Jahnavi Kapoor Et al.....

The most celebrated wedding in India's modern history finally got over and the poor Media frankly did not get much sound bites thanks to the Amitabh ji decision to keep the whole affair private. But media is well.. media,and so it finally got the sensational bite needed when a little known "model" and "actress" Jahnvi Kapoor barged into the media conclave near Partiksha, the home of the Bacchans and claimed that Abhishek was indeed her beau. Now don't ask me which movie or ad has this person acted in. (Apparently she danced in the movie Dus with Abhi, did we even notice?)

So what happens to people like Jahnvi Kapoor ( or Naina or Haya god knows how many names she has) who forsake everything they earned so far ( not that she had earned anything substantial money or otherwise) for a 2 day fame/publicity. Over the next 2 days, the media will go gaga looking for her antecedents and precedents, try to prove/disprove her claim, some will come out in support of her, others will mock her. But after the initial brouhaha is over, Jahnvi kapoor and others like her will once again lead the life of obscurity with a lot of the people trying to avoid her and not wanting to do anything with her. Her Sobriquet would change from "one who acted in the Movie Dus" to " One who claimed to the actual bahu in waiting" to Bollywood's first family.

So is it all worth it ? If there is some truth the claims made, then it is truly worth it. Remember Udit Nayaran ?He had to accept that he indeed had another wife in Ranjana Jha and had to accord legal status to her. But the Abhi-Jahnvi case here mostly does not any ground. So long Jahnvi... if all you needed was some publicity and fame, you have got it from Aaj tak, TimesNow and the hundreds of blogs like this one.

The Karan And Sweta Nanda Gimmick

Last month NDTV started a new series "NextGen" ,hosted by Sweta Bachchan Nanda, the daughter of apna Bollywood's first family. The only bachchan not to have faced the arc lights as yet, I guess simply could not resist it anymore . So the first show had her interviewing Karan Johar which must have a ploy by NDTV to make Sweta comfortable since the Johars and Karan in particular are known to the Bachchans since the 1970s. Sweta I feel needs to fine tune her interviewing skills, but she did ok for a first timer .

Coming to the point here, this week Sweta Nanda will be on the Koffee with Karan ( produced by KBalaji KTelefilms??), the filmy talk show hosted by none other than Karan Johar. So what's happening here ? Exchange offer?. The "I will feature in your show and you feature in my show" seems rather self promotive with each of hosts/guests trying to get the publicity and eyeballs .Or is it a larger pact between NDTV and Star TV, the one time partners who are now competitors ? While there is nothing wrong in doing something like this, atleast some of the viewers will surely feel they are being taken for a ride. I mean how can the questions asked in the talk show/interview be realistic when you the guest/interviewer have known each other since they were kids. Obviously some of the uncomfortable questions will never be asked ( Like Karan being a Feminine sex symbol. Any comments ?) ?

So when it comes talk shows, I have always loved the one hosted by another Karan on CNBC. Karan Thapar's no non-sense approach even with people of the Stature of Vijaya Mallaya makes an interesting watch.

American Dream...

Was reading the Rita Chaudary Article in The Sunday Times of India on the Great American Dream gone sour. The crux of the article was that there are hundreds of Illegal immigrants in the US who have gone on Tourist Visa but stayed on in the hope of getting the coveted Green Card and are now working in hotels as cheap labourers. Don't want to sound racist here(In fact I am a big fan of Gujju entrepeneurship) but the names given in the article suggested that the majority come from the Dhirubhai land. Now these immigrants cannot go back to India to meet their near and Dear ones even on short term visits as getting out of the American continent implies Deportation forever. Therefore there people have stayed in the US for years now surviving on phone calls and Pictures.

What was surprising was the tone of the article sounded as if the author was sympatizing these immigrants for not having met there kids/parents for years. But do they really deserve this sympathy ? I mean what is making these people enter legally a country and then stay on illegally for ever ? Who is responsible for there illegal status ? Certainly not the United States government. It is they themselves who came in on the Tourist visa and decided to stay on by doing petty jobs. Agreed that some of these illegal immigrants have made it big in the Land of Opporunities my owning Hotel/Motel chains but that is a miniscule percentage. ( I can vouch for this personally as I have visited motels in the US where the caretakers/room cleaners are all migrants from India legal or illegal with the Americans/Desis managing/owning the hotel) .

