To be sure, India is still a small player in the $40 billion biotech market. What is remarkable is the concerted public-private partnership that appears to be focused on making sure India is well positioned to use its intellectual and scientific talent pool to be a significant player in the global biotechnology bazaar.

India had an impressive road show at BIO 2004, the recent biotechnology convention in San Francisco. A delegation led by Maharaj Kishan Bhan, secretary of India’s Department of Biotechnology was on hand. Our cover story takes a look at the future prospects and challenges in biotechnology for India.

Our New Delhi correspondent Siddharth Srivastav has a sharp eye for the quirky story. Given the huge furor over outsourcing, guess what’s the latest trend? Roman Catholic Churches in the U.S. and Britain are beginning to outsource prayers to Kerala churches. Understaffed churches in the West are breathing a sigh of relief, churches in Kerala are making a quick buck, so is this a win-win situation or what? Not so fast, many critics are saying. There is something that’s just not right about a request for a prayer in a Massachusetts town being fulfilled by a church in Kochi. Besides, what about checks and balance? Many critics are simply saying: “Is nothing sacred?” Welcome to globalization.

Hotshot Silicon Valley entrepreneurs took a break from the serious business of making money to listen to a remarkable activist from Hyderabad. Jayaprakash Narayan isn’t one of your Naxalite rebels who wants to blow up the legislative assembly. A former IAS officer and a medical doctor, he is confident that the present system can work fine, thank you, but it needs aggressive civic engagement to make politicians and the system transparent and accountable. However, what’s rather special about Narayan and his civic group Lok Satta is that they just don’t issue press releases or hold dharnas. They actually mobilize folks and bring changes. This issue carries an article on the activist and his work.

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Today, the $500-million Indian biotech industry is a bit player in the global $40 billion biotechnology industry. But the industry as well as the government envisions the India’s biotech sector to grow into a $9 billion business in five years.

In April-May, the government set up a national task force headed by Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, chief of Center for Scientific and Industrial Research, to streamline the regulatory process involved in the approval of all recombinant DNA products.

Similarly a task force on the application of biotechnology in agriculture headed by Prof. M.S. Swaminathan, chief architect of India’s Green Revolution, submitted its report. The report focused on how to use new tools of genetics in an environmentally safe way to contribute to the sustainability of agricultural productivity in future.

The Association of Biotechnology-led Enterprises has set up a $40 million incubator biotech fund.

India is emerging as the new destination for the vaccines market, the bioinformatics industry, Genetically Modified products, clinical trials and clinical research organizations. While most of the large companies today are from the pharma background,

About 150 small and medium-sized companies are working in biotech product and services.

Of course, there are daunting challenges. Foreign investors shy away from what they perceive to be a regulatory nightmare and poor patent protection. Biotech research itself is a risky, extremely expensive endeavor, and in the West, draws superior research skills.

The growth of biotech in U.S. and U.K. can be directly associated with the ability of the research in academia to transform into technology to commercial purposes and the ability to churn out spin offs.

Take Isis Innovation, a subsidiary of the University of Oxford. “Since 1997, Isis Innovation has been responsible for creating spin-off companies based on academic research generated within and owned by the University of Oxford, and has spun out a new company every two months on average,” says Isis CEO Tim Cook. “The combined value of Oxford’s companies has reached two billion pounds, using quoted market capitalization and investor valuations for unquoted companies.”

The biotech sector has attracted virtually no venture capital in India, though a seed fund is now being set up. However, entrepreneurs and government technocrats are saying that a focused change in both regulatory hurdles and business environment will poise biotech for growth in India.

Meet Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, managing director of Biocon, India’s most successful biotech company. Mazumdar-Shaw, who has been called “India’s mother of invention,” by The New York Times and “India’s biotech queen” by The Economist magazine, is bullish on India.

She should know. In addition to chairing the Confederation of Indian Industry’s National Task Force on Biotechnology, she is also president of the India’s biotech industry group Association of Biotechnology-led Enterprises.

According to Mazumdar-Shaw, India has promising prospects in a host of fields in biotechnology, like clinical research, vaccines and biologicals, research process outsourcing and transgenic crops.

“India can be a good destination for clinical research,” says Mazumdar-Shaw. “We have diverse and dense native patient populations. The speed of patient enrollment is very high, besides there is abundant availability of qualified medical and paramedical professionals. Besides, there is abundant availability of qualified medical and paramedical professionals.

“Vaccines and biologicals is another area. The Indian pharma has proved that success in tapping the biogeneric opportunity. We have good bio-processing skills and increasingly Indian companies are showing their ability to meet international standards. And not just that, we are demonstrating cost-competitive technologies.”

