At a recent drinks party in Oxfordshire, I counted five men wearing Nehru waistcoats. Not one of these men looked like he was paying homage to the garment’s namesakes, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Not one looked as if they were genuinely taken with Indian fashion nor remotely bothered that they were wearing the same thing.

I detect a hint of smugness in there somewhere, a rather-too-pleased-with-itself appropriation

Puzzled, I thought back to other men I’ve seen rocking the Nehru: Imran Khan, obviously; Nicholas Coleridge, probably; Mick Jagger, surely. I’m not sure what all these men have in common, but their take-up of the Nehru waistcoat has neither surprised nor alarmed me. Politico-cricketers, Condé Nast execs, rock stars – all might wear the Nehru in a sophisticated, got-this-old-thing-in-Simla kind of way. All perfectly normal.

But how has the Nehru made it to Charlbury and beyond? Perhaps it has something to do with our appalling weather and parlous central heating; maybe it is highly desirable, as a man, to have a coat that you are not asked to take off on arrival. But........

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