So let's not sympathize with these illegal migrants ( mind you I have no issues if you about migrating legally by taking the H1B-GC route). BUt I cannot vouch for Indians who work all night in gas stations at the minimum wages and aim to stay on in the hope of making it big once the "Green" signal is given by the US immigration Authorities. While this could have made sense in the 1970s , the current economic environment in India provides enough oppurunities to the willing entrepeneurs . So let us not waste our productive years in dreaming to make it big in the land of opporunities. Rather let's make the land we are born in the NEXT land of Opporunities.

Liz-Arun Contra View

The crux or essence of life I believe should be "view" and "contra Views" . I say this because for every opinion you have on a certain thing be it a movie, a political event, a book, bang comes another opinion which does not agree fully with your view and sometimes completely negates the essence of your view ( CONTRAVIEW ). And so just as I was kicking the media's ass over Liz-Arun marriage came a rather different viewpoint from none other than our Socialist Congress Leader and Tourism Minister Ambika Soni. Make India a "Marriage Tourism" destination !! by glorifying the marriage customs of India and making it attractive to the Foreigners.

Well does sound interesting .. if Yoga and Kamasutra could be marketed to the western world, guess the Indian Marriage should be a cakewalk for us ....... given that perhaps the only place where we conservative Indians really come out of our shell ,show off ,create a huge noise( literally at that ) and even dance our way thru ( remember parents chiding teenagers for visiting a Disc) is perhaps the great Indian Weddings. The pomp and grandeur of the Indian Marriages seems justified since the brides and the grooms in India get this chance to splurge and showoff just once in Life :) . Lucky westerners :)

PS: The last line is changing now but we still have a long way to go and the line still applies to 98% of Indians.

Liz-Arun, Prince, Ash-Abhi etc ...

Tune into Aaj Tak , Times Now , CNN-IBN, xyz, abc channels over the last 2-3 days ........ the only thing u hear is that "industrialist" ARun Nayar and "Actress" Liz oops Elizabeth Hurley getting married in desi style in some Palace in Jodhpur ......I dont understand what great these two people have done to India and do they really deserve the media attention they are getting in India ??? the so called Industrialist Arun owns a non descript Software company which the software powerhouses of India are not even aware of .......

The only guys to be blamed are the Media specially the ones like Aaj tak who started this Sensationalization of news .....remember Prince ? the 5 year old who got a 48 hr celebrity pass ??.. yet another example is the ash- Abhishek marriage . on the day the marriage was announced Aaj tak followed the Big B wherever he went, went into the family history of both Ash and Abhishek, how they met blah blah ....... simple question who cares ?? I guess there must b some solid TRP data to support something like this and so the hapless people like me who want see "actual" news are left with no options !! guess WWW is a better option than the idiot box....

Low Cost @ What Cost ???

Air Deccan I thought was making waves in the Indian Airspace by opening up the Air Travel Vistas to the common man. But I was really shocked at the service level which the airline is offering to the so called "first Time" travellers...given the treatment they are getting .. I think they are better off travelling by train or bus to their destinations.....wondering y I am bashing up Air deccan!! .. here is my story ( rather my parents story .. with my mom travelling the 1st time on Air)

Saturday 6pm: Schedule flight to Hyderabad. Had specifically booked this time as my parents wanted to attend the evening functions of a marriage.

Saturday 8am: SMS rescheduling the flight to 8pm ...... ( I thanked Air deccan since they atleast send an SMS !!!) but all the same shocked at the impunity with which they are rescheduling a late evening flight early in the morning ...... this plainly means the Airline is tried to squeeze it's Aircraft schedule and one Flight going amiss means the entire schedule goes haywire .... trying to drive down costs......but at what costs??

Saturday 2pm: rescdehuled again now 9:20 . then came couple of more SMSes.. finally the flight left at 1130 pm in the night!!!!!!!!! ....spoiling all the plans which my parents had.....they reached hyderabad at 1am in the morning

and must say we were lucky to be send SMSs.. just wondering abt the people who did not have this facility . .. an agonizing 6 hrs @ the Airport.. add another 1.5 since u r usually @ the Airport atleast an hr earlier...... so effectively 7.5 hrs .. now add another 2 hrs to this ......... and ur in hyd by train......

the same story repeats itself on return flight .. Scheduled time 530pm .. actual departure 11:45 pm.......so I am sure such stories must b happening everyday. and seems like AIR deccan has even developed a model to predict the exact time of delay !!!!!!!! sorry Mr. Gopinath .. this wont do ....you need to pull up ur socks...... else be ready to face the Indian Desi public Ire..... sooner or later

PS : Somebody was thanking AD for making flying possible to common man.... I think this LCC model cud have been brought in Mr. XYZ .. if not Mr. Gopinath .,..given the liberalization policies and .and I dont think I need to thank him for this pain