Shantha Biotechnics managing director Varaprasad Reddy agrees. “India can position itself as an affordable base for producing vaccines for the developing countries and UNICEF demand,” he says. “The Indian market could witness the entry of new vaccines in areas like malaria, AIDS and diarrhea.”

Mazumdar-Shaw points out to other areas of biotech which are promising.

“Research process outsourcing and clinical trials is another area of advantage. India has a large scientific skill base. And with R&D costs being a big issue globally, India can offer a globally competitive R&D cost benefit,” she says. “India can become a global hub for transgenic crops. A global opportunity for innovation also exists in clinical validation of diagnostic products. Besides, Indian IT skills can be used very well in the informatics space.

“The biotech sector is committed to WTO and TRIPS. In May 2003, the Indian Patents Act recognized the patenting of microorganisms. You will see that four out of 10 top PCT patent filers n India are biotech companies like Biocon, Avesthagen, Panacea Biotech and Sahajanad Biotech.”

Mazumdar-Shaw says partnership will be the key to India’s future success. “The whole biopartnering process should shift to the more basic level of academia-industry interaction,” she says. “The partnering model is going to win the day for India.”

India’s way to biotech success, she says, is to build a high-quality education platform that will provide world-class intellectual capital, and to build on an internationally recognized regulatory framework that will incorporate high standards of bioethics and biosafety.

The future she sees is bright. It is her hope and belief, she says, that in five years India will “build a $5 billion biotechnology business segment in India which can provide employment to 1 million scientists and engineers; build a $1 billion business segment for Research Process Outsourcing. Besides world-class clinical capabilities and generate $1.5 billion through clinical trials; attract $2 billion investment in the biotechnology sector and to be amongst the top three countries and agri biotech; and to be amongst the top fie countries in health science biotech.”

R.A. Mashelkar, one of India’s top technocrats and CSIR chief, says biotechnology opens new vistas in improving people’s lives.

“Biotechnology has the potential to transform the lives of the people by impacting hugely on agriculture, animal husbandry, health, environmental protection, material transformation,” he says. “Take one example of health sector, specifically. Thanks to our increasingly deeper understanding of the intricate biochemical interactions at the cellular and molecular levels, there are new paradigms in health care. We have moved from preventive medicines (vaccines) and curative medicines (antibiotics) to predictive and corrective medicine, thanks to the unraveling mystery of the human genome.”

India has tremendous potential to play an important role in this exciting field if the government plays its cards right, he said.

“We need to understand that the only raw materials that were needed for software were ‘gray matter’ and the ‘bandwidth.’ In biotechnology sector, the government will have to play a crucial role. We have seen that the chain of ‘mind’ to ‘marketplace’ in biotechnology involves the government. Animal experimentation, customs clearances, regulatory approval delays and so on have been the major bottlenecks so far. If the government doesn’t create a hassle-free environment, biotechnology in India will not succeed, let even grow.

“But if we do so, then we have a huge chance. India’s rich, human, plant and animal genetic diversity, its rich resource of human capital in life sciences, its tremendous cost advantage and availability of large local markets in all diverse sectors, can be leveraged to make India a rightful leader. What is important is to see that hundreds of ‘bio-entrepreneurs’ emerge in this sector. Then India can really fly.”

- Deepak Goyal is a freelance writer. He lives in Kolkata.

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The acquisition is subject to approval from the relevant authorities.

Hutchison Essar already operates a GSM 1800 license in Chennai and the parties are in the process of making the necessary application to seek approval from the Department of Telecom. This will be the first intra-circle merger transaction since the announcement of the intra-circle merger guidelines.

Announcing the acquisition of Aircel, Ravi Ruia, vice-chairman, Essar Group said, “Our joint venture with Hutchison goes back over four years. We have found it a highly professional relationship and are delighted to extend it to a larger footprint.”

Dennis Lui, group managing director, Hutchison Telecom, said, “We have been in Indian telecom since 1994 and this step marks a continuation of our commitment to the Indian telecom market. We welcome the subscribers and employees of Aircel into the Hutchison Essar fold. We have grown from a single circle operation in Mumbai to now 14 license areas and look forward to playing a significant role in India’s telecom growth.”

Commenting on this acquisition, C Sivasankaran of Sterling Infotech Group said, “The acquisition of the mobility market leader in Tamil Nadu will provide significant impetus to Hutchison Essar to strive for leadership position in the Indian mobility space. Post-acquisition, the Sterling Infotech Group will continue with its focus on various wireless business initiatives including GSM businesses in north and east India with specific thrust on penetrating rural markets.”
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TCS, IBM Ties Grow

Tata Consultancy Services, a leading Indian information technology company, is expanding its relationship with IBM to cross-sell each other’s products and services, the company has announced.

