Who Is The Father Of Padma Lakshmi's Daughter?

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"America's Culinary Cup" host and author Padma Lakshmi's relationship with her daughter, Krishna Lakshmi-Dell, regularly melts hearts on social media – even over something as simple as an Instagram video of the mother-daughter duo sharing soup (or in Krishna's case, not sharing it). They appear to be very close, to the point that one of Lakshmi's biggest struggles with being a TV personality is the time her busy schedule takes away from being with Krishna, whom she affectionately calls "Littlehands". What we don't much of on social media, however, is Krishna's father, businessman and entrepreneur Adam Dell.

Dell currently serves as the CEO for Domain Money, a wealth management solutions provider he founded in 2021. Prior to this, he was a partner at Goldman Sachs and the founder and CEO of Clarity Money. If his surname sounds familiar to you, there's a good chance it's because of his brother, Michael Dell, the billionaire founder of Dell, Inc.

Lakshmi and Dell started dating in the late 2000s, while she was also in an on-again-off-again relationship with billionaire Teddy Forstman. In a 2016 interview with Today, Lakshmi shared that she hadn't been looking for a committed relationship at the time, as she was still healing from her 2007 divorce from author Salman Rushdie. When Lakshmi announced she was pregnant in 2010 without naming the father, mortifying media coverage ensued over the matter. Lakshmi had considered her relationship with Dell relatively non-committal, so there were no plans to have him involved as a parent to Krishna beyond agreed-upon visitation rights.

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The situation between Padma Lakshmi and Adam Dell took a turn in early 2011, when Dell sued for full custody of their daughter, Krishna. The lawsuit alleged that, aside from limiting his contact with the child, Lakshmi was exceptionally unkind to Dell during their relationship. It accused her of insulting him for his lack of ambition, and having "an 'uninteresting' career and equally 'unmemorable' friends" (via the New York Post).

The public nature of the suit gave some observers reason to believe that Dell intended to bully his way into getting what he wanted. He filed it in Manhattan Supreme Court rather than Family Court, where details would not have been accessible to the public. All of the media attention over the case likely made the situation much more difficult for Lakshmi, especially since it involved a child she thought she'd never have.

Speaking with People in 2016, Lakshmi said that a major contributor to her divorce from Salman Rushdie was his insensitivity towards the difficulties she faced with her then-undiagnosed endometriosis. She later revealed on "The Drew Barrymore Show" that, after receiving her diagnosis in 2006, she was told she could never have children (via YouTube). The custody battle was yet another painful chapter in Lakshmi's tragic story, but in 2012, she and Dell settled out of court. Dell gained visitation and shared custody rights, and Krishna's surname was changed to "Lakshmi-Dell".

The story, thankfully, has a happy ending. In January 2017, Padma Lakshmi and Adam Dell reportedly started seeing each other again. According to a friend of Lakshmi's who spoke with Page Six, the two loved their daughter Krishna Lakshmi-Bell so much that they were willing to put their tempestuous past behind them. The two were even spotted together at the Women's March on Washington, with their daughter sitting on Dell's shoulders.

Lakshmi and Dell split up again in early 2021, but amicably so. The former couple agreed that co-parenting Krishna was a top priority and committed to staying friends. In a 2023 Instagram post, Lakshmi shared a tidbit of what that co-parenting relationship looks like, writing that Krishna splits Thanksgiving with both parents, spending it with her mom some years and with her dad on others. Dell was also seen in a photo on Lakshmi's Instagram in 2024, celebrating their daughter's middle school graduation.

Outside of Lakshmi's occasional social media posts that include or mention him, Dell has mostly stayed out of the public eye. Though he did make headlines again in 2023, after settling an embarrassing multimillion-dollar lawsuit with a former Goldman Sachs coworker. The suit alleged that Dell had accidentally sent a sexually explicit video to one of the bank's junior staffers in 2020.