Downtown: The Delhi-Mumbai Gazette

It’s almost as if the winding iron staircase, the classic scrolls and the twodomes have got a new lease of life. Delhi’s oldest church, the St James, looksresplendent once again, thanks to intach or the Indian National Trust for Art and CulturalHeritage and British restoration experts.

The resurrection process started in 1988, when the church pastoral committee, alarmedat the leaking terrace and extensive cracks in the outer dome, approached intach. But itwas not before 1996—helped by a Rs 1.5 million grant from the Delhigovernment—that work actually began on the 165-year-old church. There’s now anew waterproof layer on the terrace and more than 150 metres of horizontal ironreinforcements of the dome have been replaced by stainless steel rods; the processinvolved taking out 450 ft of iron support two ft at a time and replacing it with steel.Says O.P. Jain, convenor of intach’s Delhi chapter and founder president ofSanskriti: "During the repair of the gold-painted dome, we noticed cannon-ball dentswhich withstood the impact of the 1857 uprising." As for the time-frame, RatishNanda, a conservation artist and coordinator of the project: "It took us two yearsbut the end result is an exact replica of the original dome."

For the stained glass panels, noted British stained glass consultant Alfred Fisher wasflown in. He recommended the panels be sent to Britain for repair. But, surprisingly,everything, including the fabrication of the kiln, was carried out within churchprecincts.

Ram Sehgal of Everest Advertising can hardly eat, drink or be merry. He has been a busyman repositioning Frooti with a brand new "accessible, friendly" icon—DigenVerma—to scuttle the cola impact. Presto, Frooti came up with this boy-next-door totake on the posterboys of desi glamour who also pose as cola ambassadors. The DV crazesimply got people talking; loud and clear. What added fillip to the whole hullabaloo wasDigen’s identity—a top secret that made all even more curious. Great strategyyou may say for even we thought so till rival McCann Erickson came up with a rather cheekydig at DV. Out of the blue popped a McCann campaign for client indiatimes.comappropriating Verma along with his entire family. Just one ad. That was enough for allhell to break loose. "Ambush advertising" screamed Everest, "creativefreedom" retorted the Erickson team. Cola wars are passé, we fencesitters are havinga ball enjoying the new ad snafu.

One would’ve thought the ratings would pour in the way money does in Jeeto Chappar Phad Ke, but the continued fall in trps of the Sony Entertainment Television show is causing the channel some concern. Their worry stems from the fact that the recent A.C. Nielsen (tam) report showed its trps touching an all-time low of 3.3 per cent and the show ranking a lowly 34th among the top 50 programmes for the period March 16-18. Then, the new reality show to be launched by Zee next month is expected to make some dent in the world of TV gameshows. Another serious concern was the fact that both tam and intam reports showed Star TV bagging the top slots with a host of programmes, which also included rival kbc. And though kbc’s ratings were also dwindling, they continue to remain fairly high. Is Chhote Miyan eventually losing out to Bade Miyan?

Something new’s cooking at the Bay of Bombay. Ashok Shetty, owner of this restaurant, has launched a unique community called the Oyster Club. Oyster lovers from all over the city and other parts of the country will congregate here every month not just to eat some late marine life but also to share recipes, to talk just about oysters and more. Says Ashok: "A lot of our clients know us for our great oyster dishes. And we’re very particular about these dishes. Our oysters come by the morning flight from Kerala everyday." It was his customers who mooted this idea. And so they’ll meet, on the first or last Wednesday of every month. And among the 50 distinguished members of the club are the likes of Parvez Damania, Ravi Ruia and Siddharth Kak. An expensive dish sure attracts hi-profile admirers.