The official trailer of one of the most anticipated 2016 releases, “Mirzya,” has been unleashed on social media June 23. Adapted from the tragic mythical love story from Punjab “Mirza-Sahiban” and scripted by Gulzar, the film is close to director Rakeysh Om Prakash Mehra’s heart. A definite visual delight, the move opens with a beautiful expanse of mountains and valleys of Ladakh, leading to glorious desserts of Rajasthan. The colors and cinematography are flawlessly done by Pawel Dyllus.
Starring fresh-faced newcomers Harshvardhan Kapoor and Saiyami Kher with a new villain in town — model-turned-actor Anuj Choudhary — in the main roles, the story is a clear case of reincarnation and lovers that transcend time and spaces.
The proud family of Kapoors posted on their social media pages the link to the trailer. Starting with papa Anil Kapoor to sister Sonam Kapoor, everyone seems extremely excited and pleased with the end result. Watch the NEW full theatrical trailer here:
Comic book legend Stan Lee, whose creations include ‘X-Men’ the ‘Incredible Hulk’ and ‘Iron Man’ among others is now planning to release his first Indian superhero-based film ‘Chakra the Invincible’ set in Mumbai and directed by Vikramaditya Motwane.
Graphic India, a character entertainment company, and Lee’s POW! Entertainment today announced a partnership with Phantom Films, to begin pre-production on the live-action theatrical film for ‘Chakra The Invincible.’ Chakra has been created by Lee along with Graphic Co-Founder and CEO, Sharad Devarajan.
“I’m a fan of Bollywood films and am really excited about launching ‘Chakra the Invincible’ as my first Bollywood superhero movie,” Lee, Chief Creative Officer at POW! Entertainment said in a statement.
Lee helped spawn some of the world’s most popular comic book heroes — The Amazing Spider—Man, The Fantastic Four, The X-Men, Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, and many more, which now dominate the film industry. The upcoming Hollywood flick ‘X-Men: Age of Apocalypse’ is based on another of Lee’s creations.
“Vikramaditya is an amazingly talented filmmaker who I have no doubt can make the Chakra film a massive hit in India and around the world. I only hope he remembers to include my cameo!,” Lee said. Unlike the animated kids property, the film version of ’Chakra’ is set to feature an older version of the character in his twenties, set against the spectacular backdrop of Mumbai.
Motwane who has directed ‘Lootera’ and ‘Udaan’ said it was an “honor and an absolute delight to be making a film based on a Stan Lee character. We’re very excited and we hope to take comic book filmmaking to the next level with Chakra. And no, we won’t forget Stan’s cameo…” he said.
“Stan Lee’s characters have generated $15 billion at the global box office, creating some of the most beloved icons in entertainment. More people likely know the face of Spider-Man than they do the Mona Lisa,” said Graphic’s CEO Devarajan.
’Chakra The Invincible’ was originally launched as a children’s animated film on Cartoon Network India two years ago, with three new animated TV movies currently in production to be released on Cartoon Network and Toonami later this year.
“In the same way the West has created superheroes or Japan created anime, India has the potential to become one of the biggest creative exporters in the years ahead and bring a new creative voice to the global stage,” stated Devarajan. “After all, it wasn’t just Japanese kids who made Pokemon a success, it was every kid.”
Devarajan is also the co-founder of Liquid Comics, a digital entertainment company that creates content for publishing, theatrical films, animation and games. He was previously CEO of Virgin Comics, which he co-founded with Sir Richard Branson, author Deepak Chopra, Gotham Chopra and filmmaker Shekhar Kapur, and was the co-creator of the acclaimed “Spider-Man: India” comic series from Marvel. He holds a BFA from Syracuse University and an MBA from Columbia University.
The media entrepreneur, also an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School, is an executive producer/producer on a number of theatrical live-action films and television projects, including the film adaptation of “The Leaves” with Lionsgate/Summit; “Ramayan 3392AD” with Mandalay Entertainment; “Dominion: Dinosaurs Versus Aliens,” with filmmaker Barry Sonnenfeld; and “Sadhu: Warrior,” for which he also co-wrote the screenplay and is in development with producer Mark Canton (“300” films, “Immortals”).
Devarajan explained that just like the western superhero, which was really redefined in the 60s by Lee and his creative partners, and drew inspiration from the existing socio-political scenarios, Graphic India “wants to allow creators to tap into today’s culture, contemporary issues, hopes, dreams and fears” to serve as the source of inspiration for their characters and stories. Devarajan said Chakra speaks to the story of this generation – the story of globalization — and that’s what makes Chakra “so special” to him.
Priyanka Chopra has been nominated for a Teen Choice Award for her role in the show. The 33-year-old actress bagged the final nomination in the Choice TV Breakout Star category. Chopra has been garnering praise for her portrayal of FBI trainee Alex Parrish in “Quantico” ever since the American TV series came out in September last year.
Chopra, who came into the limelight in the West playing the lead role in the popular American TV series “Quantico,” has also graced one of the six cover pages of the magazine. On Chopra, who was awarded the Padma Shri this year, actor Dwayne Johnson said she is a “star rising higher” and lauded her “drive, ambition, self-respect, and she knows there s no substitute for hard work.” Priyanka Chopra has been featured in TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World list this year.
The Bajirao Mastani actress has made it to the final nomination in the category ‘Choice TV Breakout Star.’ Chopra recently won the Favourite Actress title in a New TV series award forQuantico at the People’s Choice Awards 2016.
The star-studded affair, which celebrates the year’s achievements in the field of music, film, television, sports, fashion, comedy and video games, will be held on July 31 in Los Angeles.
Chicago IL: Mujeeb Ahmed from Masti Entertainment, Babu Varma, Waseem Tahir, and Arya Sounds presented Comedy Show of the Year by the versatile comedian, internationally renowned award winner and actor Johnny Lever on June 4 at Copernicus Theater, Chicago, IL. The high profile event was attended by hundreds of fans from different walks of life.
Self-taught Johnny Lever began his career back in 1984. He developed a passion for mimicry and stand-up comedy, inspired by watching comedians like the unforgettable legendary icon Johnny Walker, the remarkable Kishore Kumar and the well-known Mehmood saab in films and through mimicry artists like, Dinesh Hingoo and Nerella Venumadhav on stage, it was from here he decided to become a Mimicry Artist.
His success and talent grew gradually Johnny was then offered films instantly. Starring in more than 400 Bollywood movies with let’s say, every star under the horizon ever since! His fans took to him instantly on screen which led him to achieve success upon success, resulting in many nominations for famed Filmfare Awards in The Best Comedian Category bringing it home the price twice.
Babu Varma, Comedian Gurav Sharma, Mujeeb Ahmed, Waseem Tahir, Award Winner Actor & Comedian Johnny Lever, Actor & Director Jamie Lever and DJ Deven
His “Michael Jackson” act was the not-to-be-missed quotient of the show. His act was not limited to mere mimicry, but was a wholesome package” of entertainment. He sang and danced.. Enacted real-life situations. Mocked anything and everything under the sun. And most importantly, his wholesome presentation in the hall made fans laugh their hearts out.
The Johnny Lever’s mesmerizing performances and heart touching philosophy has always left his audience in a trance. His acumen has always excelled awarding him today’s numero uno hot spot. His talent and performance was duplicated in his daughter Jamie Lever who also performed on the stage with him, rewarding the audience with double dose of the entertainment and pleasure.
The entertainment was augmented by performer Gurav Sharma who helped transition between these two colossal father and daughter personality. Sharma is an Indian Television Actor, born in Chandigarh, India who has worked in many daily soaps. He has played some challenging roles in serials like Phulwa, Mahima Shanidev Ki, Naadaaniyaan – Teen Nadaanon Ki Kahaani and Sasural Simar Ka. He was last seen in Life OK’s popular series Dream Girl and Star Plus’ show Diya Aur Baati Hum.
The crowd enjoyed hearty laugh to the wittiest jokes to end the day. The evening performance by trio proved what Charles Dickens had said that “There is nothing in the world as irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor.”
AAPI Convention has come to be recognized for its ways of catering to the varied needs of the delegates from across the nation. A ways of networking and strengthening bond, AAPI convention offers events, programs and services, always striving to provide the best in the world to the partiucipants.
While AAPI convention is packed with Seminars, CMEs, CEO Forum, gala, cultural events, scintilating Bollywood and Hollywood shows, one thing has come to be popular among the delegates is the live Fashion Shows. Participants at the 34th annual convention in New York City this year will not be disappointed.
This year’s Fashion Show is being led by Rohini Bedi. The much sought after South Asian designer Rohini Bedi brings to you her exclusive collection 2016 for APPI in her presentation for AAPI delgates, “The Colors Of India,” announced Dr. Seema Jain, President of AAPI. “Rohini’s collection infuses the vibrant colors of the East and the jaw dropping designs that rock the runways in the West,” she added.
According to Dr. Hetal Gor, an organbizer of the event at the Convention, “The Fashion Show will start with beautiful dancers, dancing to Caribean, Brazil, Hawaian dances provided by Bergen pac and music, while the screen will be projecting beautiful natural settings. These will be followed by models walking in Resort Wear.” In addition, there will be Fusion/Jazz/ Tap dancing to get everyone excited for the day wear/office wear which stunning models will show case. A sensational Kathak Dance with Pakiza set and Taj Mahal on the screen will be followed by Party and Wedding Wear. The grand finale will have breathtaking performances by Sonali Bhendre.
The exclusive Indian fashion designer Rohini Bedi has been custom designing and selling her label throughout various boutiques in India and worldwide. She has recently opened her flagship studio “Fashion by Rohini” next to Bhindi Jewelers in Cerritos bringing her exclusive showcase to the South Asian bride right here in So Cal. Rohini has the innate talent to bring any brides dream to life, so for those brides to be that want an exclusive one of a kind piece tailored to their vision…let Rohini bring that special touch to the most memorable day of your life.
AAPI’s 34th annual convention will be held at the Marriott Marquis, Time Square in New York from June 30-July 4, 2016. Expected to have a record attendance of more than 2,000 delegates including Physicians, Academicians, Researchers and Medical students, “the annual convention offers extensive academic presentations, recognition of achievements and achievers, and professional networking at the alumni and evening social events,” she added. For more details, and sponsorship opportunities, please visit: www.aapiconvention.org and www.aapiusa.org
Joy TV Network, the first Indian-owned broadcasting station in the Southeastern United States, announces its operation in Atlanta. This broadcast, anchored at Channel # 21, is a FREE TV network available to all residents in the coverage area. Apart from the HD television channels, Joy TV will also be airing a number of 24×7 radio channels in various Asian languages. There will be a free app available for download, which will enable live/recorded telecast of the programs.
Apart from English and Spanish channels, Joy TV will have multiple channels in various Asian languages, including Hindi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Korean, Chinese, and Vietnamese. Unlike other Asian Channels, which are available only by live-streaming through internet, these channels will be available free-on-air.
Joy Television Network has a state-of-the-art recording studio and equipment. The programs are slated to go live in March 2016. It will have facilities for recording local/national news, cultural events, health, sports, test kitchen, spotlight on young entrepreneurs, and educational/informational programs. Major local news and events will be broadcast live, while other events from around the US will also share prime airtime.
Initially the programs of Joy TV are scheduled to cover nearly 5 million viewers while efforts are on to broadcast through cable carriers to telecast these programs to a wider audience. Joy TV is open to partnering with producers to develop programs for open/targeted audiences. It is also possible for interested parties to lease air-time from Joy TV’s channels. Joy TV welcomes inquiries from media corporations and public relations organizations about leasing an entire TV channel to broadcast their own programs.
Mr. P. I. Joy, the Chairman of Joy TV Network, said “There is a huge market out there that is waiting to tap into the demand for Asian and Hispanic culture and programs. Also, we cannot express ourselves effectively as a community, unless we are represented by a strong media. I am certain our US Pan Asian American community’s voice will now be heard, even in the capital and overseas.”
For more information about leasing on the TV and Radio broadcasting on Joy TV Network, please contact
(New York, NY – June 9, 2016) After numerous sold-out screenings at mainstream and South Asian film festivals around the world and multiple audience and jury awards under its belt, Parched, writer, director, producer Leena Yadav’s dramatic tale of four ordinary women courageously standing up to the repression and misogyny in their parched Gujarat village, will have its U.S. theatrical release, via Wolfe Releasing, in New York, Los Angeles, San Jose and Fremont on Friday, June 17, 2016, for a one-week run.
“This story is my reaction to a misogynistic society that treats women as objects of sex, where their greatest role is to serve men,” said Yadav about her impetus for making the film. “Giving my women characters a voice that observes, absorbs and reacts was what drove me to write this drama about ordinary women who are driven to extraordinary ends.”
Produced by renowned Indian actor, director and producer Ajay Devgn and shot by Academy Award-winning cinematographer Russell Carpenter (Titanic), the film had its world premiere at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival. TIFF’s Artistic Director Cameron Bailey raved: “With a bold visual confidence, Yadav combines the stark realism of hostile desert landscapes with a Bollywood palette, vibrant tones that celebrate the unleashing of the women’s repressed sensuality and dreams…transforming her characters’ struggles into a stirring portrayal of liberation.”
After TIFF, the film continued its global cinematic journey through the Stockholm Film Festival, Palm Springs International Film Festival, Camerimage in Poland, Miami International Film Festival, Santa Barbara International Film Festival, Cleveland International Film Festival, Beijing International Film Festival, Festival International de Films de Fribourg, Festival 2 Valenciennes, Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles, New York Indian Film Festival and Festival Cinema 5 Continents. In the pipeline after its U.S. theatrical release, Parchedtravels to the Edinburgh International Film Festival, London Indian Film Festival, Indian Film Festival of Melbourne and Film Victoria Australia.
Starring Tannishtha Chatterjee, Radhika Apte, Surveen Chawla, Lehar Khan and Adil Hussain, Parched has received rave reviews by The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Variety, Indiewire and The Hollywood Reporter, just to name a few. The film’s top honors include the Stockholm Impact Award for “Headstrong Filmmakers,” Best of the Fest at Palm Springs International Film Festival, Best Feature Film (Audience Award) at Festival 2 Valenciennes and Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles and Best Film (Young Jury) at the Festival Cinema 5 Continents.
Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra, who is throwing surprises one after another in her international journey, has now featured in a video with the likes of Jennifer Lopez and Cristiano Ronaldo. What’s more, the song is by Enrique Iglesias.
The song, titled ‘Don’t you need somebody’, has been primarily sung by ‘Hero’ singer Iglesias, with bits of it crooned by R City, Serayah and Shaggy.
Priyanka, a former Miss World title holder, is pleasantly not in a a blink-and-you-miss appearance. Instead, she features in a number of frames as she is seen grooving to and lip-syncing to the number.
The video also features international celebrities like Akon, Mila Jovovich, Ryan Seacrest, Mesut Özil, Lopez and Ronaldo among others. Released on YouTube on Friday, last week, the video has Priyanka in a hair up-do and a beige-hued jumpsuit. Her wine-coloured lipstick stands out.
Priyanka’s journey on foreign shores first began when she released her English single ‘In my city’. She launched two more tracks before landing a lead role in American TV show Quantico, and now she has even shot for the Baywatch movie with Dwayne Johnson.
Now back in India to fulfill her professional commitments, the actress launched her maiden production, “Bam Bam Bol Raha Hai Kashi,” on June 10. This busy-bee actress summed up her life with the below photo, captioned: “Always in transit.. Lost in motion.. #nomadheart #noreasontostop #nobodyclock #keepexploring.”
Chicago IL: Acharya Performing Arts Academy and Nupura Geetha staged an exciting and original dance drama performance on Sunday, May 15th at the Schaumburg Prairie Center of Arts. The feature performance titled “Rama-Eshwara” depicted the saga of rise and fall of Ravana in dance form. The founder of the academy, Vidushi Asha Acharya Adiga, choreographed and directed the play while also playing the role of the chief character Ravana. She beautifully depicted the complex emotions of the character through skillful display of Bharatnatyam dance which was feast to the eyes of the audience.
The program was kicked off by the music students of the Academy singing Ganesh Vandana song. It was followed by a splendid Kathak performance by Guru Prasanna Kasthuri of Soorya Performing Arts, St. Louis. The audience was then regaled by a unique Yakshagana dance performance by Dr. Rajendra Kedlaya and his team from Yakshahejje School of Yakshagana and Performing Arts, Indianapolis.
The dance drama feature performance began with Lord Shiva narrating the story of his greatest devotee, Ravana. Ravana, who is the son of Sage Vaishrava and the demon princess Kaikeshi was a great scholar, capable ruler and adept in Vedas. But, in his desire to defeat Devas, he fell prey to bad qualities such as lust, greed, pride, and envy and made the world suffer. To save the world, Lord Vishnu and Goddess Lakshmi took avathara as Rama and Sita. These events were brought to life through creative choreography performed by the dance students of the academy.
Additional events from Ramayana story were performed culminating in the final war where Rama kills Ravana. The creative choreography was ably supported by the splendid choice of costumes and props such as Pushpaka Vimana. The entire dance drama was accompanied by a live music performance. Madhu Chandrasekaran and Seema Kasturi were the singers supported by Srinivas Magaraja Rao on Mridangam, Neela Amaravadi on Veena, Prashanth Kallur on Flute and Muralidhar Kaje on Chande.
More than 300 strong audience gave a standing ovation at the end of the brilliant performance. Academy’s artistic director Vidushi Asha reaffirmed her commitment to continue to spread the rich culture of India through classical dance and music.
Nupura- Geetha, Inc. is a nonprofit organization for Art & Culture. It was newly established to realize a creative vision of presenting performing arts of India though performances and productions, share and spread the Indian culture.
New York, NY: Shankar Mahadevan, Sunidhi Chauhan, Aditya Narayan and Indian Idol Juniors, are all set to take the AAPI delegates by storm during the 34th annual convention organized by the American Association of Physicians of Indian origin (AAPI) at the Marriott Marquis, Time Square in New York from June 30-July 4, 2016.
“Each of the three mega stars will lead a group of talented artists and stars from Bollywood and from the United States,” said Dr. Ratan Mirchandani, Chair of the Entertainment Committee for AAPI Convention. “With 12 leading stars to entertain in one weekend during AAPI convention in the Big Apple, this mega event will truly be historic,” he added.
“In addition to live entertainment by famous Bollywood stars, the 2016 AAPI Annual Convention & Scientific Assembly offers an exciting venue to interact with leading physicians, health professionals, academicians, and scientists of Indian origin,” said Dr. Seema Jain, President of AAPI. “Physicians and healthcare professionals from across the country will convene and participate in the scholarly exchange of medical advances, to develop health policy agendas, and to encourage legislative priorities in the coming year.”
The annual convention this year is being organized by AAPI’s New Jersey Chapter. Elaborating on the efforts and preparations that have been devoted to put together this unique event, Dr. Rita Ahuja, Chairwoman of the 2016 Annual Convention, says, “We are expecting to have a record attendance of more than 2,000 delegates including Physicians, Academicians, Researchers and Medical students at the convention,” she adds.
Shankar Mahadevan will be accompanied by his son Sidharth Mahadevan, along with Antra Mitra and Sukriti Kakkar, who are well known in the Music industry as the “Young Generation Artists.” They will perform live at the much anticipated AAPI’s annual convention. An accomplished musician in Tamil cinema, Shankar is a part of the Shankar Ehsaan Loy trio team that provides music to Bollywood films. Though a software engineer by profession and having worked with Oracle Corporation, Shankar’s interest in music made him venture into the field of music. He got his first award as a playback singer in Chennai film music, collaborating with A. R. Rahman and winning a National Film Award for his song in Kandukondain Kandukondain. Since then, he has given hundreds of enchating numbers to the Bollywood world. The grand finale of the AAPI convention will be by Shankar Mahadevan and his team, who will take the audience to the memory line of Bollywood music on the final night, before a packed audience.