Under this agreement, TCS will train its employees and create focused solutions using IBM hardware and middleware platforms. The two companies will market each other’s products and services in key vertical markets such as banking, financial services, insurance, telecommunications, retail and manufacturing.

This relationship, TCS said, will enhance its delivery capabilities in several areas, including portals, security and on-demand computing. IBM will gain opportunities to reach new markets and grow market share for its hardware and middleware technologies.

TCS is part of IBM’s ISV Advantage initiative, which enables TCS to migrate its products and solutions to IBM platforms.

“This expanded global agreement builds on two decades of collaboration with the world’s largest information technology company and will reinforce our business transformation strategy that helps companies determine how they can perform most efficiently and effectively,” said N. Chandrasekaran, executive vice-president of TCS.

“When two global leaders such as TCS and IBM combine forces, customers receive a powerful new base of human and technology resources that produces high quality results at lower cost and enables faster deployment,” he added.
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GAIL Gas Pipeline

Gas Authority of India Ltd has started work on a pipeline to connect the Narimanam zone and the Kuthalam zone in Tamil Nadu.

The 50-km pipeline will help meet the requirements of consumers in the Kuthalam area and result in an additional flow of natural gas into the Kuthalam gas pipeline, a GAIL statement in Chennai said June 23.

Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Mani Shankar Aiyar laid the foundation stone of the pipeline June 20, it said.

GAIL supplies gas to around 50 consumers in all the five zones of the Cauvery basin with a pipeline network of 190 km. The public sector company also has a network of more than 5,300 km of natural gas pipeline across the country.
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Boeing, ISRO Mull Satellite

Seattle-based aircraft giant Boeing and the Indian Space Research Organization are likely to jointly build a communication satellite for the global market, US and Indian officials said June 22 in Bangalore.

Addressing an Indo-U.S. Space meet, U.S. Under Secretary of Commerce Kenneth I. Juster said the U.S. government had recently approved a license authorizing Boeing satellite systems to engage in discussions and share data with ISRO on the division of responsibilities for possible joint cooperation in the development and marketing of communication satellites.

Asked by reporters about the proposal, ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair said the satellite would be similar to the two tonne class INSAT satellite.

“We are discussing with Boeing on whether we can incorporate some of their payloads and have joint marketing of the communication satellite,” he said.

The satellite would be for the global market, he said, adding that if the agreement comes through, it would hit the market in two years.
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Chennai Staff Doubled

Britain’s fourth largest business process outsourcing company, Astron BPO, June 21 said it would double its staff strength in Chennai to 700 people in the next 2-3 months.

Astron BPO, which opened a 50,000 sq ft office here that could house over 2,000 persons, has a total of 350 employees in Chennai. “We will increase the employees to 700 in two to three months,” said David Mitchell, CEO, Astron Group.

Addressing a news conference here, he said the company also plans to invest another $2 million in the Chennai facility in the next six months.

Already, Astron BPO, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Astron Group, has invested $5-6 million in the state-of-the-art Chennai facility, said Mark Underwood, managing director, Astron BPO.

In addition to its Chennai facility, Astron BPO has a BPO facility in Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram. “The Technopark facility also employs 350 staff,” said Underwood, adding that all major expansion in India would be made at the Chennai center.
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Moon Mission

The Indian Space Research Organization has selected the payload and begun the “metal cutting” process for the unmanned mission to the moon, which it plans to launch by 2008 using an indigenous rocket from the Satish Dhawan Space Center at Sriharikota.

“The initial designs are complete. We have selected the payload and the earth station design is also complete,” ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair said June 18.

He said the “metal cutting” process will put the country in the select club of space-faring nations that have mapped the moon surface and given more scientific insights about the earth’s satellite.

“The project is on schedule,” Nair said of the mission in which ISRO’s workhorse, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, will fire a lunar polar orbiter into space that will map the moon’s surface at an altitude of 100 km.

ISRO will also have a slot for a 10 kg scientific payload from an external agency in the lunar orbiter, for which about 25 proposals have been received, including from the U.S., Israel, Canada and France, besides from several Indian academic institutions.

Nair said ISRO has finalized a contract to launch a satellite into the low-earth orbit from a European country next year using the PSLV rocket.

He said INSAT-4A communications satellite will be launched later this year and INSAT-4B next year.
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Technology Delivery Stressed

While research in science and technology for rural development is essential, the delivery of technology is equally important, principal scientific adviser to government of India, Dr R. Chidambaram, said June 18.

He told reporters on the sidelines of an in-house methodology workshop on Development Technology Achievement Index at the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation here that there was a gap between research and delivery, which had to be closed.

The intermediate link, the development part, has been a weakness in the Indian science and technology, with some exceptions, and some of the initiatives taken by the office of the principal scientific adviser related to strengthening these linkages, he said.

