Pssst... Spicing up Lutyens to exes on Tinder: 2014 was the year of gossip

As this article was being typed one tweet doing the retweet rounds of Twitter had to say this: “Bhabhiji’s attempt to cosy up to the RSS have been futile. Thakurji and Shah want her out of HRD.” A Sunday evening, which comes with the dreadful knowledge of a work-swamped week ahead, can just light up with tweets such as these. For example imagine wracking your brains over the implications of calling the woman in question ‘bhabhi ji’! That’s a gossip lover’s dream evening come true. The year 2014, that way, was also a gossip geek’s dream year. Why, you ask? We list the reasons below.

Life at Lutyens

So you thought gossip deserved no better than those forever-buzzing WhatsApp groups from school, college, gym, yoga classes? Oh maybe, if you are of the generous sort, you’d give gossip the last page of a magazine or a three-inch column in the day’s newspaper? But wake up lovelies and smell the coffee, gossip is serious business and has found better things to thrive on than just the post-shoot shenanigans of Bollywood stars which anyway are mostly PR. At this point, there are at least six Twitter handles that intend to bring to you gossip, right from the citadel of Gucci, Glenlivet, politicos and page 3 regulars - Lutyens in Delhi. It all started off with some wise social media savvy creature, waking up with a bad hangover or on the wrong side of the bed, and deciding to take the said misery out on the world.

That’s possibly how Lutyens Spice happened. And the heartburn that Spice caused with its 20,000 followers led another angry young-old man/woman telling said ‘Spice-y’ person what is Delhi’s favourite phrase after ‘jaanta hai main kaun hoon?’. And that is ‘tujhe to main dekh loonga’. That’s how, we think, Lutyens Insider came up. Now there is no veritable proof that the handlers of the said accounts are anywhere in Delhi. Soon after, a spate of Lutyens gurus appeared on Twitter - Lutyen’s Masala, Lutyens Leopards, The Real Lutyens and ahem, Boring Lutyens Gossip too! From offering ‘information’ about lives of popular media personnel and industrialists to the alleged inside stories from the power corridors, the Lutyens handles is a headache the size of Newshour for most politicians. But all of them are following them as well.

Not-so-Secret

So one fine day you downloaded the Secret app, now that Tinder too has managed to disappoint you with bad English and even worse selfies. The very next day, a very classified bit of information about the ex-boyfriend’s sleeping habits surfaces on that app. Depending on how well you manage exes and how righteous a human being you are, that could be the best thing to have happened to you in the entire year, right? The Secret app sent jitters down the spines of bosses, jilted lovers, girls who have been nasty to other girls, boys who have crushes on friend’s exes and people who generally know fellow human beings to be a humourless, vengeful species. While some of the ‘secrets’ posted on the app were rather funny, some weren’t, for the people they targeted.

However, the ‘Secret’ app made gossip a thing to think about. And worry about even! For all you know, drunken confessions went down considerably since the app surfaced or worse still, devoted drunkards started to rethink that third glass of alcohol! That’s some good done, right?

Tinder box of embarrassment

Like an intelligent person committed to not letting weekends be marred by singlehood woes, you must have logged in to Tinder. Only to find that the school friend’s husband is on it, too? And the guy from the HR department at work who gives you hell about taking a leave. The colleague’s brother who supposedly hates Facebook and yet has a fake profile custom made for Tinder? The roomie’s ex-boyfriend, the neighbourhood pharmacy owner’s son, the intern at work and friend’s friend from Facebook you secretly stalked and who just updated his relationship status saying he is seeing someone?

Now they all know that, errm, you are looking for a boy. Okay, calm down, don’t panic. You know, that all of them are in the same boat as you! Now what’s as reassuring as that knowledge? But it might make for some awkward conversation at the office water cooler or at the pharamcy.

The biggest gossip this year, obviously, were the how-I-met-your-friend/ex/boss-on-Tinder stories!

Ranbir Kapoor Inc.

While the rest of Bollywood failed rather miserably in heating up the gossip scene - except for the Roshans and Rampals - Ranbir Kapoor single-handedly kept the gossip industry afloat in the country this year. First there was gossip that his father has denounced girlfriend Katrina Kaif as his bahu. Then came the news of him moving into a lavish apartment in Bandra with Kaif. Then came the denials. Then there was the angry mommy reacting to sonny boy flying out of her brood - reports said she cropped Kaif out of a picture she uploaded on Instagramm. Finally, the Kapoor boy was probably the one B-town star who was left out of the guest list at Salman Khan sister’s wedding, where even Shah Rukh Khan was invited too! Now that man’s a gossip industry by himself. Awesome plus some, right?