Sunidhi Chauhan, the young and talented artist behind the hit evergreen numbers like ‘Dhoom machale dhoom’, ‘Sheila ki jawaani’, ‘Beedi jalaile’ and many more, will be performing live on Friday, July 1st. Sunidhi Chauhan is an Indian playback singer, who is famous for her songs in Bollywood. She has also recorded songs for Oriya, Punjabi, Marathi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Bengali, Assamese and Nepali films. She first got recognized through the music show Meri Aawaz Suno. She entered into the world of playback singing with the 1996 Bollywood film, Shastra. Later she sang for the films like Gang, Veergati, Dahek, Bade Dilwala, Raja Ki Aayegi Baraat and Samar. Just at the age of nineteen, Chauhan had lent her voice to over 350 songs. She made her International debut with the song Heartbeat, a collaboration with Enrique Iglesias.
Aditya Narayan, an actor, television host, music composer and singer, made his first screen debut with Ram Gopal Varma’s Rangeela in which he also got an opportunity to sing with Asha Bhonsle, will anchor the show by the Indian Idol Juniors. “For the first time in history, the winners of the Indian Idol Juniors are performing on a stage program,” said Dr. Mirchandani. Ananaya Narayanan, Nityashree, Nahid, Moti Khan, and Vaishnav, the last five finalists on the Indian Idol show will performed live, showcasing their talents on July 2nd.
Aditya Narayan, who was born in Mumbai, was raised into a musical family as his father, Udit Narayan, the famous playback singer and mother Deepa Narayan. Zee TV is working on launching the next season of its most popular singing talent show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa. And the iconic show will be once again hosted by singer-actor Aditya Narayan.
Fashion Show by talented young artists from across the country will cake walk on July 3rd.
Dr. Seema Jain, who assumed charge of this premier ethnic organization representing 100,000 physicians and residents, gave credit to the support of AAPI executive committee, hard work of local Chapter members, and the organizing committee chaired by Dr. Rita Ahuja. “Success of credit goes to the entire national organizing committee, AAPI executive committee, and Board of Trustees and all the AAPI members,” she said.
AAPI is a forum to facilitate and enable Indian American Physicians to excel in patient care, teaching and research and to pursue their aspirations in professional and community affairs. For more details, and sponsorship opportunities, please visit: www.aapiconvention.org and www.aapiusa.org
Over one hundred films, including Indian and other South Asian films, have been selected to be screened June 7-9 at the Landmark Theater in Los Angeles, during the seventh annual New Media Film Festival, which celebrates the ever-changing world of new media.
Indian director Aaditi Dutt’s short film, “Nepal Heroes,” which has won accolades at other film festivals, including the IndieFEST Film Awards, will be screened in the Socially Responsible Content category. The 3:39 minute film, which Dutt wrote, traces how ordinary people came together to make an extraordinary difference in helping the people of Nepal recover from the April 2015 earthquake.
Also featuring in the same category is a three-minute music video, called “Anti-Street Harassment PSA.” Directed by Katherine Filaseta, the video, inspired by Bollywood, depicts a woman walking down the street. This short public service announcement makes a statement about street harassment in New York City through a re-appropriation of the lyrics of Gnarls Barkley’s “Crazy” by Alycia Lang. Anita Singh is the assistant director of this short, while the director of photography is Srinath Ravichandran. Abhinav Chintakunta has co-edited the video with Filaseta.
“Four Million Threads” a 48-second short produced and filmed by U.S. filmmaker Jackie Hurwitz, is an interactive journey into Bangladesh’s garment industry: the women joining the workforce, the managers on the top floor, and the disaster that changed them all.
The Web series category will showcase a one-minute micro documentary series, “One Minute Meal: Ganesha’s Favorite Meal.” In one minute, Director James Boo takes the viewers to a celebration of Ganesh Chaturthi in Queens, New York City, which includes a peek into the rituals, prayers, songs, dances, and food.
“The Achiever,” by filmmaker Nardeep Khurmi, has been selected in the Web series category. “The Achiever” is the story of a man who puts little effort in to life and gets by on even smaller victories.
A three-minute-long animated film by UK filmmaker Roxi Khan, “Save My Soul,” will be screened in the Machinima category. The premise of the film is: A very important decision must be made via text message. If they choose riches, someone will die; if they reject riches, no one will die but they will not be rich — the countdown has begun!
“Save My Soul,” “The Achiever,” “1 Minute Meal: Ganesha’s Favorite Meal” and “Four Million Threads” will see their world premiere at the fest.
For a year beginning in late 2014, Sudarsan Raghavan wrote a series of dispatches from Afghanistan for the Washington Post that, through their examination of daily life in the country, transcended conventional stories of war, poverty, and instability. In one particularly memorable article, Raghavan profiled Sara Bahayi, Afghanistan’s only female taxi driver; in another, he explained how years of occupation has left a large American cultural footprint in cities like Kabul.
On Thursday, May 26, Sudarsan Raghavan appeared in conversation at Asia Society in New York with Marcus Brauchli and John Hockenberry to discuss his award-winning reporting in Afghanistan. The event will be available worldwide via free live webcast.Learn more
In recognition of his exemplary reporting from Afghanistan, Asia Society last month awarded Raghavan with its 2016 Osborn Elliott Prize, an honor recognizing excellent reporting on Asia. On Thursday, Raghavan — now the Post’s Cairo bureau chief — will appear in conversation with Marcus Brauchli, the Jury Chair for the Oz Elliott Prize and a veteran journalist, and John Hockenberry, host of The Takeaway for PRI and WYNC, at Asia Society in New York.
Asia Blog recently caught up with Raghavan to talk about the challenge of reporting in Afghanistan, the resilience of the Taliban and why, despite the country’s struggles, he remains optimistic about its future. The conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Your dispatches from Afghanistan go beyond military battles and political intrigue and get into daily life in the country. What was the most challenging aspect of reporting in Afghanistan?
The most challenging aspect is getting to the epicenter of the story. With the Taliban controlling or present in more areas now than at any time since 2001, it’s become increasingly dangerous and risky to travel outside Kabul. And with most U.S. troops departed, the availability of military embeds — which most Western journalists once relied on for reaching remote areas — has drastically shrunk.
Trips outside Kabul required careful, often extensive, planning and research. It meant cultivating trustworthy tribal elders, as well as Afghan military commanders and officials, to help get into certain areas. It also required at times passing through or near Taliban and ISIS areas. In Helmand Province, for example, the Taliban were literally walking distance away from many frontline positions I visited. Whenever I traveled, I wore an Afghan salwar kameez to help blend into the landscape.
The reporting, I believe, was worth the risk. It was essential to uncovering the truth unfolding on the ground, to portraying the daily struggles of ordinary Afghans and giving them a voice.
What surprised you the most from your time in the country? What’s something that a typical newspaper reader in the United States may not realize about Afghanistan?
Good question. I was surprised by the extent to which urban Afghans were influenced by American culture. It’s quite normal to hear anti-American sentiments, and the collective sense among Afghans is that they’ve not benefited from the tens of billions spent by the United States to improve their lives. Still, I’ve met Afghan teens into skateboarding, Afghan rappers who love Eminem. There’s a George Bush Market (named after “W”) where you can buy wrap-around Oakley sunglasses. There are even regular Texas hold-em poker games run by Afghans in Kabul!
I was also surprised by how organized and vocal Afghans have become, especially the long-oppressed Hazara ethnic minority. It’s not uncommon these days to see massive protests in the streets against government policies and alleged abuses. But I remember visiting Afghanistan when the Taliban emerged in the mid-1990s, and again after the 9/11 attacks and the 2004 elections, and they were quite subdued compared to these days.
Has the 15-year presence of the U.S. Military — as well as billions of dollars in reconstruction and aid — had a positive effect on the country? Is Afghanistan at all a better place now than 2001?
It’s a mixed picture, leaning more to the negative than positive. Speak to the average Afghan, and he or she will tell you that they have seen little impact on their lives from America’s billions in reconstruction and aid. Instead, the common refrain is that much of the money has been wasted or stolen by corrupt officials and contractors. And there’s much truth to this. Just look at the scores of reports from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, the U.S. government’s watchdog agency, which details the immense extent to which U.S. taxpayer dollars have been misspent in Afghanistan.
Many Afghans still remember with fondness the days of the Soviet occupation of the 1980s. That’s because the Soviets built apartment complexes, factories, universities, and other buildings that still stand today and are used by countless Afghans. The American intervention, many Afghans believe, will not leave anything of much permanence, at least visibly. However, there has been at least one positive impact of American aid: a vibrant, free Afghan media. In 2001, when the Taliban regime was toppled, there was no independent media. Today, there are hundreds of print, TV, and radio outlets across the country. The vast majority were initially funded by U.S. aid, and continue to be supported today.
American aid officials consider the independent press to be among, if the not the most, significant legacy that the United States will leave behind. But even this achievement is under threat. Both the Taliban and the government are increasingly targeting Afghanistan’s journalists. Many have fled the country or have decided to censor themselves. And as the U.S. departs, the money to fund journalism is shrinking. Most of these media outlets are unlikely to survive, unless they find other sources of funding.
What do you think most accounts for the resilience of the Taliban?
I think Pakistan has provided the Afghan Taliban with the sanctuary and support that allows them to be resilient. It’s no surprise that Taliban leader Mullah Mansour was allegedly killed by a U.S. drone strike inside the Baluchistan region of Pakistan. Secondly, the Afghan security forces, riddled with corruption and low morale, has struggled to fight the Taliban. That has allowed the Taliban to launch successful offensives and seize areas. Today, the insurgents are showing a battle discipline and initiative far superior than the U.S.-trained and equipped Afghan forces. The militants are also well-funded, deriving revenues from opium cultivation and smuggling, as well as marble and gemstone mining and exacting taxes in areas they control. The Afghan central government’s constant infighting also helps the Taliban survive.
Is there an optimistic case for Afghanistan?
Afghanistan has long been an important part of my adult life. I wrote my first-ever story — on Afghan war orphans — when I was working for a French NGO in Peshawar. That was in 1992, and since then I’ve been making repeated trips back to the country, covering all its pivotal transformations. So I want to believe that one day Afghanistan will become peaceful again. I want to feel optimism. But every time I return, I see new players — and old ones — seeking power and wealth, driven by tribal and regional loyalties with little care for the nation. And by now, 24 years since I first wrote that story, I have met several generations of ordinary Afghans shattered by war, corruption, and poor leadership.
At the same time, I’ve met incredible Afghans who are struggling to improve their lives against all odds, like the country’s only female taxi driver in Mazar-e-Sharif. I’ve met young Afghans educated in the U.S. and Europe who are now back in their homeland trying to make a difference. I’ve met countless others with big dreams. As long as such Afghans continue to believe in themselves and work towards improving their country, there will always be hope for Afghanistan.
New York: Indian-American neurosurgeon, Dr. Sanjay Gupta has emerged as the second most popular doctor in the US on Twitter, with over two million followers on the micro-blogging website, a new study has found. The #DocsOnTwitter study by researchers at Augustana University in the US analyzed tweeting habits of medical professionals in the country from 2006 to 2015. Gupta, with 2,031,428 followers on Twitter, serves as associate chief of the neurosurgery service at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia and as assistant professor of neurosurgery at the Emory University School of Medicine.
Gupta, 46, is best known as the chief medical correspondent for CNN and has won multiple Emmy awards. He also uses his Twitter account primarily for professional use, giving his opinions and medical advice. ”We just wanted to see how doctors are engaging with other people on Twitter,” Paige Schwitters, an Augustana student who contributed to the report, was quoted as saying by ‘argusleader.com’. The group worked with internet research firm BrightPlanet to evaluate Tweets and break the accounts down by age and gender.
The researchers sorted through 4,500 users. The most followed Twitter accounts belonged to celebrities, public figures or TV personalities. The top three followed doctors on Twitter are: Dr. Drew Pinsky (@drdrew) with 3.18 million followers, Dr. Gupta (@drsanjaygupta) who has 2.03 million followers, followed by Dr. Asa Andrew (@drasa) with 1.03 million followers. Drew with 3,183,017 followers, is an American board-certified internist, addiction medicine specialist and a media personality.
Researchers analysed about 3.4 million tweets to determine when and how physicians were most likely to use Twitter. The study also shows doctors are using Twitter on the go and are less likely to use the micro blogging site for legal reasons. Many avoid announcing their personal business on social media because of rules for patient privacy and insurance, according to the report.
“We just wanted to see how doctors are engaging with other people on Twitter,” one of the researchers, Paige Schwitters, was quoted as saying by Argus Leader, part of the US Today network.
Gupta joined CNN in the summer of 2001. “Gupta, a practicing neurosurgeon, plays an integral role in CNN’s reporting on health and medical news for all of CNN’s shows domestically and internationally, and contributes to CNN.com,” according to his biography mentioned in CNN.
“His medical training and public health policy experience distinguishes his reporting from war zones and natural disasters, as well as on a range of medical and scientific topics, including the recent Ebola outbreak, brain injury, disaster recovery, health care reform, fitness, military medicine, and HIV/AIDS,” it added.
Mallika Sherawat, the 39-year-old actress has been gaining plaudits for her fashion choices at the ongoing 69th Cannes Film Festival. On May 19, Mallika Sherawat once again shined in a gorgeous pink ombré gown with lace detailing by ace designer Alexis Mabille for her appearance at the UNICEF dinner.
The actress, whose film “Time Raiders” was screened at the film fest, shared a coy photo of herself on Twitter with details about her dress, hair and makeup.
Once she arrived at the dinner, Sherawat’s sweet tooth emerged. The svelte actress posted a photo of herself posing next to a tower of delectable desserts. his is not the first time that Sherawat has attended the Cannes Film Festival. The actress made headlines in 2014 for the pale, pleated Pucci dress that she wore to the amfAR Gala.
At this year’s amfAR Gala, Sherawat managed to click a selfie with one her favorite actors, Mads Mikkelsen, known for his role as Dr. Hannibal Lecter in the American TV series “Hannibal.”
GOPIO and its Central Jersey chapter organized a lecture demonstration of Hindustani Classical Vocal on Sunday May 1, 2016, Sunday, by Viraj Amar, an exponent of Hindustani Classical Vocal from Benaras Gharana. Amar gave a lecture-demonstration on the topic ‘Moods and Shades of Morning Ragas’ covering a wide range of topics relating to rich Hindustani classical vocal tradition. She is the Chief Coordinator of Upasana School of Performing Arts (Upasana), Gujarat University. In 2012-13 GOPIO had entered into an MOU with Upasana to have an exchange program for students and the faculty to promote classical art and culture. The MOU bore the fruits now that GOPIO Vice President Ram Gadhavi took the initiative to invite Amar for the Lecture-demonstration on classical music.
Amar lucidly explained the finer aspects of the art and its subtle nuances. She sang Raga Nat Bhairav -vilambit khayal followed by drut khayal. While singing she demonstrated the change from slow paced-vilambit laya – to the drut laya-crescendo while explaining aalaap, badhat, Bol taan, aalaap taan. She also explained how the artiste uses various voice production techniques for generating various kinds of taans. She then sang two bandishes in raga desi-one traditional Bandish and the other a haveli sangeet bandish. She also spoke on her training in Guru shishya parampara.
The lecture demo was attended by discerning listeners and the question-answer session following the lec-dem turned out to be very interesting. Such programs bring the listeners closer to the art and the Artiste. Deepak Gundani on Tabla and Amar Bhatt on Harmonium gave an able support to the artiste. Such an initiative by GOPIO was appreciated by all.
Photo above: Artists with GOPIO officials: From l. to r.: GOPIO-North Jersey Treasurer Gaurang Mehta, GOPIO-Silicon Valley President Ashok Bhatt, GOPIO Business Council Co-Chair Prakash Shah, GOPIO-North Jersey Vice President Rajul Shah, GOPIO-North Jersey Asst. Treasurer Dhananjay Desai, Main Artiste Viraj Amar, Amar Bhatt (Accompanied on Harmonium), GOPIO Vice President Ram Gadhavi, Dipak Gundani (Accompanied on Tabla) and GOPIO Associate Secretary Jaswant Mody
Vikas Khanna, the celebrity chef, premiered his documentary ” Kitchens of Gratitude ” at the ongoing 69th Cannes Film Festival on Saturday, May 21. The documentary is the chef’s ideology that food has always been the thread which brings people together and that it transcends all barriers of caste, creed, faith — thus, encouraging people to share.
The documentary was unveiled by Mohan Kumar , India’s Ambassador to France along with Leena Jaisani, senior director – Media and Entertainment division at Ficci, at the India Pavilion at the fest.
“Michelin starred Chef Vikas Khanna is not just a culinary ambassador of India but is also helping create awareness of our culture globally. For Indians, food is a sacred expression of sharing and caring and with ‘Kitchens of Gratitude’, he has personified it. This is a small step but will go a long way in building bridges amongst communities and nations,” Kumar said in a statement.
While researching on how food was cooked in the Harappan civilisation, Khanna discovered that daily cooking was a communal activity in those times and he did not find a single reference to the use of small cooking pots, which bears out this finding. The fact that everyone used to get together for cooking and eating asserts his belief that the “unifying power of food was stronger even before religion came into being.”
Khanna then created, directed and shot a 15 minute documentary which captures this belief. The documentary feature personalities like Dalai Lama, Deepak Chopra, Mata Amritanandmayi (spiritual leader) and Pastor Craig Mayes of the New York Mission among others.
“‘Kitchens of Gratitude’ for me is solely about how food has always been the thread that brings people together encourage people to share. The documentary examines how shared food experiences help break the walls that divide people. “I firmly believe that our children must know that every faith welcomes everyone. No faith ever promotes discrimination. It is food that binds us together, and it must continue that way,” Khanna said.
New York, NY: The 16th annual New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) held its inaugural gala May 7, at the Skirball Center for Performing Arts. Billed as the oldest, most prestigious Indian film festival in the U.S., this year’s smorgasbord of independent, art house, alternate, and diaspora films, screened over the period May 7-14, includes 40 screenings (35 narrative, 5 documentary), all seen for the first time in New York City. In addition, the festival also featured five programs of short films.
“It was a very exciting night,” Shivdasani said. “We never actually had a language film for opening night. This was a complete departure and what that means is we are getting bolder,” she laughed. Baretto is an emerging filmmaker and neither the director or the cast are well known. “Still we had a lovely opening,” Shivdasani said.
Numerous film-makers with their cast appeared on the red carpet speaking about their films. Celebrities spotted at the gala included author Salman Rushdie, filmmaker Mira Nair, author and actress Madhur Jaffrey, India’s Consul General in New York Riva Ganguly Das, and author Suketu Mehta.
The 7-day festival highlighted various cinemas of India’s different regions, all subtitled in English. Among the languages this year were Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Telugu, Assamese, Haryanvi and Urdu.
“Each of these language films have been gems,” Shivdasani said. “And another thing different in this year’s festival is we’ve never had so many panels before,” Shivdasani noted. Panels where representatives of each of the language films discussed their experiences; an LGBT panel, a new directors panel, among others.
The festival also featured the National Film Development Corporation of India-restored first films of filmmakers, and a three-generations sidebar, films of Bimal Roy, Basu Bhattacharya and Aditya Bhattacharya. Two National Award winners, Famous in Ahmedabad and Daarvatha, were among the 40 or so shorts being screened. The lineup also included 2016 National Award winners, A Far Afternoon, Birds With Large Wings, and The River of Fables, an Assamese language feature film.
The dance troupe, Manhattan Andaaz performed. The master of ceremonies was Sree Srinivasan, chief digital officer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Aroon Shivdasani, executive and artistic director of the Indo-American Arts Council, which puts the show together, welcomed the guests.
Nair, who is “Face of the Festival” according to Shivdasani, spoke about the growing influence of the festival and dwelt on her new film about Uganda, her second home.
The film, Nachom-ia-Kumpasar (Let’s Dance to the Rhythm) was screened, followed by a discussion with director Bardroy Baretto, producer Angelo Braganza, and actress Palomi Ghosh, moderated by NYIFF Director Aseem Chhabra. The Konkani feature film is a tribute to Goan music and musicians of the 1960s and 1970s, narrated through the emotional rollercoaster of a love story, telling the nostalgic tale of musicians who lived and died unrecognized, unappreciated and unsung.