“The PSA’s office is, therefore, taking up what it calls synergy projects,” which were essentially studies and pilot projects, which could “nucleate or catalyze” large multidisciplinary projects or help in networking “institutions whose work has a common objective but the efforts are fragmented,” he said.

Referring to the workshop, Chidambaram said hopefully the meeting would suggest some methods of measuring the impact of science and technology in Indian agriculture and rural areas.

Asked whether lopsidedness of application of technology would be discussed, Chidambaram said everything was demand driven, which was also true for technology.

Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, noted agricultural scientist, was also present.
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Ramco Systems Profits Up

Ramco Systems, the Chennai-based software company, June 17 said it has registered a net profit for the first time in the last quarter of fiscal 2003-04 at Rs. 42 million, compared to a loss of Rs. 33.4 million in the same quarter previous year.

However, in the 12-month period ended March 2004, the company’s losses stood at Rs. 332.6 million, compared to Rs. 273.2 million in the fiscal 2002-03.

Announcing this here, P.R. Venketrama Raja, vice-president and managing director of Ramco Systems, said the company’s unique solution assembly and delivery platform Ramco VirtualWorks has been successfully delivered and this will drive the company’s growth to new heights this fiscal year.

The company’s revenues from Ramco VirtualWorks have accounted for over 45 percent of its global software revenues, he informed.

Raja said the global operations of Ramco Systems, which included revenues from subsidiaries in the U.S., Switzerland, Singapore, Malaysia and South Africa, have achieved a break-even in the last quarter of 2004 fiscal.

The global revenues grew by 15 percent at $37.22 million, as against $32.32 million in the previous year, he added.
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Reliance Cuts Tariffs

Reliance Infocomm June 16 slashed the tariffs on its pre-paid phone service in Tamil Nadu and Chennai circles by 40 to 60 percent, aimed at increasing its pre-paid subscriber base by two million in a year’s time.

Under the new tariffs, local and intra-circle calls from Reliance India Mobile to other Reliance India phones have been reduced to 99 paise from Rs. 2.49 and to other GSM operators and landlines, the rates have come down to Rs. 1.79 from the existing Rs. 2.49-Rs. 2.99.

Announcing the new tariff plan Advantage 99, V.G. Somasekhar, business head, Tamil Nadu and Chennai, Reliance Infocomm, said the reduction in rates were across the board and it came without any conditions.

He said the national and inter-circle calls from RIM pre-paid phones to any other Reliance phones have also been reduced to Rs 1.79 from Rs. 2.99 and to other GSM operators and landline to Rs. 2.49 from Rs. 2.99-Rs. 3.99.

Reliance, which was the first CDMA technology-run telecom company, to introduce a pre-paid scheme in February this year, has a total subscriber base of 7.5 million across the country. The pre-paid subscriber base is 1.5 million.

In Tamil Nadu and Chennai circles, the pre-paid subscribers are about 100,000, Somasekhar said.

Compared to other telecom operators, the new rates on Reliance pre-paid were cheaper by 40 percent on STD calls and on calls to other operators, he added.
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IBM Linux Center

IBM June 15 unveiled its Linux Center of Competency in Bangalore, which, it said, will help its clients from industry, academia and government move to computing environments based on open standards.

“The center provides facilities and support and consulting services to test, develop and drive Linux application and solution development. It will also provide Linux product and solution certification.

“It will help clients take full advantage of the reliability, flexibility and total cost of ownership value that Linux provides,” IBM said in a statement.

The center will showcase integrated solutions using Linux and provide deep, specialized skills to IBM clients and business partners to help them leverage Linux-enabled solutions to solve real business challenges, it said.

The center will also be used for in-depth technology briefings and workshops, as well as product and solution demonstrations and Linux education and training.

“IBM has been committed to Linux for years and supports the `opening up’ of software and services,” said R. Dhamodaran, vice-president and country executive, IBM Software Group.

Other IBM Linux Centers of Competency are located in Austin (Texas-USA), Beijing (China), Boeblingen (Germany), Moscow (Russia) Sao Paolo (Brazil) and Tokyo (Japan), the statement said.
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Airbee Development Center

Airbee Wireless, a U.S.-based company, June 15 announced the launch of its development center here.

The company would initially invest one million dollars in the new center, which would utilize the talents of the knowledge industry here, the company’s CEO, Raj Sundaresan told a press conference in Chennai June 15.

Airbee provides innovating intelligent connectivity software for wireless communications, he said, and claimed that the company was the pioneer in the invention of intelligent software for wireless voice, data and video communication.

The company was the one which developed software licensed to manufacture microprocessors used in an increasing number of wireless communications applications, he added.
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Property Tax Online

The Madurai city corporation June 14 launched online collection of property tax and water charges at 16 centers.

