By Shilpa Raina
Mumbai, Oct 10 (IANS) It will be a six-day star-studded extravaganza. The second edition of the HDIL India Couture Week will see top notch Bollywood stars like Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Akshay Kumar, Sanjay Dutt and Saif Ali Khan walk the ramp for the fashion pageant that kicks off here Sunday.

The Oct 11-16 event will see superstar Amitabh Bachchan walking the ramp for designer duo Abu Jani-Sandeep Khosla’s inaugural show. Aamir Khan, Akshay Kumar, Sanjay Dutt, Saif Ali Khan, Govinda, Ajay Devgan and Katrina Kaif are expected to walk the ramp for Salman Khan’s Being Human show Oct 13.

Then, filmmaker Karan Johar is making his fashion debut at the event. The maker of super hits like “Kuch Kuch Hota Hai”, “Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham” has teamed up with designer Varun Bahl to showcase men’s couture range on the last day.

Since Karan Johar’s muse is Shah Rukh Khan, the Bollywood superstar will sashay down the ramp along with his wife Gauri Khan.

Bollywood’s young brigade Ranbir Kapoor and Imran Khan are also expected to walk the ramp.

The couture week is an initiative of the Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI), which annually stages two editions of the hugely successful Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week (WIFW) in New Delhi.

Other designers participating in this event are Monisha Jaising, Pallavi Jaikishan, Varun Bahl, Manish Malhotra, Manav Gangavani and Suneet Varma.

Unlike WIFW, the couture week is not a business-driven event but more a celebration of the Indian cultural heritage in a grand manner. Hence emphasis is given more to ramp decoration and creating a grand ambience to give an extravagant touch to the event.

“This is not a buyer-oriented event. Here the emphasis will be more on individual clients rather than on large buyers. We expect individual clients to conduct one-on-ones with designers to place their orders,” FDCI president Sunil Sethi told IANS.

“Couture is all about extravagance and this gives an opportunity to the designers to add to their creativity by lending more drama and grandeur to the ramp,” he added.

Talking about the celebrity quotient, Sethi said: “This year, the glamour quotient is at the peak in the couture week. These couture czars will surprise you with their collections while Bollywood celebrities will mesmerise you on the ramp.

“Full entertainment is guaranteed here.”

Apart from the glam and glitz, the event will also be a testing time for Monisha Jaising to prove her skills as a couture designer as she is mainly known for her pret line.

However, Sethi is confident about her skill-set. He said: “She is one of the finest designers of the country and I am sure she will present a scintillating collection.”

(Shilpa Raina can be contacted at shilpa.r@ians.in)