(From top) Fashion exponent Prasad Bidapa strikes a pose at Atrium at The Park; models Asha, Rachel and Anoushka from Bangalore at the same venue. Pictures by Pabitra Das

The men have been complaining for far too long and not without reason. The Indian fashion industry, tilted clearly in favour of women, has neglected them blatantly over the years. So much so that men’s silhouettes on the India Fashion Week (IFW) ramp were few and far between, even as the week-long extravaganza featured only one exclusive menswear collection.

If there’s one person who has taken it upon himself to set this right, it’s fashion exponent Prasad Bidapa.

An annual menswear fair, of the same proportion as the IFW, is Bidapa’s very own answer to the fashion week.

Titled Castle Menswear Fair, the first edition of the event was held in Bangalore last month, with designers like Rohit Bal, Tarun Tahiliani, Rocky S, Rajesh Pratap Singh, Bibi Russell, Anamika Khanna, Abhishek Gupta and Nandita Basu showcasing their creations.

“I started the menswear fair this year in Bangalore and will make it an annual event from next year. This time it happened over three days, but I’ll increase the number of days each year. Though the full event will be held in Bangalore, we’ll organise capsule shows in Calcutta, Mumbai and Delhi to give people glimpses of the show,” Bidapa told Goodlife, soon after his arrival in town on Thursday.

He even plans to take the event to international heights. “This time it was a mini fashion week, but gradually the fair will be a very big thing,” he promised Bidapa.

The Bangalore-based fashion promoter has given IFW the miss, deliberately, ever since its initiation. The reason for his absence is one of the best-known secrets of the fashion world.

Bidapa is in town to flag off the first of a series of fashion shows to be held at Tantra every month. The first show at The Park address, slated for tonight, will see designer Manoviraj Khosla displaying his summer line.

“It’s a smart, hard-edged collection that combines man-made fibres with natural ones like silk and cotton. The colours are shocking brights and the silhouettes are very modern,” revealed Bidapa.

While the series will see design biggies like Rocky S, Suneet Verma and Manish Malhotra turning on the heat on the Tantra bar-top, it’s the very next show, the one to be held in July, that promises to be much more than just a ramp affair.

A tribute to Bollywood heroes is what Bidapa is planning, for the viewing pleasures of Calcutta’s women, only.

“It will be a women’s night with the men being restricted to the ramp alone. But the show will be highly interactive as well. We did the same show at The Park in Delhi and it was a runaway hit with the ramp turning into a dance floor after some time. The idea of a tribute to Bollywood heroes came to me when a friend mentioned that the perfect man exists only in Bollywood. He is a man who can dance as well as fight, loves his mother a lot and treats his girlfriend nicely all the time,” laughed Bidapa.

The dance-oriented show will see each model enacting a Bollywood hero ? everyone from Rajesh Khanna and Amitabh Bachchan to Shah Rukh Khan and Hrithik Roshan.

“I am yet to decide on the models for the Calcutta show. It needs a lot of hard work. We have to make the models watch the movies to be able to pick up the mannerisms of the respective actors. But it will indeed be a sexy presentation,” he promised.

At the moment, the fashion guru is busy giving finishing touches to yet another show that he promises will be truly unique. To be held this Saturday, the show features creations by Bangladeshi designer Bibi Russell. But it’s the venue of the show ? the erstwhile Opera theatre on Dharamtala Street ? more than anything else that makes the event so special.

“It’s one of the very old cinema halls of Calcutta that has been closed down and converted into a television studio. We will keep the old-world charm of the d?cor intact and organise the catwalk on a makeshift ramp,” he said, adding that the idea of the show had been sparked by Sabyasachi Mukherjee, who had to pull out due to shows abroad on the same date.

If there’s one thing about the Calcutta fashion scene that Bidapa rues, it’s the lack of a fashion promoter, reflected in the poor model turnout.

“No one can deny that Bengali girls are the most beautiful in the country. Some of the hottest models and actresses now hail from this city. But right now there’s no one to spot potential and promote them. That’s the reason the city is facing a model crunch,” he observed.