Apart from property tax and water charges, people would also be able to receive birth and death certificates.

The corporation has tied up with 16 banks, where its database was available, for collecting charges, Mayor C. Ramachandran told reporters in Madurai after launching the online connection.

He said the government would bear 80 percent of the total computerization and development cost of Rs. 12 million.

Consumers could pay their dues with credit cards at http://www.maduraicorporation.com.

There is also a proposal for online collection of professional tax, vacant land tax, D and O trade license and PFA trade tax, he said. Details of defaulters would also be available, he said.
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Access to Research Journals

With an objective to have easy access to national and international research journals, Bharathidasan University is commissioning an Internet system called ER NET IN.

Vice-chancellor C. Thangamuthu, addressing a function at Jamal Mohammad College in Tiruchirapalli June 14, said it was allocated Rs. 2.5 million under a UGC scheme, out of which Rs. 1.2 million has already been spent for the installation of computer hardware and software.

With ER NET IN, faculty members and others can have easy access to prominent research journals and download the contents. The system will be commissioned within a week.

Sheikh Mohmmmad, principal of the college, released a research journal of the college and laid the foundation stone for a building block costing Rs. 10 million contributed by the former students of the college.
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- Sally Miller Wyatt is a freelance writer
who writes family-oriented auto reviews for newspapers, magazines and the Web.

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Guftugu

Girlfriend Problems

Pity poor Karan Razdan. The filmmaker had thought he’d come up with a nifty ploy: Make a film on lesbians, get kudos from the arty crowd for his “courageous attempt;” make a lot of moolah for showing lots of titillating skin for the frontbencher janta who don’t care about anything as long as they get to see babes in various states of undress, and he’d be laughing all the way to the bank.

Well, the plan has backfired. First, Shiv Sena activists have raised a stink about his Girlfriend, ransacking cinemas in Bhopal, Indore, Nagpur and Bhubaneswar, charging the film of insulting Indian culture, whatever that means.

Now it just got worse with gay activists joining in the chorus. “Not only is it a cheap and titillation-oriented film masquerading as one that’s liberal, but it portrays the minority community in a negative light,” said Chatura, and activist with the Organized Lesbian Alliance for Visibility and Action. Ouch!

Gay activist Ashok Row Kavi says: “We have a major problem with director Karan Razdan for demonizing lesbians. The film takes our sexual identities and makes a joke of them.”

The only people who seem to be happy are the frontbenchers, who appear to be watching the film in droves to see what the fuss is all about. Now, if that’s the case, maybe Razdan isn’t exactly ready to burst into tears, is he?
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Reeling from Reality

Reality, it appears, works a whole lot better in film for some people than it does in, well, real life. We’re talking here of intrepid filmmaker Prakash Jha, who made the gritty saga of crime-infested politics in Bihar, Gangaajal, and then decided to do something about it—i.e. actually go back to his home state and actually run for Parliament.

The lamentable results of this heroic endeavor are well known to all. Poor Jha got beaten so badly that he forfeited his deposit, and kept making plaintive noises about rigging and booth capturing.

Well, all is not lost, it would seem. Even if his attempt to represent the good folks of Bihar hasn’t made much headway, he has gathered enough material and experience to spin another gritty drama—and appropriately enough, the film will be called Apaharan,

Hindi for “kidnapping.”

Hey, we are talking about Bihar here, folks, so what do you expect, a satsang?

“I am looking at the industry of kidnapping in Apaharan,” Jha says. “I have incorporated several real-life incidents in the film.”

To be shot in Mumbai, Pune and Satara, Apaharan is scheduled for release in January 2005.
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Single and Not Looking, Dammit!

She’s pretty and she’s single, so of course she is fair game for Bollywood’s gossipmongers. And on top of it all, Preity Zinta is currently ruling the box office, though she is coy about telling you that herself.

All of this means gossipmongers are having a field day. And the yellow press has been so busy speculating Zinta’s relationships that they are on the verge of pretty much exhausting all young males.

Which makes Preity maha gussa. “”I’m tired of telling people that I am single and happy. And I’m even more tired of hearing about my rollicking affairs with every man under the sun,” she recently said with a sigh. She declares: “The day there is a man in my life, I’ll tell the public.”

But what to do about all those salacious stories about her? Preity doesn’ believe in taking the culprits to court, because it takes too long.

She has a startlingly simple plan: Next time anybody asks her about her “affair,” she is going to slap the writer.

“At least they’ll stop saying irresponsible things. More importantly, I’ll have the satisfaction of having dealt with the situation.” So gossipmongers, beware!
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No Mayhem Please, We’re NRI

Govind Nihalini is better known as an arthouse filmmaker who has made films like Ardh Satya and Hazar Chaurasi Ki Maa. He is gradually edging towards commercial cinema, and his latest Dev is an example. A sort of sequel to Ardh Satya, it’s a hard, realistic tale of the lives of cops in India, but it does make some concessions to Bollywood masala fare.