A high-priced ticket gala benefit dinner attended by some 250 invitees rubbing shoulders with filmmakers and celebrities, concluded the evening. Ghosh, the lead character in the Konkani film, upon request, sang a few songs impromptu at the gala, bringing people to their feet to dance.
Among diaspora films was Good Ol’ Boy, a feel-good, coming-of-age story of Smith, a 10-year old growing up in small-town America in 1979, featuring some well-known actors in Samrat Chakrabarti (Midnight’s Children, The Waiting City) and Poorna Jagannathan (Delhi Belly, Nirbhaya).
Soumitra Chatterjee Bengali starrer, Peace Haven, is the story of three septuagenarian friends who embark on a journey to build their very own mortuary. Multiple award winner and fresh from the international film festival circuit, Parched, is about four ordinary women in rural Gujarat who talk unapologetically about men, sex and life as they struggle with their individual boundaries.
The highlight was the world premiere of Kagaz Ki Kashti (Paperboat), which tracks the life of a down-to-earth, small-town boy, who made it big in the Ghazal world breaking through the norms and mixing western instrumentation. to make this classical genre simple and hummable.
Filmmaker Hansal Mehta’s “Aligarh” was chosen as the closing film of the 16th annual New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF). The festival, which concluded on Saturday, screens feature, documentary and short films made from, of, and about the Indian subcontinent in the independent, art-house, alternate and diaspora genres every year.
“Aligarh” is based on the real life incident of Srinivas Ramchandra Siras, an academician at the Aligarh Muslim University who was suspended from his job because of his sexual orientation. The film stars Manoj Bajpayee and Rajkummar Rao.
Before attending the fest, Rajkummar took to Twitter on Saturday night and wrote: “Going to one of my favourite cities in the world. New York. ‘Aligarh’ has been chosen as the closing film of the prestigious New York Indian film festival.” Mehta was excited that the American city would witness their “labour of love”. “Aligarh” has been lauded at many film festivals, including Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles, where it received a special mention.
The New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) is the oldest, most prestigious film festival screening premieres of feature, documentary and short films made from, of, and about the Indian subcontinent in the Independent, arthouse, alternate and diaspora genres. Seven days of screenings, post-screening discussions, industry panels, award ceremony, special events, nightly networking parties, red carpet galas, media attention and packed audiences build an awareness of Indian cinema, entertain & educate North Americans about the real India, and add to the amazing cultural diversity of New York City. Please visit: the NYIFF website.
Washington, DC: Indian-American star Kal Penn, best known for his roles in Harold & Kumar and The Namesake, says most Americans don’t agree with controversial presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s racist views.
“I seriously believe that most of the Americans don’t agree with Donald Trump over his racist, anti-women, anti-LGBT practices. We are not that country. Hopefully elections will prove that,” Penn, who was associate director in the White House Office of Public Engagement from 2009 to 2011, said at the “Cultural Connections in US-India Relations” at the American Center here.
Indian American Neera Tanden led the Hillary Clinton campaign in slamming the economic policies of Donald Trump, the Republican presidential presumptive nominee, and alleging that this poses a threat to the economic future of women and families. “Make no mistake: Trump’s divisive comments about women’s health are a direct threat to our dignity and economic security,” said Tanden, president of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. “Trump is now trying to cover up the bald spots in his economic plan but women can see for themselves and women can see through his comb over,” said Tanden, who was joined by Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland.
Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, expected to be pitted against Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton in November, has been opposed by peoples and critics, and often been tagged “anti-immigrant”, “misogynist”, “racist” and “worse”. During the event, Penn’s 2007 film “The Namesake”, which also stars Bollywood actors Irrfan Khan and Tabu, was screened.
Sharing his experience about campaigning for Obama, Penn said that it would not “weird” for him to shift from acting to politics. “For me it was an honor to get a chance to serve for your country,” said Penn, whose real name is Kalpen Suresh Modi, and is best known for his role of Kumar Patel in the popular “Harold & Kumar” film franchise. He has also appeared on TV shows like “House”, “How I Met Your Mother” and “The Big Brain Theory”.
Kal Penn, who served in the Barack Obama administration, was in India for the shooting of Guneet Monga’s upcoming project “The Ashram”. With Ben Rekhi as the director, the film is an English-language spiritual fantasy thriller set in the mystical world of Himalayan yogis.
“The Ashram” also features Melissa Leo, Sam Keeley, Hera Hilmar and Radhika Apte. Talking about Indian cinema, Penn said he is more inclined towards watching off-beat films, that too of Amitabh Bachchan and Irrfan Khan. He also said that loved watching 2013 film “Mere Dad Ki Maruti”.
According to Tanden, the trillions in tax cuts for millionaires, billionaires and corporations laid out in Trump’s tax plan would be an enormous boon for the top one percent of earners, made at the expense of working families, seniors and the health of the economy. Trump’s plan would give $3 trillion over 10 years or more than 35 percent of its tax breaks to millionaires, enough money to ensure Medicare and Social Security’s solvency for the next 75 years, repair the ailing infrastructure, or raise every person now living in poverty up to the poverty line. Trump would give multi-millionaires in the top 0.1 percent like himself a raise of $1.3 million a year, or $100,000 a month.
Tanden said Trump still opposes raising the minimum wage because he believes “wages are too high,” and recently said he doesn’t favor a federal floor for the minimum wage, which could leave many workers subject to a lower minimum wage.
Tanden alleged Trump’s ideas are not the only risk his presidency would pose for the economic future of women and families around this country. “His tax plan gives $3 trillion to millionaires, that’s enough to make Social Security and Medicare solvent for 75 years. Women, who rely disproportionately on Social Security, can’t afford such an irresponsible giveaway.”
Two-time Academy Award® winner Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and Andy Schocken bring their acclaimed documentary SONG OF LAHORE to U.S. audiences this Friday, May 20 with a release that includes theaters in New York and Los Angeles plus national availability on DVD, VOD and Digital HD at the same time.
Song of Lahore, the latest feature-length documentary from filmmakers Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness – 2015 Academy Award winner for Best Short Documentary) and Andy Schocken (The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner), follows the members of Pakistan’s Sachal Jazz Ensemble, a group of master musicians who find international recognition after decades of opposition from dictators and religious extremists. The ancient city of Lahore was once the center of Pakistan’s thriving film-music recording industry, but that came to an end in the late 1970s under the Islamist rule of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. Under the conservative regime, instrumental music was repressed, and entire families of musicians lost their livelihood. Music came to be seen as a dishonorable profession, and they found themselves quietly continuing the centuries-old practice of passing down ancient musical traditions from one generation to the next behind closed doors.
As government opposition to music eased in the 1990s and 2000s, businessman Izzat Majeed founded the Sachal Studios Orchestra. He encouraged the group to combine classical Pakistani instruments and techniques with the American jazz he had fallen in love with in the 1950s. Their innovative versions of jazz standards, most notably Dave Brubeck’s iconic “Take Five,” made the orchestra a surprise Internet phenomenon, earning international acclaim and an invitation to perform at Lincoln Center with jazz great Wynton Marsalis and his band. Obaid-Chinoy and Schocken follow the ensemble on an inspiring journey as they struggle to adapt to the unfamiliar strictures of Western music and restore Pakistan’s venerable musical traditions.
The co-directors sat down for this exclusive interview to discuss their new film which features the music of The Sachal Ensemble of Pakistan and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis and examines the lives and the cultural heritage of Pakistan’s classical musicians as they prepare for a concert in New York City. Interview with SONG OF LAHORE co-directors SHARMEEN OBAID-CHINOY and ANDY SCHOCKEN:
Q: Was music ever banned in Pakistan?
A: Music was never banned outright, but when General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq took power in 1977 he put in place restrictions on broadcasting non-religious music and dancing. Nightclubs and alcohol were banned, and Zia took steps to shut down the Pakistani film industry, a source of employment for many musicians. At the same time, a more hardline interpretation of Islam became ascendant. As a result, non-religious classical music declined dramatically and musicians lost their former standing culturally, economically and socially. However, even in this oppressive environment, a nascent pop industry grew as a form of protest against Zia’s conservative policies.
Q: After Zia’s reign ended, why did traditional musicians like the members of the Sachal Ensemble still struggle to find work?
A: After Benazir Bhutto took power in 1988, official opposition to non-religious music was overturned. And starting in 1999, under Pervez Musharraf, steps were taken to rebuild the music and film industries. Music grew in popularity, concerts were once again common, and shows on television and radio flourished. However, much of the music that became popular at this time was Western-oriented rock and pop. Opportunities for classical musicians were rare, so many traditional artists had to leave the profession and find work elsewhere.
Q: What are the threats faced by musicians in Pakistan today?
A: After the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan, and the U.S. military engagement in the region, the situation changed again. The Taliban banned instrumental music and dancing in Afghanistan, and as their influence later crossed into Pakistan, similar efforts were made in areas under their control or sympathetic to their strain of Islam. When fundamentalist religious parties came to power in the Khyber-Paktunkhwa region of Pakistan, they banned public concerts, hundreds of music shops were burned, and a number of musicians and dancers were killed. Many musicians fled the region.
Q: What is the situation like for musicians in Lahore?
A: The situation in Pakistan differs widely from region to region. Lahore experiences limited influence from the Taliban, though hundreds have been killed in terrorist attacks there in recent years. There have been some efforts by outsiders to spread anti-music messages in the city, and there have been some personal attacks on musicians. There are fundamentalist agitators who rally opposition to musicians, claiming that music is sinful. As described in the film, the son of guitarist Asad Ali was attacked and had his keyboard smashed. In 2008 bombs were set off at Lahore’s Alhamra Cultural Center during a musical performance by folk musician Arieb Azhar. Because of security concerns it is rare for concerts to be held publicly. Instead, performances are typically held in private hotels or venues with security guards.
Q: Why does flutist Baqir Abbas speak of having to hide the fact that he and his brother are musicians?
A: In many strata of Pakistani society, instrumental musicians are not seen as respectable. Despite the long tradition of music in Islamic society, conservative Muslims consider instrumental music to be obscene. Musicians are often referred to in derogatory terms, and musical families often hide the fact that they’re musicians, so as not to invite opposition or dishonor. Hence, in the film, we see Baqir Abbas playing the flute with his brother in a soundproof room, so as to not bring dishonor to the family.
SONG OF LAHORE
Release date: May 20 (select theaters, DVD, VOD, Digital HD)
Directors:Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy & Andy Schocken
Music: The Sachal Jazz Ensemble and The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis
Bollywood star Celina Jaitly, who speaks on behalf of LGBT people in India and all over the world, was honored with the Harvey Milk Foundation’s Lilla Watson Global Champion Medal at the gala co-presented by the Harvey Milk Foundation and The Pride Center at Equality Park on May 13th.
“It’s a great honor to be recognized with this medal from the Harvey Milk Foundation,” said Jaitly. “In spite of the huge strides being made in the U.S. and in many other countries, far too many LGBT people still suffer rejection, harassment and discrimination. In 76 countries – including, my own, India – the law treats gay people as criminals, reinforcing stigma and leaving people vulnerable to blackmail and imprisonment. The work we are doing through the United Nations Free & Equal global campaign is raising awareness and challenging prejudice. It’s a chance to stand shoulder to shoulder with LGBT friends and allies around the world and demand equal rights, respect and recognition. I like to think that Harvey Milk himself would have heartily approved.”
Jaitly, who is an official Champion of the United Nations Free & Equal Campaign, was honored for her advocacy and support for the LGBT rights movement in India. A former Miss India winner and Miss Universe runner-up, she is one of the most visible advocates against the criminalization of same-sex relationships in the world’s largest democracy.
Jaitly wrote recently: “In spite of the huge strides being made in the U.S. and in many other countries, far too many LGBT people still suffer rejection, harassment and discrimination. In 76 countries – including, my own, India – the law treats gay people as criminals, reinforcing stigma and leaving people vulnerable to blackmail and imprisonment. The work we are doing through the United Nations Free & Equal global campaign is raising awareness and challenging prejudice. It’s a chance to stand shoulder to shoulder with LGBT friends and allies around the world and demand equal rights, respect and recognition. I like to think that Harvey Milk himself would have heartily approved.”
“Celina Jaitly is one in a million — a huge Bollywood star and a leading light in the global movement for LGBT equality,” Charles Radcliffe, chief, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement. “A stalwart ally of the LGBT community in India for more than a decade, she is, today, playing a central role in UN efforts to fight homophobia and transphobia, globally.”
“Celina Jaitly is an incredible champion of human rights, not just in India, but globally, through her unwavering support of the UN Free & Equal Campaign,” added Stuart Milk, co-founder of the Harvey Milk Foundation and a global human rights advocate. “She is guided by passion, committed to hard work, aided by grace, and the belief that our shared journey is enriched, and not weakened, by our diversity. We are honored that she is traveling halfway across the globe to join us.”
Washington, DC: Actress Priyanka Chopra was elated to meet the “very funny and charming” US President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner here. The 33-year-old actress, who found global recognition with her character Alex Parrish in the American TV series “Quantico”, looked ravishing in a deep-cut, striped black gown at the dinner held on April 30 night.
The actress was among some of Hollywood’s biggest names like Bradley Cooper, Lucy Liu, Jane Fonda and Gladys Knight to have been invited for the special dinner, which will take place at the White House, said a statement from Priyanka’s representatives.
Priyanka also shared a photograph of herself along with the two. The U.S. President looked dapper in a black suit and crisp white shirt which he teamed with a black bow tie, while Michelle Obama looked lovely in an embellished beige gown.
“Lovely to meet the very funny and charming Barack Obama and the beautiful Michelle Obama,” Priyanka captioned the photograph. “Thank you for a lovely evening. Cannot wait to start working on your girls education program,” she added.
Mallika Sherawat, a 39-year-old actress from India has been featured in the United Nations’ short video “Impossible Choices,” released on April 28. Sherawat joins a group of celebrities like Daniel Craig, Forest Whitaker, Alfre Woodard, Yara Shahidi and Rosario Dawson, promoting the upcoming World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul, to be held from May 23-24. The Summit is a call to action by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to reduce human loss and suffering from crises by setting an agenda to make humanitarian action fit for the challenges the world currently faces and will face in the future.
Impossible choices are being made every single day by the more than 125 million people in desperate need of humanitarian assistance around the globe. To spark action ahead of the first-ever World Humanitarian summit, the United Nations (UN) has launched a global, interactive digital experience that aims to inspire commitment to meaningful change in the name of humanity. The digital challenge at ImpossibleChoices.org features a three-minute, online journey based on real experiences people in crises often face. At the end of the online experience, users can share results across their respective social platforms and call upon global leadership to attend the Summit, and take bold action.
Touching on the UN’s Global Goals for Sustainable Development, the celebrities say in the video: “Our global leaders will be asked to make commitments to end the crisis, to put humanity first. Let us commit to end hunger for those in need, to empower youth impacted by conflict, to ensure displaced children still receive an education, to resolve conflict through dialogue and reconciliation rather than violence and revenge, to eliminate the threat of mines and explosive hazards, and to make sure no parent or child has to make an impossible choice.”
Sherawat, along with actress Catarina Furtado, hip hop artist Big Sean, Princess Haya bint al Hussein, Dawson and Craig, go on to jointly say in the video, “If we actually want to make things better, then the choice is clear: We urge our global leaders to show up and take bold action.”
“Arguably one of the most powerful tools at our disposal today is social media — it can give a voice to the voiceless, create instant awareness and drive change in ways never before seen around the world,” said Stephen O’Brien, UN Humanitarian Chief. “With Impossible Choices, we are calling upon the digitally-connected to help create a movement towards showing world leaders that the world is looking to them to make bold decisions and act for the good of humanity.”
In an effort to ensure the campaign maintains the most authentic possible voice, the UN has also appointed 20 Champions for Humanity, a group of influential individuals — from CEOs to photographers, philanthropists to entertainers — to kick-off the Impossible Choices campaign and gather support from within their networks.
The video ends with a plea to petition world leaders to attend the Summit. “Millions are counting on us. Go to ImpossibleChoices.org to tell your leaders to be there and put humanity first,” the celebs urge. For more information about the World Humanitarian Summit, please visit: www.worldhumanitariansummit.org.
Bethpage, NY: On a beautiful sunny afternoon, senior citizens and members of Indian American community joined together for spring celebrations. Occasion was the monthly senior programs at Bethpage senior Community Center in Beth page, Long Island. Organized by Indian American Forum and Apna Ghar, on Tuesday April 26 in the afternoon. Kirit Panchamia and volunteers of Apna Ghar made arrangements for seniors to come to Bethpage Senior Community center. Chief Guest for the program was Centenarian Marathon Runner Fauja Singh, visiting from London.
Program started with welcome remarks by Anu Gulati and Vijay Goswamy, coordinators of the senor programs. Narinder Kaur and Kirit Panchamia introduced Apna Ghar and services being provided for seniors. Rekha Chichara, Jyoti Gupta and several members sang songs and bhajans.
Mr Mohinder Singh Taneja welcomed all and spoke about the senior programs and importance of participation. Dr. Prem Gupta, spoke briefly regarding heart health for seniors. Indu Jaiswal Chairperson of IAF, welcomed Fauja Singh and introduced the members running senior programs in Long island.
Fauja singh came with Satnam Prahar and Dr Tinna , coordinators of VAISAKHI 5K run marathon. Mr Fauja Singh was recognized and presented with a Citation from Nassau County executive Mr Edward P Mangano. Mr Fauja Singh was applauded for his accomplishments and success as a Centenarian Marathon Runner, Several community leaders present were Bobby Kumar Kalotee, Dipika Modi from AIA, Peter Bheddah, Indu and Giri Chabbra from Hindu center, Dr Prem Gupta, Mr Ramesh Gupta, and several dignitaries attended the event.
(Thursday, April 26, 2016) New York City’s dance ambassador to the world, Battery Dance, introduces an Indo-American, collaborative dance interpretation of Hindu Goddess Durga’s Shakti (strength) and Bhakti (devotion) through the world premiere of “The Durga Project,” featuring renowned classical Indian dancer Unnath H.R. and five of Battery’s Western-trained dancers.
The 30-minute choreographic fantasy, which weaves together the movement vocabularies, sonorities and aesthetics of the United States and India, will also be complemented by works commissioned by European and African choreographers: “Inter/Ago,” created in 2015 by Tadej Brdnik, the recently retired Martha Graham principal dancer and choreographer, who has danced with Battery Dance since 1998; and “Observatory,” created in 2014 by Theo Ndindwa, founder of South Africa’s iKapa Dance Theatre, and since performed in tours of South America, Europe, Asia and at the first Cape Town International Dance Festival in 2015.
World premiere of “The Durga Project” is planned to be held on May 11th at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.; May 12th at 7 p.m., followed by a VIP gala at the Schimmel Center for the Arts (3 Spruce Street), Pace University, New York City. For Tickets, please visit: http://batterydance.org/ny-season/
New York, NY: Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra, Aziz Ansari, founders of Flipkart Binny Bansal and Sachin Bansal, tennis ace Sania Mirza, Google’s Indian American chief executive Sundar Pichai, activist Sunita Narain, Raj Panjabi, CEO of Last Mile Health and Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan have been featured in TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World list.
Time’s annual list, released last week, includes pioneers like American composer Lin Manuel-Miranda, leaders like IMF head Christine Lagarde and icons like Oscar-winning actor Leonardo DiCaprio who are “exploring the frontiers of art, science, society, technology and more.” These persons of Indian origin have been features alongside Oscar-winner Leonardo DiCaprio, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and singer Nicki Minaj.
This year’s list includes Pope Francis, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla, Russian President Vladimir Putin, US President Barack Obama, French President Fran ois Hollande, Myanmar’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Democratic Presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton, her Republican rival Ted Cruz, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was among the probable contenders for the list, was not in the final list determined by Time s editors. Modi was among Time’s 100 most influential people in the world last year.
