adjectives sommeliers use to describe wine, but simply and undeniably drinkable.
Thus began my love affair with Indian wine and the fact of what its improvement represented. In the world of libations, wine is king and a country's or a person's level of familiarity with it is often taken to be directly proportional to his/her level of refinement. A rum- and whiskey-loving country, India in the last few years has developed a palate for wine that will only become more delicate with the launch of more domestic wines. Consumers will begin to discern one from the other, shun some brands, favour others.
Indians are by nature adaptable and inquisitive and being able to add wine alongside other alcohol on menus indicates their openness to participating in a global arena. Wine connoisseurs in the West certainly won't be stocking Indian vintages in the foreseeable future, but just as in other industries, Indians no longer need to apologise for the poor state of affairs.
As for me, I raise my glass and toast to modern India, though I won't be owning a vineyard anytime soon.
(Jain is the author of
Marrying Anita: A Quest for Love in the New India, to be published by Penguin this month)