So how’s it doing? Not too bad in India itself, but in NRIland, the film appears to have sunk like a stone.

In the U.S., Dev collected $84,728 on 35 screens (Rs. 3.83 million) in its opening weekend. The per screen average is a paltry $2,420.

In U.K., the film didn’t impress much either. The film collected £40,509 on 25 screens (Rs. 3.36 million) in its opening weekend. The per screen average is £1,620. The collections as well as per screen average are lower than that of Hum Tum, which is running in its third week.

Hum Tum, starring Saif Ali Khan, meanwhile, continues its victorious march in both in the U.S. where it has collected $97,312 on 35 screens in its third weekend and in the U.K. where it has collected £62,170 on 27 screens. All told, the film has netted a tidy total of $686,007 (Rs. 31 million) in the U.S. and £446,177 (Rs. 37 million) in the U.K.
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Romancing Aish

After bad boy Salman Khan’s departure from her life, young studmuffin Vivek Oberoi seems to have lighted up beauty queen Aishwarya Rai’s life. And the man isn’t just good looking, he’s quite a romantic too.

Not only has he recently bought a painting of his beloved Aish for Rs. 50,000 at a charity auction, he lavished 30 gifts on her 30th birthday—one for each year.

He’s just an incurable romantic, he says. “I like the idea of getting drenched in the rains in an auto-rickshaw with your partner. The moment has to be just right — for example, as you leave the college in the evening. It’s getting a little cold and raindrops are spattering you from time to time in the open vehicle. Now imagine yourself snuggling close to someone you are fond of. Can there be anything more romantic than that?”

Probably not. So maybe he will add an extra dollop of passion in the forthcoming Monsoons? The film, as its name suggests, has a steamy, rain-drenched love scene, and Vivek, romancing in the rain, should be quite a sight.
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Big B, the Badshah

Just how does he do it, you may wonder. In his youth, he revolutionized Hindi cinema with his fire-breathing dialogues written by Salim-Javed. Now, at the ripe age of 61 when others look for a serene retirement, Amitabh Bachchan says he has no time “to tire or retire.”

Just how successful he is apparent by the fact that he is in both recent releases, Lakshya and Dev. And that’s not all. He has a whopping 15 to 20 films waiting to be released in the next couple of years.

Big B’s new lease of life, it is generally agreed, came with hosting the game show Kaun Banega Crorepati. His sheer class in dealing with contestants made the show a TV cult classic.

Recently at a pre-release press meeting campaign of his forthcoming movie Deewaar, Lets Bring our Heroes Home the Big B was his genial, philosophical self: “Work has now become a necessity. Sometime ago, I was breaking my back to find work and trying to revive my company, AB Corporation, and for the family. Now, despite the situation not being too different, I am fortunate to be getting work.”
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Hrithik and Hollywood

Right after his recent release Lakshya, matinee idol Hrithik Roshan is already eyeing Hollywood. He is ready to sign in for the lead role in London-based Shekhar Kapur’s international project Paani.

As of now, he has not signed any films and is considering various offers. A little bird tells us Shekhar Kapur had a four-hour meeting with him in Mumbai. The two discussed the script in detail, we are informed.

The project brings together Hollywood and Bollywood as The Lord of the Rings producer Barrie Osborne and Elizabeth director Kapur have announced that they will make two films in India together. Osborne and Kapur reportedly plan to start their first collaboration by the end of the year.
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Filmmaker in Trouble

Filmmaker Kaizad Gustad is in deep doo-doo. To begin with, his assistant director Nadia Khan died on the sets while shooting for his new film Mumbai Central. Mumbai police have arrested him, accusing him of culpable homicide.

Now it turns out that Mumbai police aren’t the only law enforcement authorities looking for him. Apparently his name appears in the wanted list on the Police National Compute in England. “The investigation remains open and inquiries continue to trace the suspect,” a police spokesman was quoted as saying in The Times.

British police want to question him for allegedly threatening a former London friend and harassing his family with a baseball bat, according to The Times.

Police in Britain want to speak to Gustad in connection with the reported harassment of author William Rhode, 32, who published his first novel “Paperback Raita” last year.

Gustad is said to have demanded money and threatened Rhode’s family in a park in Kensington. Rhodes admitted that he knew Gustad seven years earlier in India and had drawn on his experiences in Mumbai for the book.

Gustad thought that the anti-hero in the book, who smuggled drugs to fund his film projects, was based on him, and filed a libel case and won compensation from Rhode’s publishers six months ago. During the case he admitted to e-mailing a message detailing his libel complaint. “If I don’t succeed legally, you can be assured I will, every other way, until such time as I clear my name.”