Other big names from the entertainment industry whose names have been featured on the list include British singer Adele, actor Gael García Bernal, actor Idris Elba, singer Ariana Grande, actress Taraji P. Henson, filmmaker Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, actor Oscar Isaac, reality TV star Caitlyn Jenner, actor Dwayne Johnson, model Karlie Kloss, rapper Kendrick Lamar, actor Julia Louis-Dreyfus, actress Melissa McCarthy, actress Gina Rodriguez, actor Mark Rylance, and actress Charlize Theron.
Terming Rajan as “India’s prescient banker,” Time said he is among a rare breed of “economic seers” who he “steered” India through the global crisis and fallout, “playing a large role in making it one of the emerging-market stars of the moment. While serving as the youngest chief economist of the IMF from 2003 to 2006, Time said Rajan predicted the subprime crisis that would lead to the Great Recession, standing up to critics like former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who labeled him a “Luddite”.
“Since then, more and more of the economic establishment has come to share Rajan s view that debt-fueled growth is just a saccharine substitute for the real thing,” Time said.
In a profile for Mirza, cricket superstar Sachin Tendulkar writes that her “confidence, strength and resilience reach beyond tennis” and she has inspired a generation of Indians to pursue their dreams ” and to realize that they can also be the best.” Tendulkar described Mirza, who recently was awarded India’s third highest civilian honor the Padma Bhushan, as an “inspiration” on the court. He lauded her “dedication and willpower” to reinvent herself fully as a doubles player when her singles career was cut short by wrist injuries.
Chopra, who came into the limelight in the West playing the lead role in the popular American TV series “Quantico,” has also graced one of the six cover pages of the magazine. On Chopra, who was awarded the Padma Shri this year, actor Dwayne Johnson said she is a “star rising higher” and lauded her “drive, ambition, self-respect, and she knows there s no substitute for hard work.”
Time said Flipkart founders Binny Bansal and Sachin Bansal may have come across as arrogant when they told investors the company they started in 2007 as an online bookstore could be worth USD 100 million in a decade. “It turned out to be modesty: Flipkart now has 75 million users and a $13 billion valuation,” Time said.
On Pichai, author Bill Nye said the “internet’s chief engineer” has “helped change the world”. The Chennai-born was the “head guy” on Google Drive and worked on Google Chrome, Gmail and Android phones and the world is now watching what he comes up with next, Nye said in his profile.
On activist Sunita Narain, author Amitav Ghosh said her ideas have shaped some of the “key debates of our time” and “hers is a voice that urgently needs to be heard in this era of climate change.
“As an activist, Narain is a pioneer,” he said, adding that she and her organization New Delhi based Centre for Science and Environment, have been campaigning to reduce the Indian capital’s dangerous air-pollution levels for almost two decades.
Also on the list is Indian-origin actor and comedian Aziz Ansari and Indian-origin Raj Panjabi, CEO of organization Last Mile Health. “The way Aziz talks about his ethnicity and career is so interesting, and the entertainment-industry world he writes about is hysterical and on point,” his colleagues from the industry Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson said.
On Panjabi, who at 9 had escaped a civil war in his home country of Liberia former, US President Bill Clinton said, “to spend time with Raj Panjabi is to see up close what happens when someone with uncommon courage and compassion puts himself on the front lines of the world s most complex challenges.” Clinton said the “heroic work” Panjabi and and his organization did to train 1,300 community health workers in Liberia was critical in helping the government contain the Ebola epidemic.
On Suu Kyi, Obama wrote for the Time that “The Lady” remains a “beacon” of hope, “now more than ever,” for 50 million people reaching for justice, and for millions more around the world. Time Managing Editor Nancy Gibbs said the people on this year’s list “have lessons to teach. We can debate those lessons; we don t have to endorse them or agree with them. But the influence of this year’s TIME 100, to my mind, is that down to the last person, they have the power to make us think. And they are using it.”
New York, NY: Generation Hope,a documentary movie about the life-changing work of Mary’s Meals, is set to be shown at the 69th annual Cannes Film Festival in May. Filmed on location at Mary’s Meals projects in Malawi, Haiti and India, the movie highlights the difference a nutritious daily meal in school can make for children living in the world’s most impoverished communities.
Mary’s Meals was born in 2002 when Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow, a Catholic from Scotland, visited Malawi and witnessed the plight of youngsters there who did not have enough to eat.
Supported by people from many walks of life and different backgrounds,the charitable program now feeds more than one million poor children in 12 countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, every day they attend school.
In India, the charity works in Bihar, Orissa, Kolkata, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand and Delhi. They work in both formal and non-formal education centres – such as railway platforms – providing a daily meal to children who are disadvantaged by caste, disability, gender, or HIV status. In collaboration with a partner, BREAD, they feed 19,148 Indian children, according to the charity’s website.
The uplifting half-hour documentary will be exhibited at the Cannes Film Festival’s ‘Short Film Corner’, a prestigious platform for the work of up-and-coming short film directors and producers from around the world.
Hollywood star Gerard Butler, who has supported Mary’s Meals for several years and has visited one of its sites in Liberia, features in the movie directed by Charles Kinnane.
“It’s an incredible gift to bring our work to new eyes, new ears and new hearts in this way,” said Mary’s Meals founder and CEOMacFarlane-Barrow on the movie beingselected to be shown at Cannes.
He added, “At this point in our growth, we see that a beautiful revolution is taking place as a new generation, once fed by Mary’s Meals, begins to find its voice. We call them ‘Generation Hope’.
This is what this film is about – the university students, singers, farmers, teachers, DJs, footballers, and a myriad of other happy young people who, well-nourished and well-educated, are now finding their own way in life.” Ahead of the Cannes Film Festival, Generation Hope received its official launch on April15, with premiere events taking place across six continents.
New York, NY: April 25, 2016 –As the global film industry continues to be dominated by superhero films based on Stan Lee’s co-creations, including the upcomingX-Men: Age of Apocalypse,the legendary creator is now planning his first Bollywood film for India.
Graphic India, India’s leading character entertainment company, andLee’sPOW! Entertainment,announced today a partnership with Phantom Films, to begin pre-production on alive-action theatrical film for “Chakra The Invincible,” the first Indian superhero created by Lee along with Graphic Co-Founder & CEO, Sharad Devarajan.
The film will be directed by acclaimed filmmaker, VikramadityaMotwane(Lootera, Udaan) who is currently working on the screenplay with Lee and Devarajan. Phantom’s MadhuMantena will produce the film with Devarajan and POW! Entertainment’s Gill Champion. Datta Dave at Tulsea (Motwane’s agent) brought the parties together and structured the arrangement. Unlike the animated kids property, the film version of Chakra will feature an older version of the character in his twenties, set against the spectacular backdrop of Mumbai.
“I’m a fan of Bollywood films and am really excited about launching Chakra the Invincible as my first Bollywood superhero movie,”commented Stan Lee, Chief Creative Officer at POW! Entertainment. “Vikramaditya is an amazingly talented filmmaker who I have no doubt can make the Chakra film a massive hit in India and around the world. I only hope he remembers to include my cameo!”
Says Vikramaditya, “It’s an honor and an absolute delight to be making a film based on a Stan Lee character. We’re very excited and we hope to take comic book filmmaking to the next level with Chakra. And no, we won’t forget Stan’s cameo…”
“Stan Lee’s characters have generated $15 billion at the global box office, creating some of the most beloved icons in entertainment. More people likely know the face of Spider-Man than they do the Mona Lisa,” commented Graphic’s Co-Founder & CEO, Sharad Devarajan. “With VikramMotwane, we have been fortunate to find both a groundbreaking director and a passionate comic book fan, who will be able to create something uniquely Indian, but also authentic to Stan’s pantheon of superhero storytelling.”
Chakra The Invincible was originally launched as a kids animated film on Cartoon Network India two years ago, with three new animated TV movies currently in production to be released on Cartoon Network and Toonami later this year. The hero also built a worldwide following through a digital mobile series launched on Rovio’s ToonsTV available through the Angry Birds game – resulting in more than 40 million views for the Indian superhero. Chakra has also had hundreds of thousands of comic books released worldwide in India and North America.
GRAPHIC INDIA is a character entertainment company focused on creating leading characters, comics and stories through mobile and digital platforms. Graphic’s stories include, Ramayan 3392A.D., The LeavesandThe Sadhu, allcurrently in development as Hollywood feature films; 18 Days, a reimagining of the great eastern epic, the Mahabharata, by acclaimed graphic novel creator, Grant Morrison which was launched as an animated digital series in partnership with YouTube India; Devi, a female superhero from acclaimed filmmaker, ShekharKapur; Chakra The Invincible, the first superhero for India from legendary creator Stan Lee; and numerous other heroes and stories. www.GraphicIndia.com
POW! Entertainment, Inc. (OTCQB: POWN), a multi-media entertainment company, was founded by noted comic book writer Stan Lee, together with award-winning producer Gill Champion and the late intellectual property specialist Arthur Lieberman. Phantom Films is India’s first ‘Directors’ Company’. It was formed by four young creative minds of the country, viz. VikasBahl, Anurag Kashyap, VikramadityaMotwane and MadhuMantena in 2011.
Bollywood actor Salman Khan has been named goodwill ambassador of the Indian contingent for the upcoming Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro — an unprecedented appointment in the run-up to the quadrennial extravaganza. The announcement was made in the presence of Olympic medallists and Rio star athletes such as boxer MC Mary Kom, hockey captain Sardar Singh, and shooter Apurvi Chandela, among others. The next Olympics will be held at the Brazilian capital of Rio de Janeiro from August 5-21, 2016.
The association between Salman Khan and the Indian Olympic Association was facilitated by IOA’s official marketing agency IOS Sports & Entertainment. Speaking on this new association with IOA Salman said, “I am honoured that Indian Olympic Association has chosen me as the goodwill ambassador for the Indian contingent for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.”
Commenting on the announcement IOA President N. Ramachandran said, “His association will not only attract sports lovers but also help motivate the players to do well in the Olympics. We are sure our association with Salman Khan will go a long way.”
The athletes too welcomed the move with Mary Kom saying, “This is a big moment for all of us that Mr. Salman Khan has joined us as our family member during Rio Olympics. My preparations for Rio Olympic qualification are going on and I will be competing in the World Championship soon.”
The Indian Olympic Association (IOA), which made the announcement at its headquarters here, chose Salman from a list of two to three candidates which also included Shah Rukh Khan and veteran actor Amitabh Bachchan.
However, the IOA reportedly chose Khan as he is considered to be more connected with the youth and is known to be a sports enthusiast. The 50-year-old is a youth icon and an inspiration for bodybuilding fans across the country. His latest film ‘Sultan’ is a sports-drama which sees Salman in the role of a wrestler who rises from small town origins to achieve international success.
“We welcome Salman Khan as the goodwill ambassador of the Indian contingent for Rio Olympics and his association is in line with our focus to create the required excitement in the country. His association will not only attract sports lovers but also help motivate the players to do well in the Olympics. We are sure our association with Salman Khan will go a long way,” IOA president N. Ramachandran said in a statement. This is the first time that a Bollywood superstar will be a goodwill ambassador for the Indian contingent at the Olympics. A host of sports stars including M.C. Mary Kom, Sardar Singh, Ritu Rani, Deepika Kumari, Apurvi Chandela and Manika Batra were also present on the occasion.
Praising the sportspersons for their hard work and dedication, Khan hoped that they will be able to win medals at the Olympics. ” It is a matter of great national pride that our athletes are performing better and better at the Olympic Games and I think we should all join hands in giving them every support and cheer for them so that Rio 2016 becomes our best Olympic tally. They are extremely talented and hard working. They are not here due to anybody’s recommendation. They are here because they are the best in the country. That is the reason why they are going to the Olympics.”
Washington, DC: April 12th, 2016: Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Sania Mirza are among the winners of Times Now ICICI Bank NRI of the Year Awards 2016. Piyush Goyal, India’s Minister of State with Independent Charge for Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy in the Government of India Piyush Goyal graced the occasion gave away the awards to the winners on April 11th in Mumbai.
17 individuals under 7 different categories — Entrepreneur, Professional, Academics, Arts & Culture, Philanthropy, Special Jury Award, and Global Icon of the Year and India’s Global Icon Award, were recognized during the solemn event.
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was given the Global Indian of the Year award, while Sania Mirza was honored with the India’s Global Icon award. Nikesh Arora won the Special Jury Award. In the field of Academics, Prof. Ahmad Umar, Prof. Dr. Sanjay Gandhi, Varun Gupta were de the winners of the award. Amit Shah, Mohit Malhotra, Josvaraja John Christopher, and Riju Agarwal were recognized for their achievements in the Professional Category.
Jabir Puthiya won the award for Philanthropy, while Sonia Nair was given the award for her work in Art & Culture. Dhruv Saxena, Joji Mathew, Saravana Kumar, and Virendra Chopra were awarded in the Entrepreneur category.
The gala event was hosted by Kabir Bedi and Mandira Bedi and witnessed the presence of eminent personalities from the industry and Bollywood. This is the first event attended by the newly crowned FBB Femina Miss India 2016 – Priyadarshini Chatterjee, Sushruthi Krishna – 1st Runner Up and Pankhuri Gidwani – 2nd Runner Up. The event also witnessed last year runner ups Sushrii Shreya Mishra (Miss United Continent 2015, Varitka Singh- Miss Grand International India 2015 and Aafren Vaz – Miss Supranational Asia and Oceania 2015. Raymond was also one of the partners for this year’s award function. The jury, for NRI of the Year 2016, comprised of eminent leaders with the likes of Suhel Seth, Partha Sinha, Anurag Batra, P. R. Chakravarty and Sudhir Dhar. EY was the process partners for the award.
Lauding the contributions and achievements of the Overseas Indians, MK Anand, MD and CEO, TIMES Network commented, “TIMES Network is the leading broadcast news network and our flagship channel TIMES NOW is the leader in English News space. As a premium network, we cater to premium English audiences in India and around the world. Non Resident Indians are a very important target group for our international business and their achievements go beyond the ordinary and this spirit truly needs to be acknowledged and awarded. I congratulate all the winners on getting this recognition and honour. ”
Chanda Kochhar, MD & CEO, ICICI Bank said, “Congratulations to all the winners of the Times Now ICICI Bank NRI of the Year awards. It is indeed a pleasure to witness the phenomenal achievements of NRIs around the world. We at ICICI Bank are proud to celebrate and recognize the achievements of the NRI community.”
“The NRI of the Year awards is the most distinctive awards for Indians globally and we have received an overwhelming 25,000 registrations online and the multiple Jury rounds have ensured that the winners are of high quality. Among the winners this year are accomplished Neurologists, Oncologists, CEOs of global businesses and a former white house intern, and some very rich and accomplished Indians. We hope to take this further into more markets and reach out and cover more Indian Diaspora over the years ahead,.” Naveen Chandra, Head- International Business, TIMES Network said.
Atul Temurnikar, Executive Chairman and CEO Global Schools Foundation, Singapore added, ” India is the world’s third largest exporter of skilled manpower, and the Indian Diaspora – comprising NRIs and PIOs – have been a source of great strength to over 140 countries where they are settled. As one of world’s premium and award-winning K12 schools serving over 45 diverse nationalities, Global Schools Foundation nurtures global, future-ready citizens. The Foundation is a proud co-founder of the ‘NRI of the Year’ Awards with TIMES NOW, to recognise and celebrate the outstanding contributions of the Diaspora across the globe.”
Vijay Chandok, President, ICICI Bank Limited, said, “ICICI Bank has always offered the best-in-class products and services to suit NRI needs. These awards give us the opportunity to honor members of the NRI community who personify the same approach to being leaders in their fields.”
Hosted by TIMES NOW, India’s No. 1 news channel TIMES NOW and ICICI Bank, India’s largest private sector bank, the third edition of ‘NRI of the Year Awards’ recognize and salute the spirit of the Global Indian. The prestigious awards powered by Global Indian International School (GIIS) is India’s most distinctive awards recognizing the outstanding achievements of the Indian Diaspora globally. With their grit and perseverance, Non Resident Indians (NRIs) have achieved tremendous success in various fields in the countries they have chosen to adopt as their homes. Many NRIs are accomplished politicians, scientists, sportsmen, businessmen, professionals and academicians in various countries and TIMES NOW ICICI Bank ‘NRI of the Year’ awards recognize the success of these achievers. NRI of the Year, this year was also open to any Non Resident Indian (NRI), Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) and Person of Indian origin (PIO) who resides in USA, Canada, UK, Middle East, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.
(New York, NY – March 14, 2016) Battery Dance, New York City’s dance ambassador to the world, is proud to announce its 40th anniversary season lineup, which will feature the world premiere of “The Durga Project,” an original work created by founder and artistic director Jonathan Hollanderthat weaves together the movement vocabularies, sonorities and aesthetics of the U.S. and India into a choreographic fantasy of 30 minutes in length.
The program will be complemented by works commissioned by European and African choreographers:“Inter/Ago,” created in 2015 by Tadej Brdnik, the recently retired Martha Graham principal dancer and choreographer, who has danced with Battery Dance since 1998; and “Observatory,” created in 2014 by Theo Ndindwa, founder of South Africa’s iKapa Dance Theatre, and since performed in tours of South America, Europe, Asia and at the first Cape Town International Dance Festival in December, 2015.
Founded in New York’s financial district in 1976, Battery Dance is an anchor in the cultural life of Manhattan and a global ambassador for dance, with signature performances in 65 countries across six continents. This year, the Company celebrates its 40th anniversary season with a diverse array of performances in New York, Texas, South Korea, Germany, India and elsewhere around the globe.
Two events will showcase the Company’s artistry and its commitment to its lower Manhattan home base, where Battery Dance was born some 40 years ago:
New York Season performances at The Schimmel Center for the Arts at Pace University (3 Spruce Street) on May 11th at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. and May 12th at 7 p.m., followed by a VIP gala reception.
35th annual Battery Dance Festival in Battery Park City from August 14th to the 19th, with a grand finale at Schimmel Center on the 20th (performances at 6:30 pm – schedule to be released soon).
“Selecting an Indian theme for the Company’s 40th Anniversary was a natural and fitting choice,” said Hollander, founder and artistic director of Battery Dance. “We are the best-known American dance company in India, having engaged in seven national tours (17 cities reached thus far) since 1992 and having hosted dozens of Indian dancers and musicians in New York and across America.”
In “The Durga Project,” guest artist Unnath H.R., one of the leading classical dancers of his generation in India, engages in a symbiotic process with Battery’s Western-trained team of five brilliant and diverse dancers, yielding swaths of distinctive, yet undefinable, choreography that are like none other in the Company’s repertoire. A commissioned score by award-winning composer Frank Carlberg adheres to the musical notes that define the Hindustani Classical Raga Durga, a late evening raga that pays tribute to the Goddess Durga, but spins his own melodic and rhythmic invention. Costume designer Solé Salvo applies her vision and skill to adorn the dancers in garments suggestive of a primitive time and place, in hues inspired by the spices of India. Calvin Anderson employs a variegated palette in his lighting design with sculptural chiaroscuro suggestive of the bas relief on Indian temples.
“With its beautiful images and soulful music, The Durga Project evokes the sentiment of Bhakti(devotional love of the Goddess),” said Indian dance historian and critic Sunil Kothari. “The choreography is excellent, drawing inspiration from Indian classical dances and music. The human chain performed in the beginning with Bharatanatyam dancer Unnath H.R. gradually gathers momentum, resolving into the pas de deux which offer imaginatively suggestive and iconic poses of Goddess Durga in motion. Hollander and his dancers from the U.S. and India have captured the essence of Shakti, the female principle of divine energy, in a meaningful manner.”
Tickets are available now at the Schimmel Center Box Office. General Admission is $20 for the matinee performance and $25 for evening performances. Gala tickets for the May 12th performance are available by contacting info@batterydance.org. For more information, please visit www.batterydance.org
New York –April 12, 2016 – The New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) has announced the full lineup for its 16th year of celebrating independent, art house, alternate, and diaspora films from/about/connected to the Indian subcontinent (May 7 – May 14). Dedicated to bringing these films to a New York audience, the festival will feature 40 screenings (35 narrative, 5 documentary) –all seen for the first time in New York City. In addition, the festival will also feature five programs of short films.
