Taste the Nation star Padma Lakshmi met her former husband, Salman Rushdie in 1999. A celebrated novelist and the 1981 winner of the esteemed Booker Prize, Salman left Padma feeling starstruck when they first met. "For us Indians, he's like Hemingway," she told Jess Cagle.
"Imagine a young woman in her twenties, who loves books and who had published her little cookbook and in comes this guy," Padma recalled. "I mean, he was the best thing that ever happened to me by a mile. The fact that somebody of that stature and calibre was even interested remotely enough in me to want to take me to lunch was kind of unbelievable."
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Following their first date in Central Park, and Salman's finalized divorce from his third wife, the couple moved in together in 2000. "For me, it was wonderful because I finally had somebody who understood me because he too was Indian and he was also living in the West and he was very nimble in navigating those two worlds," Padma told People.
The couple eventually married in 2004. Both the wedding ceremony and the afterparty took place on the 14th floor of a lavish Manhattan studio.
Following their nuptials, however, Padma and Salman faced several challenges in their relationship. The TV personality explained that as she progressed in her career and became more in-demand, Salman became resentful. "I just wanted to also do something else on my own," she said. "I just wanted my own identity."
In her 2022 memoir Love, Loss And What We Ate, Padma also cited her experience of Endometriosis (which was then undiagnosed) as a key factor in their 2007 divorce. A condition that caused her chronic pain and often left her bedridden, it also led to a lack of intimacy between them.
"Endometriosis was definitely a major reason that my marriage failed and I don't think either of us understood it at the time," she said. "I think that Salman took it personally and I think that he felt rejected, and I can understand that."
While the couple divorced in 2007, Padma and Salman have remained friends. Reflecting on their "wonderful years" together and how she consciously tried to be "even-handed" when writing about them in her memoir, Padma added:
"I do still love him. In many ways, I consider him still part of my family. I think if you really fall in love with someone, even if you fall out of love with them, you still must have some little portion, some little imprint, on your heart that can never be extinguished or erased."
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