Heralding a weighty revolution

Several litres of water a day, multiple small portions of nutrition-laden meals and regular workout sessions - those are the clandestine ingredients to a Kareena Kapoor-esque figure.

Or at least that’s what Rujuta Diwekar, fitness guru and dietician to stars such as Kareena and Karisma Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Amrita Arora, Konkona Sen Sharma and Preity Zinta, promises us when we get her on the phone.

“I want to revolutionise the way people look at the word diet. It is not a short term solution that you adopt and discard at your convenience. It’s a lifestyle,” comments Diwekar, her tone laced with authority.

And while most weight watchers may already be familiar with this concept, the nutritionist is happy to reiterate it several times during our phone conversation: don’t starve yourself, it just does not work.

She also assures us that contrary to popular speculation her poster client, and good friend, Kareena Kapoor, did not skip even a single of her multiple meals to perfect her Tashan look.

“When reports of Bebo apparently being anorexic first came out, I was pretty shocked and annoyed. After all the dedication she’d put in, people thought it was because of a severe crash diet! But those around her, from her staff to family and friends, realised that she was eating more than ever and still losing weight,” elucidates Diwekar.

So the how does this almost-too-good-to-be-true, mystical system work?

Well, Diwekar tells her clients to follow her ‘Eat Yourself Thin’ mantra; her philosophy is that a dream body is seventy per cent the result of diet and thirty per cent that of exercise.

“My book Don’t Lose Your Mind, Lose Your Weight highlights four principles of eating right. The first is to never wake up to tea or coffee, which is a really common habit. Instead go with fruits or milk. The second one is about eating every two hours, the third says that you should alter your meal size according to your activity level and the fourth is that your last meal should be at least two and a half hours before bedtime,” reveals the dietician.

“What I provide is a broad framework and readers can tailor their diet according to their needs. There are no hard and fast rules such as not eating bananas or rice. The gist of the book is being sensible about your food instead of obsessive.”

This 279-page, best-selling book also contains an anecdotal chapter dedicated completely to Kareena Kapoor and an appendix that comprehensively lists out the diet she followed prior to the shooting of Tashan.

In fact it was the national interest in Kapoor’s newly toned figure that inspired Diwekar to put down her advice into words.

“I encourage my clients to depend on their own stomachs to decide what they should eat, what time they should eat at and what quantity they should eat. Each and every one of us has the capacity to do this on our own, but we tend to sever the connection with our stomachs,” she says.

Unfortunately, to hire the dietician is not as cheap as buying her book; she charges Rs 150,000 (approximately Dhs 15,000) per month in the capacity of a personal trainer.