The festival highlights various cinemas of India’s different regions. All the films are subtitled in English and some of the languages this year include Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Telegu, Assamese, Haryanavi and Urdu. This year’s festival will feature a couple of sidebars –NFDC restored first films of filmmakers and a three-generations sidebar, films of Bimal Roy, Basu Bhattacharya and Aditya Bhattacharya.
The festival’s film lineup includes 2016 National Award winners A FAR AFTERNOON, BIRDS WITH LARGE WINGS and THE RIVER OF FABLES (KOTHANODI). THE RIVER OF FABLES is an Assameselanguage feature film written and directed by Bhaskar Hazarika and stars Seema Biswas and Adil Hussain. The story of the film is based on folktales from Assam, India.
“We are thrilled to be able to share these films with the New York audience,” states Aseem Chhabra, NYIFF festival director. “Three of the feature films are National Award winners. And out of the nearly 40 shorts we are showing this year, there are two National Award winners: FAMOUS IN AHMEDABAD and DAARVATHA.”
Straight from the Sundance Film Festival, BRAHMAN NAMAN is a true Indian teenage comedy. It is funny, touching and will be universal in its appeal. It is about the exhilaration and confusion of being 17 – the pleasure of being in a gang, breaking the rules, acting big, falling in love – coming of age.
From the Tamil films, CRIME IN PUNISHMENT is the latest film from NYIFF alum and 2015 NYIFF award winner M. Manikandan. FOR THE LOVE OF A MAN is a documentary film that explores the popularity of the Tamil Superstar Rajinikanth.
GOOD OL’ BOY is the feel-good, coming-of-age story of Smith, a 10-year-old boy from India growing up in Small Town, America in 1979. This Diaspora film features actors Samrat Chakrabarti (Midnight’s Children, The Waiting City) and Poorna Jagannathan (Delhi Belly, Nirbhaya). Bengali master, Soumitra Chatterjee starrer PEACE HAVEN is the story of three septuagenarian friends who embark on a journey to build their very own mortuary.
Multiple award winner and fresh from the international film festival circuit PARCHED is a story about women set in the heart of parched rural landscape of Gujarat, India. It traces the bittersweet tale of four ordinary women Rani, Lajjo, Bijli and Janaki. We see them unapologetically talk about men, sex and life as they struggle with their individual boundaries to face their demons and stage their own personal wars.
In an era when Bollywood music ruled the Indian households and when Ghazal as a genre was limited to only the connoisseurs, Jagjit Singh made Ghazals a necessity of every music lover’s collection. KAAGAZ KI KASHTI traces the life journey of a down-to-earth, small-town boy, who made it big by breaking through the norms and the Ghazal scenario, by texturing traditional Ghazal singing with western instrumentation and making it simple and hummable, enticing new listeners into becoming Ghazal fans.
“The 2016 festival features a wide array of films from all over the South Asian diaspora,” states IAAC founder Aroon Shivdasani. This year our films reflect the reality of India, dealing both with LGBT issues that have surfaced in the supreme court and on the streets, as well as strong feminist films dealing with female infanticide, child marriage, domestic abuse, trafficking and several other key issues that affect women in a world that still leans towards chauvinism.”
Ruchi Shah and Suhani Jalota, two Indian-American women are among Glamour Magazine’s Top 10 College Women of the Year. Each of the go-getting women chosen for their leadership qualities and humanitarian work gets $20,000 in prize money.
Ruchi Shah, a biology major at Stony Brook University, was moved by problems she saw during her visit to India and applied her expertise to create a solution for real-world problems. Shah is CEO of Mosquitoes Be Gone, an all-natural mosquito repellent which could combat disease in third world countries; she has also been recognized by the American Association for Cancer Research for her research on improving cervical cancer diagnoses.
The anti-mosquito product she developed was a result of her trip to India to see her uncle when she was 15. “He was suffering from dengue fever, a disease that is transmitted by mosquitoes. Yet right outside the clinic, people were getting dozens of mosquito bites! So I decided to develop my own bug repellent.”
Once back home, she began by collecting sweat samples from athletes at school — “that wasn’t awkward at all” she quips. She built a test chamber I built in the family garage with supplies from Home Depot, and studied exactly what most attracted the bugs. After hundreds of failed compounds and many bites later, she found the winner. “Mosquitoes Be Gone is the first repellent to neutralize nitrogen-based compounds in sweat. And it’s all-natural,” she is quoted saying in Glamour. She is now at the stage of finalizing safety testing and bottle design, and expects the product on shelves within a year. She currently has a team of nine interns working to bring the repellent to the market, according to a press release from Stony Brook University.
Shah has many other accomplishments to her name. Recognized by the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, Forbes, and the AXA Achievement Award, she has worked in a cancer research lab with a team that discovered a protein that can predict cancer patient survival better than the tools doctors currently have. She was a science writing intern at the National Institutes of Health. The Ronkonkoma, NY resident is also minoring in journalism.
Twenty-one-year-old Suhani Jalota of Duke University and 22-year-old Stony Brook University student Ruchi Shah have found a place in Glamour magazine’s “Top 10 College Women of the Year” list for their leadership qualities and humanitarian work. Each Indian American undergraduate will receive a grand prize of $20,000.
Jalota, an economics and global health major, has been working to reform public health in India’s slums since she was 15. With her winnings she hopes to expand her start-up, Myna Mahila Foundation — which seeks to increase accessibility to menstrual hygiene products and public health infrastructure for economically disadvantaged women in India — to other countries.
She told Glamour magazine: “In India, where I grew up, menstruation is considered impure, and even saying the word period is taboo. It’s hard to imagine. I wanted to chip away at that stigma, but how do you change something people aren’t even willing to talk about?”
Chicago IL: Starz Entertainment, SAHIL, and LA TAN presented the legendary and highly acclaimed Bollywood singers, Kumar Sanu and Alka Yagnik, on April 8th, 2016, from 8:30 PM onwards, at Sears Center Arena, 5333 Prairie Stone Pkwy, Hoffman Estate, IL. A band of twenty fine musicians, who were flown in from India, added great value to the musical extravaganza. The Emcee Ravi Raj Kandle, integrated various graphics on the fly with live camera feed of the concert to the venue’s two 15 ft x28 ft media screens.
It was a night of high-voltage entertainment, glitz, and glamour, all rolled into. The red carpet entrance and stunning stage set added to the high impact making ambience of the venue. The vibrant concert proved to be a treat for music lovers of all ages in Chicago. They were clapping, singing, dancing, and enjoying throughout the concert.
Kumar Sanu kick started the scintillating evening with a number of chartbusters which included: “Dheeray dheeray se merizindagi main aana”, “Do dil mil rahe haimagar chupke chupke”, “Yeh kaali kaali aankhe, ye gore goregaal”, etc. After a huge round of applause, he moved on to such saccharine-sweet romantic compositions as “Bas ek sanamchahiye ashique ke liye”, “Ek ladki ko dekha to aisa laga”, etc.
Alka Yagnik, who is called the nightingale of India, set the stage on fire by giving a power- packed rendition of her all-time hits, including “Tum pas aaye yun muskuraye tum ne na jane kyssapne dikhai”, “Akele hai to kya gham hai”, “Lal dupatta urgaya teri hawa ke jhoke se”,”Tum aai to aaya yaad gali mai aajchand nikla”,”Tip tip barsa pani pani mai aag lagai”,” Bole churiya bole kangna”, “Ek, do, teen, char, panch, che, sath, aath, nau, das giara, bara, tera”. She garnered huge admiration of the audience for her electrifying performance. Jassi Parmar and Vinita Gulabani, who are well-known in the music circuits in Chicago, gave in to the spell of the musical evening, and danced energetically to the fast tunes of quite a few of Alka Yagnik’s renditions.
Finally, the highly sought-after moment arrived which every single person sitting in the Auditorium was eagerly waiting for, that is, the rare opportunity to enjoy the duets of Kumar Sanuand Alka Yagnik. Both of them rendered the everlasting melodies and immortal rock songs from the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’sand mesmerized the audience. As expected, they created magic with their timeless songs and took the listeners down memory lane. Some of the evergreen classics that they sang included:“Tere mare milan ki ye raina”, “Chura ke dil mera goriyachali”, “Zara tasweer say tu nikal ke samme aa merimahbooba”. “Tumhe dekha to ye jana sanam pyar hota haideewana sanam”, “Sarki jo sarke woh dheera dheera”, “Meradil bhi kitna pagal hai ke pyar tum hi se kerta hai”, and many more.
The audience was literally blown away with the dazzling display of the musical talent of Kumar Sanu and Alka Yagnik and their gifted versatility as natural performers. Two popular singers from Chicago, Chetan Laxman Rana and Anuradha Gosh, also enthralled the audience by singing select solos and duets.
Kumar Sanu and Alka Yagnik expressed their heart-felt gratitude for the love they received from the people of Chicago and promised to come back again for another live concert. “Our concerts are being organized in several cities across the USA
“Our commitment to entertain music lovers will continue unabated. Many more high-profile events, aimed at bringing qualitatively-rich entertainment, are in the pipeline such as Dream Team on August 19, 2016 at Sears Center Arena”, said Bhavesh Patel and Babubhai Patel from SAHIL, Nick Patel and Mayur from LA TAN, Savi Singh from Starz Entertainment, and Dr. Manish Pandya of AV Masti Inc unanimously.
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has won the ‘Global Indian of the Year’ award, and was honored at Non-Resident Indian of the Year award function held in Mumbai in the west Indian Maharashtra state on the evening of April 11.
The actress, 42, dedicated the award to her daughter, Aaradhya. “I was very passionate about making it more than a perceived beauty pageant. For me, I all along believed that it was the opportunity to represent an Indian woman on the international platform. I believe that from then until today, in 2016, it continues,” Bachchan said in a statement here.
“I am glad to have been chosen to be a feature film artist and a career woman. I have had so many opportunities, personally, professionally, socially,” she said. The “Dhoom 2” actress will be seen next in “Sarabjit” alongside Randeep Hooda and Richa Chadda.
Besides Bachchan, noted tennis player Sania Mirza was also honored at the NRI of the Year Awards 2016. Altogether 17 individuals were given the awards under different categories like – entrepreneur, professional, academics, arts & culture, philanthropy, special jury award, global icon of the year and India’s global icon award. The NRI of the Year Award recognises outstanding achievements of the Indian diaspora globally.
New York, NY: The Man Who Knew Infinity, a new movie depicting the improbable true story of a unique genius, Srinavasa Ramanujan, whose pivotal theories propelled him from obscurity into a world in the midst of war, and how he fought tirelessly to show the world the genius of his mind, will be shown during the New York Indian Film Festival planned for next month here in the New York City.
The New York Indian Film Festival was the first festival in the United States devoted to Indian films and has grown to be the largest and most influential, helping to set up several other Indian Film festivals in the US. Claus Mueller speaks with the New York Film Festival Executive Director Aroon Shivdasani on the progress story and the problems encountered.
There will be a post-screening discussion with Director Matt Brown, Executive Producer Annie Pressman, Executive Producer Swati Bhise, Lead Actor Devika Bhise, Nobel Laureate Manjul Bhargava immediately following the screening. The screening of this film has been made possible by Executive Producer Swati Bhise.
Colonial India, 1913. Srinavasa Ramanujan (Dev Patel) is a 25-year-old shipping clerk and self-taught genius, who failed out of college due to his near-obsessive, solitary study of mathematics. Determined to pursue his passion despite rejection and derision from his peers, Ramanujan writes a letter to G. H. Hardy (Jeremy Irons), an eminent British mathematics professor at Trinity College, Cambridge. Hardy recognizes the originality and brilliance of Ramanujan’s raw talent and despite the skepticism of his colleagues, undertakes bringing him to Cambridge so that his theories can be explored.
Aroon Shivdasani, the festival’s driving spirit and its executive director, says, “We started this film festival in 2001 because we wanted to showcase Indian Independent and Diaspora films in the US -something that had not been done before. Less than two decades ago, nobody knew about real Indian Cinema in North America. We are the oldest Indian film festival in the US – older than any of the other Indian film festivals that have now cropped up all over the country, like those in Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, and many others. We started as an Indian Diaspora film festival screening films made by Indians living all over the world – outside India.”
Celebrating its 16th anniversary from May 7-14, 2016, the New York Indian Film Festival was the first festival in the United States devoted to Indian films and has grown to be the largest and most influential, helping to set up several other Indian Film festivals in the US. It is part of a comprehensive program in the arts offered by the New York based Indo-American Arts Council.
Chicago IL: Nik Joshi of Shy Entertainment and Manish Pandya of AV Masti Inc, with National Promoters Prria Haider and PurooKaul, presented a high-voltage musical concert with Bollywood’s music composers and singers, Vishal Dadlani and Shekhar Ravjiani, and songstress Neeti Mohan, as the star attraction on Sunday-March 27th, 2016, at Copernicus Theater, 5216 West Lawrence Avenue, Chicago, IL 60630. The high profile event was attended by over 2,000 music lovers from different walks of life.
The Bollywood dynamic duo, Vishal-Shekhar, with several big hit under their belt, captured the hearts of the young generation by singing the most contemporary and popular songs, which included “Bachna ai haseeno”, Ek mai aur ek tu”, “Aa milja haste haste salaam namaste”, “Meri umar ke nowjawano”, etc. The audience was literally blown away with their gifted versatility as natural performers. They garnered huge admiration of the audience for their electrifying performance.
This was followed by a wave of soulful and most haunting melodies of the yesteryears by Vishal and Shehkar, which included “Lag ja gale ke phir a haseen raat ho na ho”, “Choudween ka chand ho ya aaftab ho”, “Pyar huwa ikraar hua hai”, “Mera juta hai japani”, “Kisi ki muskurahaton pe ho nisaar”, “Chura liya hai tumne jo dil ko”, “Roop tera mastana pyar mera deewane”, etc. These all time hits not only uplifted the mood of the audience but also ignited the air with the magic of intense romance.
Neeti Mohan did a fabulous job by rendering the hit tracks of Bollywood and made the evening an occasion to remember forever. She sang such chartbusters as “Jeeya jeeya re”, “ban ke titli ura hai kai door”, Tu hogai one to two”, etc. After a huge round of applause, she moved on to such saccharine-sweet romantic composition as “Jata kaha hai deewane sab kuch yaha hai sanam”, “Sapna jaha dastak na de”, “Manwa lage lage re”, “Har kisi ko nahi milta yaha pyar zindagi main”, “Agi bari bersi khatak gaya se”. etc.
Vishal and Neeti stole the thunder by singing- “Tang Tang”. Vishal picked up his guitar and played it while singing the song and mesmerized the audience. Visha, Shekhar, and Neeti established a live contact with the audience. They took selfies and shook hands with as many members of the audience as possible.
The glittering lights and thundering sound system provided foot-tapping experience to the audience. The magic of the electrifying music, both the timeless classics and the contemporary hits, was so powerful that many members of the audience, irrespective of age and gender, danced endlessly matching the beats of the captivating songs. The sizzling evening started with a tremendous opening performance by a team of dancers from Shingari’s School of Rhythm showcasing various themes of Indian dance forms. The event concluded with a standing ovation by the audience for Vishal, Shekhar, and Neeti. The event Emcee was none other than the gorgeous Ms. India-America, Priya Patel, who added great value to the event by her professional compeering.
New York, NY (April 4, 2016) – The New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) announced the Opening Night Gala film: Bardroy Baretto’s Nachom-ia Kumpasar (Let’s Dance to the Rhythm). LET’S DANCE TO THE RHYTHM is a Konkani feature film- a tribute to Goan music and her musicians. Narrated through the emotional rollercoaster of a love story destined to tragedy, it celebrates Goan music through the eyes of its eclectic’s generation of musicians in the 1960s and 70s.
“Lets Dance to the Rhythm is a beautiful representation of another era, where jazz music flourished outside of the realms of the popular Hindi cinema of Bombay. The film is a joyful celebration of the music, the energy and the musicians and it is a story that not many people know about, states Film Festival Director Aseem Chhabra. “It is truly a happy film and a perfect way for us to launch the 16th edition of the New York Indian Film Festival.”
The festival is widely recognized as the oldest, most prestigious Indian film festival in the United States, showcasing some of the greatest talents working in the diaspora. Celebrating its 16th year, NYIFF will run May 7 to 14 at a variety of prestigious New York City venues, including the Skirball Center for Performing Arts, where the opening and closing films are set to take place.
In addition, the centerpiece and closing films were announced. Renowned filmmaker Hansal Mehta will be closing the festival with his latest work, ALIGARH. Director Mehta provides a look into the real life incident of Dr. Shrinivas Ramchandra Siras, who was suspended from his job because of his sexual orientation. Siras was the professor of Marathi at the Aligarh Muslim University. After successfully appealing his suspension, he died under suspicious circumstances.
HIGHWAY will be featured as the centerpiece film. Umesh Kulkarni’s HIGHWAY is a Marathi film set on the Bombay-Pune Highway and it examines diversity and soul searching. Aroon Shivdansani, Executive Director and Artistic Director of IAAC states “The excitement is growing as our festival approaches! Our flagship event, NYIFF 2016 is proving to be even more exciting than last year!” She adds “The recently announced Indian National Awards included both our 2015 Opening & Closing Night films as well as five films from our current schedule. This year our festival has grown in the number of days, the number of films screened, as well as the depth and variety of themes and languages. Three theatres will screen films simultaneously all day for 8 days with films from all over India and the subcontinent representing myriad regional languages (with English subtitles) while the fourth theatre will entice audiences with fascinating panels on LGBT, Regional Language Cinema, Directors’ First Films, Animation, Industry Panels on Shooting in NYCity & NYState as well as Special Events such as the presentation of films from three generations of filmmakers in the Bimal Roy/Basu Bhattacharya family. Guests to our Opening & Closing Night Galas will be welcomed by amazing local dancers, while filmmakers & celebrities walk off the red carpets to glamorous cocktail parties prior to the reality screenings.”
The Indo-American Arts Council is a registered 501(c)3 not-for-profit, secular service and resource arts organization charged with the mission of promoting and building the awareness, creation, production, exhibition, publication and performance of Indian Sub-Continental and cross-cultural art forms in North America. The IAAC supports all artistic disciplines in the classical, fusion, folk and innovative forms influenced by the arts of India. We work cooperatively with colleagues around the United States to broaden our collective audiences and to create a network for shared information, resources and funding. Our focus is to work with artists and arts organizations in North America as well as to facilitate artists and arts organizations from the Indian Sub-Continent to exhibit, perform and produce their works here.
The New York Indian Film Festival is the oldest, most prestigious Indian film festival in the United States. It is dedicated to showcasing, promoting and building an awareness of Independent, art house and diaspora films from/about/connected to the Indian subcontinent. Our mission is to encourage filmmakers to tell their stories, to educate North America about them and their talent and to facilitate the making and distribution of these films. NYIFF boasts eight days of premiere screenings of feature, documentary & short films, industry panels, special events, retrospectives, red carpet galas, an award ceremony, packed audiences and amazing media coverage.
Chicago IL: A globally-known Egg Artist, Farha Sayeed, wife of Dr. Ausaf Sayeed, Consul General of India in Chicago, held her first solo Egg Art exhibition in Chicago – “The Easter Eggstravaganza” – at the prestigious Chicago Symphony Center in Chicago, Illinois from March 20-21, 2016. A part of the sale proceeds of the Exhibition will go to the America-India Foundation’s Maternal and New Born Survival Initiative (MANSI). The event attracted hundreds of art lovers, state officials, and diplomats from several countries.
Farha exhibited seventy Egg Art pieces during the exhibition comprising creations made out of egg shells of Ostrich, Rhea, Emu, Goose, Duck, Turkey and Guinea. All these pieces were intricately hand-carved in minute detail and embellished with crystals, rhinestone chains, and golden filigree. These creations not only captured the imagination of the visitors but also left them awe-struck.
