"Bhai Ho" A fitting reply to Jai Ho.

I was watching this video on You Tube which looks amateurish but still drives the point home and is a fitting reply to the "Jai Ho" campaign by Congress. Well even A. R. Rahman agrees to this fact that "Jai Ho" is not among his best of creations but still it's a perfect example of "Bahti Ganga mein haath dhona" loosely translated, it's similar to swimming with the tide.

So Congress paid a good price to buy the rights of this song. (Well not sure but still I think that the ruling party might have passed a part of the cost to taxpayers like us). Anyone remember which was the most repeated ad during last IPL? Well, it was the "Bharat Nirman" ad. The giant 90 second ad sung by Kailash Kher (the second video in this post). I think that the ad money came from our taxes only as it was done much before elections and government could easily pass off the expenses in the name of awareness campaign for government programs. Well anyways, it seems that BJP has just elbowed the "Jai Ho" ad out of their way. But, I guess it needs a little fine-tuning. They should seriously start thinking of building around this concept which the party claims is sent by some well wisher. In that case, Jai Ho.

News ke peeche ka news..

Sorry for the title, It seems that slowly my blog is more and more becoming a Hindi blog. Anyways harz hee kya hai?

So was just going through some newspaper articles to kill time. I can't tell you but I really want to watch Sachin and Dravid bat together in a test match because it may be their last New Zealand tour together and for Dravid this country has always been special. It was here where he shed his tag of being a slow batsmen and later in the same year was the highest scorer in the world cup. As the timings are little odd, here I am. Up at 3 am in the morning waiting impatiently for the match to start.

Well, I was reading through ibnlive.com and immediately went on to read some masala news. It seems that they had a little quiz about who is the highest paid actress in Bollywood. They show pictures of Katrina, Aish and Kareina in that order and suddenly there is a fourth picture of a smiling girl who they say is charging 13-15 crore for a movie. And can you believe this that she is Freida Pinto? Well, may be, somebody tipped this exclusive news to this channel. Maybe tomorrow it will become breaking news on some other channel as well. But pata nahin who is paying this girl 15 crore for a movie? That too when her only claim to fame is 15 minutes of 'disguised documentary' Slumdog Millionaire. Phir pata nahin 15 crore kis baat ke? Naa hee to itni sundar hai aur naa hee itni popular.

Anyways, it seems that surely this counter has not been hit by slowdown yet. But well, isse pahle ki lene ke dene pad jaayein (I mean about a time when she has to pay some money to the producers to cast her in a lead or second lead role) hope she slows down a bit. If not, then Ye Mumbai hai meri jaan.

image courtesy - http://ibnlive.com

IPL is gone finally..

The cat and mouse game between IPL and Govt. of India is over and the final verdict just confirms the initial speculation but after lot of drama. BJP leaders immediately jumped onto the scene and accused government for letting IPL go. Congress will counter this attack by highlighting the relationship that Modi shared with erstwhile Rajasthan chief minister whom Lalit use to address with the nickname "Vasu" (and one of the reason why Jaipur got a franchisee last year and probably the reason why Jaipur was denied any matches in this edition). Also, the other leader who has just leveled the accusation has his last name common with the "karta dharta of IPL" (and because Ahmedabad was likely to get a franchisee soon).

No wonder if you hear the news about BJP wooing Sharad Pawar in the name of IPL as Pawar was the guy who ultimately had to bargain with the government. Anyways I think the government is right by denying IPL the permission for this year. Arre bhai itna bada political circus is already under the way? Who needs distraction?

Well there are some reasons why IPL should be held in India and first of all the name itself is Indian Premier league. It's really a shame if Indian premier league is to be hosted by England or Australia for that matter. Leaving aside the 'I' connection, I think the business needs are more compulsive. Just imagine -

If it is not for India or Indians then who will really bother playing 7 Indian players in the match?

Difference in Time zones will make the IPL TV coverage less lucrative for both franchisee and the sponsors. At the same time the costs will go up unless they play in Bangladesh.

I don't think that the stadiums will get the same capacity crowd in some foreign country. What worked in India (the quantity of the matches) might not work in the Videshi land. I don't find lots of Mumbai Indians, Deccan Chargers or Kolkata Nightridders in let's say Tunbridge Wells.

So it's a blot on the homeland security (forgive me, I know there is no homeland security thing in India but the word looks lot cooler) and the home ministry and it's foolishness on the part of the organizing authority to ask for police protection. It also raises a basic doubt that why government should provide security to an event being organized by private parties? Had IPL paid anything to the home ministry for the public/state services availed by them? "Hmmmm a nice Right to Information idea". Well, even if it's there can't the organizing authorities be a little more sensitive to the larger issue at hand like holding free and fair elections?

Well, anyways this will be definitely good for the Kolkata Knight Riders's cheerleaders if Shahrukh really allows them to travel with the team. Good hai.