“I know where you live. I know your number on both sides of the Atlantic. I know where your wife works.... Right is on my side and I will nail you for the scum you’ve revealed yourself to be. I will not let it rest, and I assure you, you will have to spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder.”

That’s pretty heavy stuff. Gustad has few friends in Bollywood, where people have been put off by his cocky arrogance. As for critics, the less said, the better. His wildly misnamed Boom, was in fact a spectacular bust.
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Farhan Akhtar, on the other hand, was different. His Dil Chahta Hai had a refreshing take—from filmmaking to storyline, it had a fresh approach and displayed a consummate skill and understanding of the medium—and surprise! It did quite will in the box office, and not just at the multiplexes, either.

So when Farhan decided to make another film, of course audience—the discerning audience, at any rate—were waiting expectantly with the fervent hope that this wasn’t just a one-film wonder. Add to that the return of Javed Akhtar, who with Salim years ago had wrought a makeover of Hindi cinema with their sharp angry-young-man dialogues that catapulted Amitabh Bachchan to fame, and the expectations ran pretty darn high.

The result is Lakshya—and the news is both good and bad. The good news is that Farhan Akhtar is not a one-film wonder; even with its flaws, the film has got class and depth. The bad news is Farhan has sacrificed artistic judgment to filial piety. Was this father-son joint effort supposed to be a son’s loving tribute? Farhan hasn’t told us, but the result doesn’t work, even if Javed’s script at times does have good, powerful dialogues.

The reason is simple: Farhan and Javed belong to very different genres—schools, if you will—of Hindi filmmaking. While it’s true Javed is good at what he does, he comes from an old school of traditional masala filmmaking that undercuts Farhan’s strongest suit—his freshness, his out-of-the-box approach that could yet create a viable crossover niche in Bollywood. So next time, dear Farhan, keep Papa out. If you want to go all mushy over him, take him out to dinner. In films, your joint efforts are apt to work at cross purposes.

Having said that, in story, concept and plot, Lakshya shows a kind of class and good taste that bodes well for Bollywood. The premise of the film is a noble one, and also a quite plausible one. It’s about a dissolute, affluent youth and his apathy towards the army, and how he gets changed as he joins the army and experiences combat firsthand.

Here’s how the story goes: Karan (Hrithik Roshan) is a happy-go-lucky, laidback youth without a care in the world. His sunny nature is unburdened by any thought of what to make of his life, buy his girlfriend Romi (Preity Zinta) is different. Modeled along war reporter Barkha Dutt, Romi is modern, emancipated, focused and very successful.

So what brings the big change in Karan’s lifestyle? A tongue-lashing from Romi, believe it or not. Alas, the world of romance is strewn with brokenhearted and frustrated girlfriends/ fiancées/wives who will tell you this is simply absurd; much of real-life relationships of women trying to reform men and men doing their damnedest to resist.

But let it pass. Karan joins the army, and is determined to make something of his life.

However, boot camp is something that his pampered lifestyle hasn’t prepared him; he soon finds he cannot handle it and returns home. Romi is appalled, and the two break up.

This being a Bollywood film, of course they meet again, in Ladakh, plumb in the middle of a war zone, where Romi is a reporter and Karan—you guessed it—is an ace army officer.

Here’s where the film’s second flaw lies. The film’s lakshya, which till now seemed to be a nuanced exploration of feckless, affluent youth, seems to shift, and we seem to be in the middle of a war movie. Not that it’s badly done. The production values are actually quite impressive, and the sequences, particularly one where Karan and his associates scale a sheer mountain to surprise Pakistani troops is quite compelling. But the thrust of the story seems to change.

The obligatory climactic scene with Karan hoisting the tricolor at the summit will perhaps muster deafening applause, but a thinking viewer will doubtless wonder: was this, then the filmmaker’s lakshya?

Somehow this is hard to believe. If indeed Farhan had set out to make a war movie, then a lot of the earlier developments are overly long and almost extraneous. On the other hand, if his goal was to essay a nuanced character study, then the war sections are intrusive and distracting.

The result is a confused film which should have at least 30 minutes excised from it. This is a real pity, because, even when its flaws, the film bears the unmistakable imprint of a filmmaker who knows his stuff, and has something that’s rarer than hen’s teeth in Bollywood: a mature, refined sensibility that firmly eschews melodrama, histrionics and the cheap hijinks that B grade Bollywood moviemakers love so much.

The music is forgettable, and the acting is not bad, but Hrithik is simply competent, which isn’t good enough for him, given his talent. Big B is unfortunately wasted, as is Om Puri. The cinematography and overall production values are quite good.