Over three hundred persons participated in the inaugural ceremony held on Sunday, March 20th, 2016 and dozens of others visited the exhibition during the rest of the day. Renowned tabla maestro Padma Bhushan Ustad Zakir Hussain was one of the internationally renowned persons who graced the event. He praised Farha for the precision and ingenuity demonstrated in her creations.
The other prominent dignitaries who participated in the event included Mr. Hardik Bhatt, Chief Information Officer, Office of Governor Bruce Rauner, State of Illinois; Mr Dennis Jung, Outreach Coordinator, Office of Governor Bruce Rauner; Ms. Nettie Lasko, Immigrant Assistance Program Coordinator, Office of the Attorney General; Ms. Emily Berman, Deputy Director, Office of the Mayor; Ms. Patricia Maza-Pittsford, Dean of the Chicago Consular Corps, Dr Gopal Lalmalani, Mayor of Oak Brook; Hon’ble judges Anthony Simpkins and Divya Sarang, Seann Nelipinath, President of the India Chamber of Commerce, Ms. Paula Garrett Ellis, President of Now Art India; Raja Krishnamoorthi, Congressional candidate for Chicago’s 8thDistrict, Mr. Zain Raj, President & CEO of Shapiroraj and Mrs. Lubaina Raj. Mr. Vimal & Bulbul Bahuguna, Board Members of the American India Foundation, and Consul General’s mother Mrs Kaneez Fatima. Consuls General of Germany, Sweden, South Africa, Philippines, Pakistan, Lithuania, Serbia and several other countries also participated in the event.
During her remarks Farha Sayeed mentioned that she got exposed to Egg Art seventeen years ago while she was in Qatar. “The fragility of an eggshell appealed to me as a unique medium to test my creativity”, she said, adding “I can switch over easily from painting to carving to calligraphy to etching on the egg shell and the scope seems to be unlimited.” Farha mentioned that over the years she had attempted introducing Indian motifs and calligraphy into her art.
Mr. Zain Raj outlined the activities of the American India Foundation with particular reference to the Maternal & Newborn Survival Initiative (MANSI) and thanked Farha for supporting this noble cause.
Consul General of India Dr. Ausaf Sayeed said that while art is important in its own right, it assumes social significance when it is used as a vehicle to find enduring solutions to the problems faced by the people, particularly women and children. He outlined the Consulate’s support to various socio-cultural activities undertaken by the American-Indian Diaspora in Chicagoland.
While all the egg art exhibits were widely appreciated by the visitors, “Eggstravaganza” and “Nirvana”, the lead pieces of the exhibition and a combination of the egg shells of Ostrich, Rhea, and Goose eggs, along with “Apostles of Peace”, a tribute to Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa on an Emu egg shell, drew particular admiration.
Earlier, Farha has hosted her solo exhibitions titled “EGGSPERIENCE” in Copenhagen, “EGGCELLENCE” in Jeddah, “EGGXOTICA” in New Delhi, and “EGGSPRESSIONS” in Sana’a. She had also participated in the Dallas Egg Show 2015 along with other international egg artists. Farha, a member of the international Egg Artists Guild, is considered a pioneer in promoting egg art in India.
Sonika Vaid’s AmericanIdol journey came to an end one week after performing the Frozen song “Let it Go,” but that doesn’t mean her Disney dreams are dashed. After being saved by the judges twice, Indian American singer Sonika Vaid saw her “American Idol” journey ending on March 24 from the Fox singing competition show after she failed to rack up enough audience votes.
The 20-year-old student, who made history as the first contestant of South Asian descent to advance to the ‘Top 5’ of the reality singing completion, had been an early favorite of the judges since opening auditions, who had constantly made admiring comments about her powerful voice.
“I always wanted to work with people like Disney. I have grown up watching Disney movies [and the] Disney channel,” Vaid, 20, told reporters on a conference call on Friday (March 25). “I just love the music that they put out — their whole vibe.”
“Disney is always a dream. That would be really awesome,” the singer said. “I just really like pop and maybe a little bit of R&B, but now that I sang rock on the show, that’s always an option, but pop is something I am really going to just stick to.”
Vaid looked like a gorgeous Disney princess right out of a movie, singing songs like Evanescence’s “Bring Me to Life” in a flowing black dress. The singer said she loved to get all dolled up, “even for the dark songs.”
“I was singing Evanescence in this beautiful gown that made me feel like I was going to the Oscars. The wardrobe team was just insane,” she said. “The dress I was going to wear for [the Sia song] “Love Me Back to Life” was breathtaking. I’m a little sad that I didn’t get to wear it because it’s really beautiful.”
While working with the mouse is at the top of Vaid’s wish list, she also wants to stick with pop if she continues to pursue music. The episode marked the Martha’s Vineyard resident’s third time in the bottom, and now that there were no saves left on the farewell season of the show, Vaid, whose rendition of pop hit “Clarity” by DJ Zedd featuring English singer Fox on March 17 couldn’t pull in the fan votes, was sent home.
“Being in this competition has been the biggest journey of my life,” Vaid, who sobbed on being axed, said in her final words before thanking the judges and her mother.
“I think I got more comfortable being onstage. I just feel so blessed to be here right now. This has been such an amazing experience. I came out of my comfort zone and it’s been like a dream for me.”
Only two Indian Americans in the past have made it to the finals of the much famed singing competition. Sanjaya Malakar advanced to the seventh place on the sixth season while Anoop Desai achieved a sixth place finish on the eighth season of the show.
Nalini Malani from India was among the three artists honored by The Asia Society as artists, art collectors, art dealers, and members of the Hong Kong business community packed the Conrad Hotel at the kick off Art Basel Hong Kong, a week of major art events in the city. Cai Guo-Qiang and Yoshitomo Nara, were the other two artists to be honored, as Asia Society Vice President for Global Arts & Cultural Programs Boon Hui Tan put it, “touching our souls.”
The artists — giants in contemporary Asian art — were named “Asia Arts Game Changers” at Asia Society’s 2016 Asia Arts Awards for their transformative work in the field. All three artists have been showcased, often early in their careers, by Asia Society. Nara, whose fanciful — and sometimes unsettling — illustrations of children were recognized for being “the mirror image of ourselves,” has had major shows at Asia Society Museum in New York (Nobody’s Fool, 2010) and at Asia Society Hong Kong (Life is Only One: Yoshitomo Nara, 2015).
Malani, a “champion of the marginalized,” had her work shown at Asia Society Museum in New York as a part of Traditions/Tensions: Contemporary Art in Asia (1996) and in the one-person exhibition Transgressions(2014). Cai Guo-Qiang’s solo exhibition An Explosion Event: Light Show Over Central Park was on view at Asia Society Museum, New York, in 2003. His work was also featured in the Society’s groundbreaking 1998 exhibition Inside Out: New Chinese Art.
Guests at the Hong Kong event, which included Asia Society’s global board of trustees, also bid on works of contemporary Asian art, donated by the artists themselves to benefit Asia Society’s work. A standout was the painting Noble’s Virtue by Chinese icon Pan Gongkai, who was also on hand for the event.
“Artists often feel isolated and uncertain,” said Cai, who thanked Asia Society for its long-time support and inspiration, and said the honor “will encourage me to be more courageous in my work.”
Beyond the celebration of today’s contemporary stars, the evening’s main theme was Asia Society’s role as a standard bearer for new artists. Said Cai, “Wherever Asia Society goes, Asia follows.”
NEW YORK —Vasudeo S. Gaitonde, one of India’s most important abstract artist’s masterpiece painting ‘Untitled’ fetched a whopping $2.8 million at Sotheby’s, leading the sales at a week-long auction of Southeast Asian works of art at the auction house here, last week, during ‘Asia Week New York.’
Sotheby’s sales of Indian, Himalayan and Southeast Asian works of art altogether raised $55 million. Gaitonde’s painting, the largest-known canvas by the artist, led both the sales and all of Sotheby’s Asia Week New York auctions. The art sale included works by India’s modern masters, including Amrita Sher-Gil and Raja Ravi Varma.
The auction was commissioned by Air India to commemorate the addition of transatlantic flights to their schedule, the auction house said in a statement. “Our sale built on the growing western interest in modern and contemporary South Asian art with great results for artists, such as Nasreen Mohamedi and Bhupen Khakhar, who are soon to be the subjects of exhibitions at the newly-opened Met Breuer… They joined the likes of V.S. Gaitonde and Amrita Sher-Gil at the highest echelons of the auction market,” Yamini Mehta, international head of department of Indian and South Asian art at Sotheby’s, said.
An untitled portrait of a lady in a russet and crimson sari by Varma, India’s earliest oil painter, went for almost 2.5 times its estimate, selling at $586,000. Henry Howard-Sneyd, chairman of Asian Arts, Americas and Europe at Sotheby’s, said the Asia Week total of about $55 million was at the “top of pre-sale expectations, proving that clients across the globe remain actively engaged in collecting the finest examples of Asian Art.”
From the best-selling author and Pulitzer Prize winner, “In Other Words” (Knopf, 231 pp., **½ out of four stars) is a powerful nonfiction debut— which has been described as an “honest, engaging, and very moving account of a writer searching for herself in words.”
According to critiques, In Other Words is a revelation. It is at heart a love story—of a long and sometimes difficult courtship, and a passion that verges on obsession: that of a writer for another language. For Jhumpa Lahiri, that love was for Italian, which first captivated and capsized her during a trip to Florence after college. Although Lahiri studied Italian for many years afterward, true mastery always eluded her.
As per some critiques, there’s a beautiful medium-length essay lost somewhere in Jhumpa Lahiri’s unilluminating and self-regarding new book In Other Words. Its conceit is exciting — one of the most gifted living writers of English prose deciding mid-career to write in Italian, daring failure — and it has moments of the cool and piercing emotional acuity that characterize her four previous books.
But too few of them, and thematically Lahiri (The Lowland, The Namesake) never moves far past her initial awe at the act of audacity it has taken her to write these essays and short fictions. Late on she says she composed them “as if they were homework for my Italian lessons.” Well, we think — yes, that sounds about right.
Seeking full immersion, she decides to move to Rome with her family, for “a trial by fire, a sort of baptism” into a new language and world. There, she begins to read, and to write—initially in her journal—solely in Italian. In Other Words, an autobiographical work written in Italian, investigates the process of learning to express oneself in another language, and describes the journey of a writer seeking a new voice.
What drove this experiment, in which Lahiri presents her Italian writings and their English translations (by Ann Goldstein) on facing pages? Language is essential to the identity of many of Lahiri’s Indian-American characters, and In Other Words describes the author’s own linguistic history. Her first memories of speech are of learning Bengali, but it was in English that she became American, and in English that she achieved fame as a writer.
By this light, her adoption of Italian seems felicitously ambiguous, another gesture of rebirth. She moves to Rome, and, writing in the city’s language, with a little dictionary at hand, says, “I’m aware of a state of deprivation. And yet, at the same time, I feel free, light. I rediscover the reason I write, the joy as well as the need.”
There’s the promise of something profound in this cleansing reinvention, midway upon life’s journey. But In Other Words never does much more than reiterate this central idea, declining to follow it too deep into the reaches of autobiography — Lahiri is steelier than ever here — and alighting instead on a series of year-abroad banalities about the minor errors involved in learning a new language.
Presented in a dual-language format, this is a wholly original book about exile, linguistic and otherwise, written with an intensity and clarity not seen since Vladimir Nabokov: a startling act of self-reflection and a provocative exploration of belonging and reinvention.
And indeed she treats these not with any sense of humor, which might have given them charm, but with deep gravity, a quality that pushes the book from disappointing to irritating. The tutors and publishers and friends who fill its vignettes are all solemnly reverent about her journey into Italian, and she herself refers to other writers famous for working in a second language (Conrad, Beckett, Nabokov) without quite the same irony and self-doubt that attended their transitions.
Add to this an understandable diminution in the excellence of her prose (phrases like “a stunning clarity,” which could be selling you a television, keep popping up), and a more surprising impoverishment of imagery (within a few pages she twice identifies new words in Italian as jewel-like, a weary simile from the outset), and you have a good author’s first bad book.
But even a bad book by a writer as gifted as Jhumpa Lahiri has something to offer. “Why do I write?” she asks at one of this volume’s elusive high moments, which call to mind the power of which she’s capable. “To investigate the mystery of existence. To tolerate myself. To get closer to everything that is outside of me.” It will be thrilling when she resumes that project.
(Los Angeles, CA – March 18, 2016) After 22 sold-out screenings at mainstream and South Asian film festivals around North America in 2015 and multiple audience and jury awards under its belt, the smart, witty, coming-of-age comedy feature, “Miss India America,” will have a special, red-carpet screening, followed by a Q&A with the cast/team, in Los Angeles on March 24th. The limited theatrical release will take place at theaters in Washington, D.C., Chicago and San Jose starting on Friday, March 25th, for a one-week run. Following the theatrical release, the movie will be available on the following broadband platforms starting Tuesday, April 5th: Amazon, GooglePlay, iTunes, Vimeo, Vudu, Xfinity and Sling.
The brainchild of husband/wife creative team Ravi Kapoor (director/co-writer) and Meera Simhan (actor/co-writer), the cross-cultural comedy is set against the backdrop of the Indian beauty pageant world in Los Angeles. Inspired by Simhan’s one-woman-show of the same title, “Miss India America” stars Texas native Tiya Sircar (The Internship, 17 Again, Vampire Diaries) andHannah Simone (of Fox television series New Girl fame), along with a supporting cast of talented actors, including Kosha Patel, Satya Bhabha, Cas Anwar, Rizwan Manji, Anjali Bhimani and Bernard White. Produced byMegha Kadakia and Saurabh Kikani and distributed by MarVista Entertainment, the feature film “establishes an authentic tone that pays respect to Indian cultural norms, while poking gentle fun at these traditions,” raves The Hollywood Reporter.
Freida Pinto is the latest actress to join forces with Andy Serkis for his directorial debut, Jungle Book: Origins. Pinto is not only loaning her voice, but is playing one of the actual flesh-and-blood roles alongside Matthew Rhys and Rohan Chand. Freida Pinto, who found popularity with her appearance in “Slumdog Millionaire”, is excited to be a part of “Jungle Book: Origins”. She says her life has come full circle with the Hollywood project.
Freida is voicing Mowgli’s adoptive mother in the Warner Brothers’ motion capture live-action adventure adaptation of “The Jungle Book”, based on the novel by Kipling. And the actress asserts that the film is worth the wait. “It’s going to be a while for ‘Jungle Book…’. It will release in 2017. I am pretty excited about it because we all used to watch it on Doordarshan every Sunday. We loved watching it. Life kind of becomes full circle to participate in a project like that,” Freida told the media.
Directed by Andy Serkis, who also gives voice to friendly bear Baloo, the cast includes names like Benedict Cumberbatch, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, and Indian-American child actor Rohan Chand as Mowgli. She added: “It is Andy and I am super excited.”
Slumdog breakout Pinto was in 2011’s Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes with Serkis who is directing Jungle Book from a script by Callie Kloves. He’s also producing with Steve Kloves and Jonathan Cavendish. Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, and Benedict Cumberbatch feature in the voice cast.
While there is still time for “Jungle Book: Origins” to hit the screens, Freida is back on the screen with her next project, Terrence Malick’s film “Knight of Cups” opposite Hollywood’s “The Dark Knight” Bale. The film hit the screens in the US last week.
The actress told Entertainment Tonight that she’s very excited about the role. “I read The Jungle Book and watched the TV series in India growing up, and for me, to finally be part of the film that reminds me so much of my childhood is just amazing,” she said.
“It’s one of those films that I feel, no matter what age group you are, you’re going to enjoy that film, and I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve done something like that, because most of my films have not been good enough for children. A little too intense, so I’m very happy to finally be doing a film that can be [watched by kids].”
Rutgers, NJ: Between taking center stage in Jesse Eisenberg’s off-Broadway production The Spoils last spring and getting cast alongside Damian Lewis and Paul Giamatti this winter in Showtime’s Billions, it’s safe to say Annapurna Sriram’s star is on the rise.
But three years ago, the 2011 Mason Gross BFA’s career was in slumpsville. “I hadn’t had work. I’d had a bad break up and bad representation,” she said of the rough patch that lasted about six months. “When you’re as ambitious and impatient as I am, it felt like ‘I’m wasting precious time!’ ” Acting is the only vocation the Nashville native had ever envisioned for herself. “I decided I wanted to be an actor because I was so bad at school growing up,” said Sriram.
She chased her dream with gusto: hustling for gigs before she entered a performing arts high school, graduating from Rutgers’ Mason Gross School of the Arts with an agent and landing her first community theater gig – with Red Bank’s Two River Theatre – when the ink on her diploma was barely dry.
Yet there she was, paying rent on her Gowanus, Brooklyn, apartment with babysitting money. That’s when a friend with a small local record label asked her to do a web comedy series. Sriram was so hungry for the opportunity to get back to her craft that she not only worked for free she also footed the bill.
“I maxed out a credit card feeding everyone and buying all the props, and I edited it on a pirated version of Final Cut Pro,” the 26-year-old said of the project. She built a set in her apartment and clearly had fun creating an eccentric cast of musical characters for the “Gowanus Music Lab Presents” webisodes.
And then, the project was scrapped. “I thought the whole thing was for nothing,” said Sriram. But the experience – which showed off the half-Indian, half-white actress’s newfound comedic chops and her ability to inhabit a variety of racially diverse characters – was her ticket.
“Those tapes booked me my first TV job on South of Hell, ” she said of the 2015 supernatural horror WEtv series starring Mena Suvari. “People kept telling me, ‘You have a way different range than we had assumed.’ ” The irony that her ethnically mixed background is an advantage in her field, while still a disadvantage in the real world for so many who look like her is not lost on Sriram.
“It’s a fad. We’re in a day and age where being ethnically ambiguous – which is what I am – is a commodity,” she said. “My goal and my purpose in the industry is to reclaim what the face of America really looks like and show that being other is just as American as being white.”
Last year Eisenberg tapped Sriram to play the girlfriend of The Big Bang Theory’s Kunal Nayyar in his dark comedy The Spoils about an obnoxious trust fund millennial and his snarky circle of friends.
“He is so funny, so smart,” said Sriram of Eisenburg. “And Scott Elliot is one of the most amazing directors. He’s similar to (Mason Gross associate head of acting) Kevin Kittle in his style. He really wants simple, authentic work.”
For Sriram, The Spoils was a turning point: It was the moment when her Mason Gross training came full circle. “A lot of the stuff we learned at Rutgers was marinating. It was in me, but I didn’t know how to use it fully,” she said. “The Spoils was the first time that the pieces were starting to come together for me.”
Then it was back to the small screen for a meaty three-episode role on “Billions,” which airs 10 p.m. Sundays on Showtime. Sriram plays Tara Mohr, the hard-partying, blackmailed employee of Giamatti’s U.S. attorney character. “TV is definitely something I’m still figuring out. It requires this super high level of relaxation and trust in yourself,” she said. “Paul made the room safe. He’s incredibly funny and light and really a joy to work with.”
Though Sriram has developed relationships with other advocates and mentors in the industry, such as Giamatti, she said she is indebted to her first cheerleaders: Kittle and Barbara Marchant, head of acting at Mason Gross.
“Kevin and Barbara are so incredible in the way that they teach. They just pour their lives into it,” she said. “They come and see my work still. The relationship was beyond just having a professor because their job is basically to carry us into a career. They were kind of like shepherds in that way.”
These days, Sriram is happy to report that she is fully supporting herself through her acting career. (“I also have a roommate and one bedroom, which helps,” she said.). She is grateful for the success she’s experienced. “I’m aware of how lucky I’ve been. But there’s still a long way I want to go.”
Jersey City, NJ: With Bollywood superstar Salman Khan Tweeting about the Video of Indian American Kid Rapping, Sparsh Shah, a 12-year-old Indian American rapper based in New Jersey, got global recognition. Salman Khan on March 14 tweeted a video of him rapping to Eminem’s song “Not Afraid.”
The video of this boy sitting in a wheelchair and rapping was posted on YouTube at the beginning of this year, Jan. 2 — don’t miss the decorated Christmas tree in the background — but, post-Khan’s tweet, it got over 1.6 million hits. No mean feat by any stretch.
When Khan Bhai (known to applaud and promote true talent) posts something on his Twitter page, his fans sit up and notice — the Tweet was liked by 7,000 fans and re-tweeted over 3,000 times.
After the video was posted, everyone wanted to know more about the talented rapper. His Twitter page describes him as “a singer/song writer/rapper born with brittle bones (120+fractures), but an unbreakable spirit,” and states, “He aspires 2 sing in front of a Billion people one day.” Now that’s quite a dream. Shah noticed Khan’s Tweet and thanked him promptly in a Tweet.
New York, NY: Pia Padukone’s new book, “The Fasces of Strangers” will have a launch event planned for March 30@7pm at the Barnes and Noble on Upper West Side at 2289 Broadway (Between 82/83 Streets) in New York City.
The highly acclaimed author of Where Earth Meets Water, Pia Padukone returns with an arresting exploration of family and culture. When native New Yorker Nicholas Grand applies for an international student exchange program, he thinks it’s an opportunity to broaden his horizons and meet some interesting people. He never imagines that a single year would have repercussions that would follow him throughout his lifetime.
Nicholas is sent to Estonia, where he meets shy, sensitive Paavo, his beautiful sister, Mari, and their gruff father, Leo—a family grappling with the challenges of life in a small country struggling to assert its post-Soviet identity. Nicholas sets off on an unforgettable journey through a foreign landscape that ultimately teaches him that some bonds can never be broken.
Bridging two uniquely captivating cities, The Faces of Strangers traces the intertwined lives of two seemingly symmetrical families from extraordinarily different worlds. This compelling odyssey through friendship and self-discovery illuminates the universality of how deeply we are defined by our connections with others.
Growing up in New York City has its privileges, which certainly helped shape Pia’s life. Her future in writing was cemented early, at age 12 when she won the Barnard College Young Women’s Writing Award – long before she was eligible to enter (at age 18).
Pia derives much literary inspiration from the world around her – witnessing interactions while running in Central Park, overhearing delicious snippets of gossip in waiting rooms, as well as those ever-engaging exchanges on the subway. All these combined with her fascination with her parents’ past lives in India before they settled in New York were the impetus behind Where Earth Meets Water.
During her years in London, Pia wrote for Star News and the London desk of the Associated Press, covering many high-profile stories including the protests against the Iraq War. She wrote press kits and position papers for a Member of Parliament representing Birmingham. Pia and her husband Rohit maintain a reading and eating blog, Two Admirable Pleasures, which combines their two loves: the written word and the recipes that are inspired by them.
Pia is a graduate of Stuyvesant High School and the London School of Economics. She entered the professional writing world as a copywriter in pharmaceutical advertising. Pia was a finalist for Seventeen Magazine’s fiction writing award and more recently a winner of the Women on Writing Flash Fiction Contest.
(NEW YORK – March 20, 2016) “Kapoor & Sons – Since 1921” starring Sidharth Malhotra, Alia Bhatt, Fawad Khan, and Rishi Kapoor, has generated the biggest Bollywood opening weekend of the year in North America grossing an estimated $965,000 over the March 18 – 20 period. The acclaimed Karan Johar production from Fox Star Studios and Dharma Productions beat out the $878,000 debut weekend of Akshay Kumar’s Airlift which previously held the record for 2016.
The Times of India gave “Kapoor & Sons” four stars stating “Wicked, witty and wise, Kapoor & Sons does Karan Johar proud!” Bollywood Hungama also gave a four-star review remarking “Kapoor & Sons makes for an excellent movie that you must watch with your entire family!”
Filmfare exclaimed “there’s no way on earth you should miss this movie,” while Firstpost said “this endearing flick gives ‘Neerja’ competition for Best Hindi film of 2016.”
Shakun Batra‘s first film was an unusual romance – one in which the boy and girl didn’t end up together. Four years later, Batra is back with “Kapoor and Sons“, a family drama with Sidharth Malhotra, Alia Bhatt and Fawad Khan in lead roles.
Handout still from “Kapoor and Sons” Batra spoke to Reuters about the film, the influence of Woody Allen and Wes Anderson on his film-making and why he cast Rishi Kapoor, 63, as a 90-year-old. In a nutshell, some family films are better off as either tele-films or (finite) TV serials. Especially when the writing team and director cannot decide how much to keep real and life-like, and how much to keep overtly melodramatic.
This mix of old-world family drama told in a new-age way with contemporary and young nuances does hit the right chords off and on, but overall, the script changes graph jerkily in the second half just when we feel things are trekking back to course slowly for the harangued characters.
Of course, there is justification shown for things the way they happen, and we liked the way tragedy is graphically shown in a very ‘60s to ‘80s way yet through the cell phone, but overall, the sudden shift from the humor to the serious and even maudlin could have been better written and handled, or changed smoothly like a “Dil Chahta Hai.”
Briefly, the film’s story is about old man Kapoor, Dadaji (Rishi Kapoor), now 90, and in a hospital bed from a heart ailment, who is stubborn, naughty, endearingly child-like and emotionally strong all at the same time. He has two sons, and the second, Harsh (Rajat Kapoor) with whom he lives in Ooty, is the head of a dysfunctional family, complete with wife Sarita (Ratna Pathak Shah), who suspects his affair with ex-colleague Anu (Anuradha Chandan); his two sons Arjun (Sidharth Malhotra) and Rahul (Fawad Khan), both aspiring authors working abroad, with Rahul doing well, and Arjun always considered the un-focused loser; and of course Harsh himself.
The outsider coming into their life is Tia (Alia Bhatt), who has lost her parents in an accident, and is a seemingly happy-go-lucky lass. Both brothers encounter her separately, and Arjun suspects Rahul of also being in love with her like he is.
A welcome home-cum-90th birthday party is held by the family for Dadaji when he returns home from the hospital, but, thanks to the family’s basic temperament, the celebrations go bust. Later, all that the old man wants before he dies is a family photograph with everyone, including the other son and his normal family, who soon visit him. But with each person from Harsh’s family having either a skeleton in their closet or a grudge, will that ever happen?
Though not too long, the film could have still been sharper, more concise and not so retro whenever it decides to suddenly veer towards melodrama, flip-flopping between real and ‘filmi,’ and being unnecessarily dark in its cinematography — Ooty never looked so unappetizing! The music, shoddily used and content-wise not up to the mark, fails to boost the movie. The background score is just about serviceable.
The dialogues do work most of the time. But when financial problems are given so much prominence in the beginning (as one of the root causes of conflict) and then suddenly disappear, and the family seems to be having a luxurious lifestyle, we wonder what the scriptwriter was (not) thinking. Also, Arjun buying property was something vague too, again disposed of at convenience.
Shakun Batra scores far better vis-à-vis his debut film “Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu” and handles the emotions well in most sequences, but, as we said, the totality does not add up. He extracts wonderful performances, in particular from Rishi Kapoor with his spontaneous one-liners, Fawad Khan and Ratna Pathak-Shah. Bhatt is good but scores over everyone else in the cast in her breakdown sequence — the build-up and her expressions are incredibly heart-tugging. The rest of the cast does a good job, though Malhotra has only a sketchy role.
Washington, DC: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will join the ranks of prominent global leaders at Madame Tussauds in London, Singapore, Hong Kong and Bangkok next month, the world famous wax museum announced March 16th.
Describing him as a “hugely important figure in world politics,” the museum said the Indian prime minister had given the museum’s team of artists and experts a sitting at his residence in New Delhi earlier this year.
“Madame Tussauds has crafted figures of very distinguished dignitaries from around the world — how could I regard myself worthy of being alongside them? But when I was informed that your decision had emanated from public opinion and public sentiment, I was comforted,” Modi said in a statement to the museum.
“During my sitting, I observed the team carefully and was deeply impressed by its dedication, professionalism and skill. I have visited Madame Tussauds three or four times and had the pleasure of getting myself photographed standing next to the figures of various dignitaries,” he said.
The wax figures at each of the museum’s locations around Europe and Asia will be dressed in Modi’s “signature kurta” in cream with a jacket and he will be featured in a traditional pose “making a namaste gesture.”
“Prime Minister Modi is a hugely important figure in world politics, a position supported by his place in the top 10 of Time Magazine’s ‘Person of the Year List 2015’,” said museum spokesperson Kieran Lancini.
“His massive social media presence — he is currently the second most followed politician on twitter after President Obama — also confirms the intense interest the public have in him, a fact supported by the requests our guests have made for us to create his figure.
“We are delighted to be including the prime minister’s figure in our attractions in London, Singapore, Hong Kong and Bangkok,” he said. Each figure took a team of Madame Tussauds’ artists four months and cost around 150,000 pounds to create.
“Guests will be able to stand shoulder to shoulder and measure up to one of the most powerful men in the world – and even grab a selfie when the figures arrive in their locations,” the museum said. The launch in London and all other centers is expected around late April and it is yet to be confirmed if Modi would be personally unveiling himself in wax at any of the four locations.
A new branch of Madame Tussauds is also set to open in New Delhi as part of the India-UK Year of Culture in 2017, announced during Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the UK last November.
Indian American singer Sonika Vaid gave it her all for a shot at the last spot in the ‘Top 6’ of “American Idol,” when she took on Whitney Houston’s classic, “I Have Nothing,” on March 10. According to reports, the 20-year-old Vaid, however, failed to amass enough audience votes, which put her in the bottom 3 of the competition.
The episode saw the other two contestants from the ‘Top 8’ being eliminated from the competition, but Vaid, who received glowing reviews from the judges, also won their safety after her emotion-oozing performance.
The judges thought that Vaid did enough justice to the classic number, and decided that she belonged in the ‘Top 6.’ The judges, though impressed with her performance, however, felt that she still needed to loosen up.
The Massachusetts-based singer has been on top for much of this competition alongside being a judges’ favorite, who have often complimented her on her sterling vocals. In fact, during the auditions of the singing competition show, judge Harry Connick, Jr. had remarked that she had a “winning voice,” and that “this is one of the only times, this particular season, that I saw somebody that I can think can actually win this thing.”
The March 10 show kicked off with duet performances during which Vaid teamed up with Avalon Young to sing “Rise Up” by Andra Day. The duo brought out the best in each other. The ‘Top 5’ contestants will be revealed March 17 during a two-hour episode of “American Idol,” which airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. EST on Fox. The series finale will air in the first week of April.
Indian American model and television personality Padma Lakshmi has written a revealing autobiography, which includes intimate details of her failed marriage to celebrated author Salman Rushdie. Laxmi, 45, one of the judges on the television show “Top Chef,” chronicles details of her relationship with the Mumbai-born Booker Prize-winning author in her memoir “Love, Loss and What We Ate.” “I just wanted my own identity. I was making the transition out of one stage of my life and into another. But in order to do that, it required that I wasn’t everywhere that he (Rushdie) needed me to be,” she told People magazine.
“Love, Loss And What We Ate,” a memoir by Padma Lakshmi, who became a celebrity in her own right since she divorced Rushdie in 2007 after a three-year marriage, was quoted in the media saying the memoir started off as a book about health and healthy eating using her own life as an example, instead ended up as a reflection on “love and heartbreak” – spanning her tumultuous affair and marriage to Rushdie, the painful break up, to finding love again with billionaire Teddy Forstmann, who died three years ago.
A vivid memoir of food and family, survival and triumph, Love, Loss, and What We Ate traces the arc of Padma Lakshmi’s unlikely path from an immigrant childhood to a complicated life in front of the camera. Long before Padma Lakshmi ever stepped onto a television set, she learned that how we eat is an extension of how we love, how we comfort, how we forge a sense of home—and how we taste the world as we navigate our way through it. Shuttling between continents as a child, she lived a life of dislocation that would become habit as an adult, never quite at home in the world. And yet, through all her travels, her favorite food remained the simple rice she first ate sitting on the cool floor of her grandmother’s kitchen in South India.
Poignant and surprising, Love, Loss, and What We Ate is Lakshmi’s extraordinary account of her journey from that humble kitchen, ruled by ferocious and unforgettable women, to the judges’ table of Top Chef and beyond. It chronicles the fierce devotion of the remarkable people who shaped her along the way, from her headstrong mother who flouted conservative Indian convention to make a life in New York, to her Brahmin grandfather—a brilliant engineer with an irrepressible sweet tooth—to the man seemingly wrong for her in every way who proved to be her truest ally. A memoir rich with sensual prose and punctuated with evocative recipes, it is alive with the scents, tastes, and textures of a life that spans complex geographies both internal and external.
The memoir also details her relationship and bitter split with venture capitalist Adam Dell, who is the father of her daughter that she conceived when she was still with Forstmann. All this, of course, is not very new as the tabloids over the years had several exposes on the three-way relationship. What’s new, steamy and dark in the memoir is all about the author of “The Moor’s Last Sigh” and “The Satanic Verses.”
The Indian-American model and the host of the popular Top Chef was 28 when she started an affair with the married 51-year-old writer. A report in the Daily News said “the pair first met in 1999 at a party. On their first real date — Rushdie initially wooed her by phone since she lived in Los Angeles — the pair fell into bed.” The report quotes her memoir saying, “at 3 a.m., I woke with a start. I’m naked in a married man’s bed.”
The two married after Rushdie divorced his third wife. While their early years were full of passion (Lakshmi, reportedly, alludes to great sex and great food) things began to sour as she focused on her career, a report in the People magazine said. “I just wanted my own identity,” the report quotes her saying. “I was making the transition out of one stage of my life and into another. But in order to do that, it required that I wasn’t everywhere that he (Rushdie) needed me to be.”
Gleaning from the reports, their relationship strained at two levels – professional and personal. Lakshmi bitches about how Rushdie had to be consoled each year when he didn’t win a Nobel Prize, even as she describes how disappointed she was at his disinterest in her career and success.
At the personal level, things had deteriorated when Lakshmi could not keep up with Rushdie’s sexual demands because of a condition that was much later diagnosed as endometriosis, which caused chronic pain. “It’s not that I didn’t want to be there for him, but something was very deeply wrong … And I didn’t understand it. And that caused a whole lot of misunderstanding,” Lakshmi says in her memoir.mAccording to the Telegraph, Lakshmi accuses Rushdie of describing her as “a bad investment” after she refused his sexual advances, and paints him as a cold and heartless husband.
The last straw was when after one five-hour surgery, Lakshmi returns home “with stitches in four major organs and stents in both kidneys. Rushdie left the next day for a trip.” “The show must go on, after all,” he apparently told Lakshmi, on his way out the door. Next time she stepped out of the house, Lakshmi went to see a divorce lawyer. She writes about how at first their marriage was blissful, and Rushdie used to make breakfast for her every morning. But the book then goes on to paint a portrait of a demanding husband in need of constant attention. Lakshmi claims Rushdie was insensitive to a medical condition. Lakshmi later divorced Rushdie in 2007 and went on to become involved with Ted Forstmann, the billionaire chief executive of sports and artist management company IMG, who died in 2011 at age 71. She has a six-year-old daughter with venture capitalist Adam Dell.
New York-based Rushdie, 68, has not responded to his ex-wife’s claims so far. Shortly after his marriage to Lakshmi ended, Rushdie had said, “It’s strange, given that I’ve been married four times, but I actually don’t think marriage is necessary.” “Girls like it, especially if they’ve never been married before. It’s the dress. Girls want a wedding; they don’t want a marriage. If only you could have weddings without marriages,” Rushdie had said. Love, Loss, and What We Ate is an intimate and unexpected story of food and family—both the ones we are born to and the ones we create—and their enduring legacies.
Bedminster, NJ: Erasing Borders Exhibition of Contemporary Indian Art of the Diaspora is scheduled to open with a reception on Thursday March 17th, 5-7 pm at The Center for Contemporary Art, 2020 Burnt Mills Rd, Bedminister, NJ.
Erasing Borders is a richly provocative exhibition by artists of the Indian diaspora who confront issues of sexuality, terror, disease, the environment, racial and sectarian politics in painting, prints, installations, video, and sculpture. With great technical mastery and diversity of theme and style, these works combine traditional Indian aesthetics with Western elements, and speak to the powerful experience of personal and cultural dislocation in the global village. In its twelfth year, Erasing Borders is curated by Vijay Kumar and produced by the Indo-American Arts Council. Free and open to the public.
The Center for Contemporary Art in collaboration with the Indo-American Arts Council is hosting annual “Erasing Borders Exhibition of Contemporary Indian Art of the Diaspora.” The Indo-American Arts Council’s production “Erasing Borders,” curated by Vijay Kumar, is a stimulating exhibition that presents artists of the Indian diaspora who challenge issues of sexuality, terror, disease, the environment, racial and sectarian politics in painting, prints, installations, video, and sculpture. The diverse theme and style of the art juxtaposes traditional Indian aesthetics with Western elements. It also expresses the hardship of personal and cultural disturbance throughout the worldwide community.
Bollywood actress Preity Zinta has confirmed that she has given up her ‘Miss’ tag by marrying her American beau Gene Goodenough. The dimpled beauty made the announcement on her official social media pages, just days after news of her secret wedding in Los Angeles surfaced.
“I was holding on the ‘Miss Tag’ rather seriously till now, until I met someone ‘Goodenough’ to give it up for. So now I join the Married Club folks. “Thank you all for your good wishes and for all your love. Love you all. Ting! Let the Goodenough jokes begin,” Preity wrote.
Last year, there were reports that she will be marrying Goodenough in January, and then around Valentine’s Day. But back then, she had declined the reports, saying that she is fed up with all the speculation about her personal life.
But the virtual world went into a tizzy earlier this week over news of the “Kal Ho Naa Ho” actress’ wedding as veteran actor Kabir Bedi congratulated her.
Preity’s close friends, fashion designer and stylist Surily Goel and Sussanne Khan were also reportedly a part of the celebrations. Online memes surrounding Preity and her husband began in no time once the news of their wedding news spread.
A user posted: “Finally #PreityZinta married a Goodenough Gene!”, while another shared: “Actress Preity Zinta gets married to Gene Goodenough – so will she now have the epic name, Preity Goodenough?”. But as one can make out from her latest social media post, Preity has taken them all in the right stride.
Bollywood actress Nimrat Kaur will soon be jetting off to Vancouver, Canada, to shoot for India American filmmaker Manoj Night Shyamalan’s TV series, “Wayward Pines,” and hopes to have a lot “fun” with the show’s foreign cast.
The actress, who garnered applause for her role as a Pakistani ISI agent on Showtime’s political thriller series, “Homeland,” will be adding a mysterious twist to “Wayward Pines” as an architect. She said details of her role in the psychological thriller will be unraveled gradually.
“I’m playing the part of a girl called Rebecca, who’s an architect and it’s very mysterious, and you know like cards that unfold episode after episode and towards the end of the season, you realize who she really is and what her role is in the world they live in,” Kaur said in a statement.
She said the team will start filming very soon. “I will be joining them soon in three-four days at most. It should be fun. We will be filming in Vancouver and maybe little bit in Los Angeles, so I am going to be stationed out there.”
The “Airlift” actress will be paired with actor Jason Patric in the series, which is based on the “Wayward Pines’” novels by Blake Crouch and developed for television by Chad Hodge. The first season of the series is currently being aired on FX in India.
The series stars Matt Dillon as Ethan Burke, a U.S. Secret Service agent investigating the disappearance of two fellow agents in the mysterious small town of Wayward Pines, Idaho.
All praise for her co-stars Jason Patric and Djimon Hounsou, Kaur is already in prep mode for her part – and that too via Skype! “I actually Skyped with M. Night Shyamalan about a week ago and we had a really lovely chat about what season two is going to be about. He wanted me to watch it and then kind of discuss my character little better in depth but I have not come along to doing that yet.