Despite its flaws, Lakshya is still worth watching, because flawed or not, Farhan has got class, and so does his film. Too bad his lakshya isn’t so good.

Be warned, Farhan. Next time you won’t get off so easily. Bollywood needs good work from you.

Rating: *** (Good)

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The film revolves around three men with varied backgrounds, aspirations and attitudes: Inba, the hired assassin; Michael, his intended victim, and Sidharth, the innocent by-stander caught in the cross-fire between the two. A horrific shoot-out at the beginning of the film results in their lives going in total disarray, changing their destinies.

So what’s new about the script, characters and narration? As far as the three male protagonists go, we’ve seen them all in many earlier films. The heroic-rowdy who’s the hired henchman of the local politician; the fiery student leader who’s the bete noire of the same politician; and the youth-in-love, caught in a dilemma to go abroad or stay back for his love. The episodes hold nothing new for the viewer.

If you are looking for a different narrative style, well, don’t expect to be surprised. The three episodes are inter-linked, rather neatly, but the multiple-narrative and cuts-to-the-past for each protagonist is a style which seems to be quite popular these days. We’ve seen it in Virumandi, and Nagesh Kukunoor’s Theen Deewarein, among other films. All again off-shoots of the Kurasowa-Rashomon multiple-narrative style.

Again, as it happened in the director’s earlier films like Bombay, where he deals with serious issues, the clarity and a definite stand is missing here too. For example, student politics and the cleansing up of the system is dealt with rather naively, the scenes predictable and clichéd, leaving many questions unanswered.

That said, it looks like only Mani Ratam can get Madhavan to give a decent performance (Run was an exception). As Inba, the actor has got his body language and looks right. Surya, as Michael, is a clear winner with his steely eyes and cool, confident demeanor. His meaningful smiles when Selvanayagam taunts him is bears mention. Poor Sidharth is yet again short-changed here.

Bharatiraja in the role of the unscrupulous politician Selvanayagam is a total miscast, standing out like a sore thumb.

With the male protagonists taking over the story, the women do not seem to matter much here. Trisha looks like she’s come straight out of bed, with her dull eyes, unkempt look. Meera Jasmine, with her mercurial expressions, looks a bit naïve about camera angles while Esha is disappointing in her Tamil debut, with zilch screen presence.

The lengthy climax scene on the bridge is well-shot. Ravi K. Chandran’s camera catches effectively stunt choreographer Vikram Dharma’s splendidly choreographed chase scene, with Sreekar Prasad’s fast cutting adding to the impact. But A.R. Rahman’s music is disappointing.

The film ends on an abrupt note, one not sure whether to get up and leave or not, in case something more turns up on the screen!

One wouldn’t mind such a film from any other director. But from Mani Ratnam, one surely expects much more. Something definitely more distinct and original by way of scripting and narrative style, not a film with an already-seen feel.

— Malini Mannath

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Spicy Potato Dish:
Bengali Aloo Dum - By Paramita Roy

Paramita Roy shows you how to cook a Bengali favorite dish.



Ingredients:

12 potatoes (small, round shape)

1 big red onion

1 tbsp freshly made ginger paste

2-3 big garlic cloves, made into paste

1 small tomato, diced

4/5 green chilies

½ tsp jeera seeds

2 bay leaves

1 tbsp whole garam masala (elaichi, cardamom, cinnamon)

1 tsp tamarind paste

1 tbsp jeera powder

1 tsp coriander powder

½ tsp fresh garam masala powder

1 tbsp ghee

1 tsp turmeric powder

1 tbsp coriander leaves (chopped)

Salt to taste (11/2 tsp)

Sugar to taste (1 tsp)

Method:

1. Boil the whole potatoes in the pressure cooker. When half-done remove them from the cooker, let them cool. Then peel them.
   
2. Heat the oil in a wok and fry the potatoes. Sprinkle some salt and turmeric powder. When the potatoes are golden brown, put them aside.
   
3. Chop half of the onion into longitudinal strips and make a paste of the rest of the onion.
   
4. Heat more oil in the wok. Put bay leaves, jeera seeds, green chillies, whole garam masala. Add chopped onions into wok and fry.
   
5. When the color of the onion is golden brown, put ginger paste, garlic paste and onion paste. Fry them for 2 minutes. Put the diced tomato in the wok and fry. Add salt, turmeric powder, jeera powder, and dhania powder and fry for a few minutes. Add fried potatoes and mix well. Add sugar and garam masala powder.
   
6. Pour 1 cup of water. Add tamarind paste. Let everything cook for five-eight minutes.
   
7. Spread some ghee before removing it from the wok.
   
8. Garnish with chopped coriander and serve with hot, fluffy pooris.
   

– Paramita Roy is a homemaker. She lives in Pleasanton, Calif.

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