“He is super excited about the season two and he’s like we are moving up a notch with how we are presenting the season two.” Kaur’s body of work might not be very elaborate, but her credibility shines through her work in films such as “Airlift” and “The Lunchbox.” And now with “Wayward Pines,” the actress is eager to explore a new arena.
“Well I am super excited because this is a genre that I have never worked in before and also found this premise very exciting.”
“I have to say that I haven’t watched the first season yet. I have had my hands full so haven’t gotten down to watching it, but I have heard incredible things about it. I have heard that it’s really cool and it had people hooked right up till the end,” she said.
Though not winning any wards, India was represented at the annual Oscar by Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra who is on an upward trajectory in Hollywood with her lead role as a rookie FBI agent in the series, Quantico. She appeared on the red carpet in a languorous, body hugging, shoulder less white embroidered dress with a trail, created by Lebanese designer Zuhair Murad and featured in his Spring-Summer 2016 collection.
Actress Priyanka Chopra, who chose a Lebanese designer’s pristine white ensemble for her Academy Awards appearance, says she wanted to turn up at the gala in a pretty, feminine and a “very classic” gown. The “Quantico” star was one of the presenters at the 88th Academy Awards — which took place here on Sunday — where she looked stunning in a structured cage bustier mermaid dress in white silk tulle adorned with 3D shimmering climbing flowers. The dress was a creation by Lebanese designer Zuhair Murad.
“I can’t be told what to wear. So, when I told Sophia I was like… It has to be a moment… the outfit. That I definitely want. It’s one of the biggest red carpets in the world. It’s super long so, I want to be comfortable for sure. And something that lasts the whole evening…you know it’s not ripping,” she told eonline.com. Comparing the Hollywood awards to Bollywood, she said “It’s similar– like Bollywood. It’s just giganomous. It doesn’t end.” During the awards, the camera rested several times over Chopra as it panned the crowd at the Dolby Theater.
British-Indian director Asif Kapadia, won the Oscar in the Best Feature Documentary “Amy” about jazz singing sensation Amy Winehouse who suffered from drug addiction and died from accidental alcohol poisoning in 2011. Thanking sponsors and supporters while accepting the Oscar, Kapadia lashed out at critics including Winehouse’s family. “Really, this film is all about Amy. This is all about showing the world who she really was, not her tabloid persona — the lovely girl, the unbelievable soul, funny, intelligent, witty, someone special, someone who needed looking after,” Kapadia said. Winehouse’s father Mitch Winehouse called it “a negative, spiteful and misleading portrayal.”
Pakistani documentary film-maker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy won her second Oscar for Short Documentary, this time for The Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness, dealing with honor killing in Pakistan. Chinoy, who splits home between Canada and Pakistan, was called the “Pride of Pakistan,” by that country’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. And U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry who was in Pakistan when the film won the award praised the documentary for changing the language around honor killing. “This is what happens when determined women get together,” Chinoy said accepting the award, adding, “This week the Pakistani prime minister has said that he will change the law on honour killing after watching this film. That is the power of film.”
She later told CBC News that living in Canada and Pakistan and going back and forth had taught her “that you need to strive to make Pakistan a better place,” and indicated her life was at risk when making the film.
Keralite Sajan Skaria, a character supervisor worked on the animated film, “Inside Out” which won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film. A graduate in computer science from the National Institute of Technology Kozhikode, Skaria is with the famed Pixar Animation Studio, a subsidiary of Walt Disney Company, and was present at the 88th Academy Awards, Indo Asian News Service reported.
Mindy Kaling, Indian-American comedian and creator of the popular series The Mindy Project, did the voice-over for one of the characters of “Inside Out.” Kaling walked the red carpet looking stunning in a black tight-fitting long gown by Elizabeth Kennedy, with a bright navy blue trail much like a Cinderella ball gown. Funny as usual, Kaling joked about the time it took her to dress for the event. “I’m very low-maintenance. No, actually, I’ve been doing this for 72 hours,” said the off-beat actress who is universally loved by fans for her candid portrayal of Hollywood behind the camera.
British-Indian actor Dev Patel of Slumdog Millionaire and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel 1 and 2, was a presenter; Another British-Indian actor famous for his role in My Beautiful Launderette and Gandhi, who appeared in Indian films like Shatranj ke Khiladi, was among those remembered in the “In Memorium” reel for those who lost their lives in 2015.
(New York, NY – March 4, 2016) Founded in New York’s financial district in 1976, Battery Dance is an anchor in the cultural life of Manhattan and a global ambassador for dance, with signature performances in 65 countries across six continents. The Company celebrates its 40th anniversary season in 2016 with a world premiere and a diverse array of performances at home and abroad.
Two events will showcase the Company’s artistry and its commitment to its lower Manhattan home base, where Battery Dance was born some 40 years ago: New York Season performances at The Schimmel Center for the Arts (3 Spruce Street) on May 10th at 2 p.m., May 11th at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. and May 12th at 7 p.m., followed by a gala reception at the House of Morgan on Wall Street.
35th annual Battery Dance Festival in Battery Park City from August 14th to the 19th, with a grand finale at Schimmel Center on the 20th (performances at 6:30 pm – schedule to be released soon).
The centerpiece of the New York season will be the world premiere of The Durga Project, which weaves together the movement vocabularies, sonorities and aesthetics of the U.S. and India into a choreographic fantasy of 30 minutes in length. Watch a sneak peek of the performance HERE!
“Selecting an Indian theme for the Company’s 40th Anniversary was a natural and fitting choice,” saidJonathan Hollander, founder and artistic director of Battery Dance. “Battery Dance is the best-known American dance company in India, having engaged in 7 national tours (17 cities reached thus far) since 1992 and having hosted dozens of Indian dancers and musicians in New York and across the U.S.,” Hollander explained. “The concept of Durga, or Shakti, the power and energy and magnificence of womanhood, underlies and informs the piece. And it follows other works that have been inspired by Indian music and with Indian guest artists such as Songs of Tagore and Layapriya.”
Guest Artist Unnath H.R., one of the leading classical dancers of his generation in India, engages in a symbiotic process with Battery’s Western-trained team of five brilliant and diverse dancers, yielding swaths of distinctive, yet undefinable, choreography that are like none other in the Company’s repertoire. A commissioned score by award-winning composer Frank Carlberg adheres to the musical notes that define the Hindustani Classical Raga Durga, a late evening raga that pays tribute to the Goddess Durga, but spins his own melodic and rhythmic invention. Costume designer Solé Salvo applies her vision and skill to adorn the dancers in garments suggestive of a primitive time and place, in hues inspired by the spices of India Calvin Anderson employs a variegated palette in his lighting design with sculptural chiaroscuro suggestive of the bas relief on Indian temples.
The international program will be complemented by works commissioned by European and African choreographers—“Inter/Ago,” created in 2015 by Tadej Brdnik, the recently retired Martha Graham principal dancer and choreographer, who has danced with Battery Dance since 1998; and“Observatory,” created in 2014 by Theo Ndindwa, founder of South Africa’s iKapa Dance Theatre, and since performed in tours of South America, Europe, Asia and at the first Cape Town International Dance Festival in December, 2015.
Tickets will be available beginning April 1 at the Schimmel Center Box Office. General Admission is $25. Gala tickets for the May 12th performance are available through the company. For more information, please visit www.batterydance.org.
New York: Rajasthan Association of North America (RANA) has planned to organize its annual Spring Festival Celebrations on March 26 at Hotel Hilton, Huntington, NY. In his address to the community leaders at the kick-off meeting held recently, Naveen C Shah said, “RANA has proven that we can celebrate all our festivals on one common platform. We want to continue this practice this year by organizing the Spring Festivals Celebration.”
The 2016 Spring Festival Celebration includes a Fashion Show event showcasing the attire of different states from India by top fashion designers, a segment on Wedding Day Attire by community members and cultural performances. This will be followed by a Kavi Sammelan featuring renowned poets and satirists from India, emceed by Shailesh Lodha. Over 1000 people are expected to attend the event.
“We expect people from all communities – Rajasthanis, Gujaratis, Punjabis and all other Indian communities to attend the day’s events and partake of the celebrations. RANA aims at bringing about harmony and celebrating the festivals of India jointly with other communities to foster the spirit of brotherhood and comradeship,” said Shah.
RANA has previously successfully organized Rajasthan Mahotsav – Festival of Festivals 2015 under the leadership of President Naveen C Shah, which saw participation from over 3000 attendees, complete with a grand parade featuring elephants, horses and camels to various dance & musical performances showcasing the variety and depth of Indian culture.
The Deepavali celebrations in November 2015 was another monumental sensation with over 600 people packing the Grand Ballroom at the Long Island Marriott and were entertained by the sensational music trio from India – Dhwani.
Tickets cost only $75 each and include lunch, afternoon tea & snacks, dinner and entrance to the fashion show, cultural entertainment, kavi sammelan & exhibitions area. For more information, visit website www.ranausa.org
Long Island, NY: Anu Jain was the only Indian American artist, who had showcased two of her paintings, “Freedom-the Beauty of Life” in oil on canvas and the other, “Jesus” at the Fine Art and Photography Exhibition on March 2nd at the Theodore Roosevelt Executive Legislative Building in Mineola, New York. The contest was part of the National Women’s Heritage Month celebrations organized by Comptroller George Maragos, Nassau County on Long Island, NY.
Anu’s creations at the exhibition got accolades and recognition from not only fellow artists and organizers but from a large number of guests from Indian-American community, which included community leaders, prominent businessmen and leading media personalities.
As part of The exhibition’s title “Truth & Beauty” was inspired, probably, by the famous English poet John Keats’ Ode on a Grecian Urn’ wherein the poet says: ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty, —that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
Fifty-five distinguished female artists and photographers participated. The paintings at the Exhibition were done in both water color and oil and included portraits and landscape. Anu Jain, as other artists, took in a stride the challenge of entering the world of art in a large format that expressed the feminine spirit- a moment in the life of a woman- Past, Present and Future – with one dominant figure as the main focus.
Many of the pieces of artwork presented depicted a global outlook on women’s issues and concern in a realistic style while others were Semi-abstract and symbolic, inviting the viewers to add their own interpretation.
The panel of judges included professors of art from finest local universities as well as renowned award winning artists and photographers. The invited judges included Robert Carter, Notable Artist; Emi Gomez, LIU Post Department of Art Professor; Kellyann Monaghan, Adelphi Professor; Gabriel Marques, Notable Artist; Catherine White, Renown Artist; and Xio Xiomaro, Notable International Photographer. The curators included Carla Hall D’Ambra and Minna Dun. The event was attended by over 200 guests, including Dilip Chauhan, Director, South East and Asian Affairs in the office of Nassau County Comptroller.
Asif Kapadia, an Indo-British director, is all set to capture the life trajectory of popular icon, the Argentinian soccer player Diego Maradona. Kapadia won an Oscar last month for chronicling Amy Winehouse’s life journey, and scoring an Oscar for it,
The feature documentary, “Maradona,” will look closely into the sportsman’s wildly celebrated time at Italian club Napoli, with the help of hundreds of hours of never-before-seen footage taken from his personal archive, according to a report in Hollywood Reporter. Speaking about the project, Kapadia said he had long been a fan of Maradona, and had wanted to make a film about the man even before he started the documentary, “Senna.”
“I was taken by his character, his genius, honesty, passion, humor and vulnerability,” the report quoted him as saying. “I was fascinated by his journey, wherever he went there were moments of incredible brilliance and drama, he was a leader, taking his teams to the very top, but also many lows in his career. He was always the little guy fighting against the system, against the wealthy, the powerful and he was willing to do anything, to use all of his cunning and intelligence to win.”
After “Amy” and “Senna,” Kapadia is reteaming with James Gay-Rees and Chris King on the film whose global sales rights have been picked up by British sales and distribution company Altitude. Joining them as a producer is Paul Martin (“Ronaldo”). Alongside “Maradona,” Kapadia and his team are also prepping a documentary on the British rock group Oasis.
The Cinequest Film Festival 2016, which will run from March 1- March 13 in San Jose, Calif., will present a line-up of Indian cinema, offering three examples of the current state of Indian film art. The films that will be showcased are: Director Selvamani Selvaraj’s debut film “Nila”; first-time director Atul Taishete’s “Vartak Nagar-A Story of Four Crows”; and “The Last Smile.”
“Nila,”which will see its North American premiere at the festival, deftly explores the murky realm of deceptive desire and the damaging consequences resulting from a passionate, but misguided pursuit of love, according to a press release.
“Vartak Nagar-A Story of Four Crows,” starring actor Jimmy Shergil, merges an emotionally stirring coming-of-age tale with real life drama. The premise of the film is: In 1982, the innocence of four boyhood friends is abruptly shattered during the Bombay Mill Strike and the encompassing violence imperils their lives. But through the combined forces of brotherhood, love, and the resilience of the human spirit, the boys not only survive, they thrive, according to the release.
“The Last Smile” is described as a film where an Indian American father suddenly loses his son under mysterious circumstances and simply wants to know what happened. But his pursuit of the truth plunges him into the corrupt and shady underworld of the unregulated dietary supplements business, a thriving $37 billion industry, the release said. Inspired by a true story, this drama exposes the greed-driven practices that prey on human vanity, gullibility, and the American obsession with the “quick fix.” Both “Vartak Nagar-A Story of Four Crows” and “The Last Smile” will have their world premiere at the festival.
Indian actress Priyanka Chopra is out to put India on the global map again. She is on board to play the villain in the upcoming “Baywatch” movie, based on the hugely popular 1990s TV series, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson announced via an online video.
“She’s one of the biggest stars in the world… the beautiful Priyanka Chopra, welcome to ‘Baywatch’,” Johnson said in a video posted on Instagram. He is seen in the frame with the former beauty queen against seaside and excitement seems to be at its peak.
Priyanka, who has found international popularity after playing the lead role in American show “Quantico”, shared on social media: “And it’s time to tell you all officially! Baywatch it is! Being bad is what I do best!!! You better watch out!”
Her debut film in Bollywood, “Aitraaz”, in fact featured her in a negative role. In “Baywatch”, she will be seen essaying Victoria Leeds, said a report by people.com.
In an Instagram post to welcome Priyanka, Johnson wrote: “She’s one of the biggest stars in the world. Insanely talented, relentlessly smokin’ and extremely dangerous – perfect for ‘Baywatch’. Welcome Priyanka Chopra to our bad a** and incredibly dysfunctional family.”
One of the most watched TV shows globally, “Baywatch”, was about the Los Angeles county lifeguards who patrol the beaches of Los Angeles, California. It starred David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson among others. Priyanka will begin shooting for the movie version of the show with its cast and crew next week.
Messages congratulating the actress, who was named to receive the Padma Shri honour from the Indian government last month, poured in from her friends in Bollywood. “Dostana” director Tarun Mansukhani, who made Priyanka act in a golden swimsuit for a scene in Miami, wrote to her: “You’re the only one who can make a red swimsuit sexier than a gold one!!! Way to go Priyanka Chopra!!!”
New York, NY: Leading multicultural marketing firm, Touchdown Media Inc. and MoneyGram, (NASDAQ: MGI) a leading global money transfer service, have announced the kick-off of the first annual Cricket Bee sponsored by MoneyGram on February 24th. The new competition allows cricket fans to compete for prizes while sharing their knowledge of the game in an effort to win a cash prize of $10,000.
Open to those 18 and older, the contest will begin with regional rounds in New Jersey, San Francisco and Toronto, each testing participants’ general cricket knowledge. The regional contest will have two components, a written test and an oral test. In the written qualifier, contestants will be asked 35 questions. They must get at least 25 correct in order to advance to the oral round. In the oral round, the contest will be held on a miss and out basis; simply if a contestant misses the right answer, they are eliminated.
The three finalists in each regional round will move on to the grand finals. Unlike quiz shows, the Cricket Bee will be conducted so that contestants are actually competing with themselves and the question posed to them as opposed to their peers. In the oral round, the initial rounds will be category wise.
Contestants can register to compete in the game of their choice at www.cricketbee.com. A sample set of questions and sources will be provided for the participants. “We are proud to sponsor the 2016 Cricket Bee,” says Joann Chatfield, MoneyGram’s vice president of marketing. “We know that the passion for cricket unites friends and loved ones around the world and brings them closer together. It’s always exciting to be a part of initiatives that support our South Asian communities.
Expressing her keen interest and understanding of cricket and the enthusiasm it generates among South Asians, while addressing a gathering of media persons at a Midtown Manhattan restaurant, Joann Chatfield, MoneyGram’s vice president of marketing had said last year, “We are proud to sponsor the 2016 Cricket Bee. We know that the passion for cricket unites friends and loved ones around the world and brings them closer together. It’s always exciting to be a part of initiatives that support our South Asian communities”.
Joann has served as vice president of marketing, since January 2013, most recently responsible for the US, Canada, UK, Ireland and northern Europe. Chatfield previously served as vice president, global marketing and services, and director of marketing, US and Canada. Since joining MoneyGram in May 2011, Chatfield has a proven track record of building and leading highly productive global teams, as well as demonstrated her proficiency in the intricacies of a complex, global, multi-cultural brand.
Joann has taken on several leadership roles and has consistently shown her business acumen with her innate ability to drive a wide range of internal and external marketing and communication strategies designed to establish market presence, and increase revenue and profitability.
Prior to joining MoneyGram, Joann served in a number of business development and marketing roles within the finance and telecommunication industries. She is a graduate of the University of New Mexico with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications.
Kawan Foods will serve as the powered by sponsor for the innovative event and has been deeply involved with the South Asian community through various initiatives and hopes to connect with the entire Cricketing community here in the US and Canada. “Cricket is an integral part of the demographic and as a household brand, we want to involve ourselves with initiatives that bring the community together,” said Tim Tan, MD Kawan Foods.
The brainchild of Founder Rahul Walia, who is credited with launching the successful South Asian Spelling Bee and other multicultural platforms, the Bee promises to attract all Cricket enthusiasts to test their knowledge and skills.
“The game of Cricket is an integral part of any commonwealth Expat community in North America and the objective is to leverage the passion of the sport to engage the diaspora in a fun and informative manner while promoting the game to the next generation,” said Walia.
TV Asia will serve as the exclusive broadcaster for the event and has been a strong proponent of promoting Cricket in the country. The broadcaster has been avidly involved with American College Cricket and also sponsors school children to play cricket in India.
“As the oldest broadcast medium for the community, it’s definitely an honor to be the exclusive broadcaster for the first ever MoneyGram Cricket Bee. We pride ourselves with connecting with our community and this initiative is in line with our continued commitment to the diaspora in North America,” said HR Shah, chairman and CEO of TV Asia and an avid cricketer himself.
MoneyGram is a global provider of innovative money transfer services and is recognized worldwide as a financial connection to friends and family. Whether online, or through a mobile device, at a kiosk or in a local store, we connect consumers any way that is convenient for them. We also provide bill payment services, issue money orders and process official checks in select markets. More information about MoneyGram International, Inc. is available at moneygram.com.
TV Asia is a New Jersey based Pay TV Channel with more than 30 bureaus in major cities of North America. It is the only South Asian channel to cover the community coast-to-coast in this part of the world, making it the voice and mirror of the community. The channel is the only South Asian network to produce a major portion of its programming in North America. It is available in USA in HD on Dish Satellite Channel 700, Sling International IPTV and in SD on major Cable systems such as Comcast Xfinity, Time Warner, Cablevision etc including Verizon FIOS & AT & T U Verse. TV Asia is celebrating 23 years in the United States. For further information, visit www.tvasiausa.com
Touchdown Media Inc. is a specialized South Asian advertising and promotions firm based in New Jersey. Now in its 12th successful year, Touchdown has helped clients- both mainstream and otherwise, reach out to the lucrative South Asian market, Touchdown Media represents more than 35 years of collective experience in this niche market. As a full service ad firm, Touchdown has helped many clients achieve their media and marketing goals within the South Asian Diaspora in the US.
(New York, NY: February 25th, 2016) – Shalini Vadhera, a renowned, award-winning global beauty and lifestyle expert, founder and CEO of Power Beauty Living, and best-selling author of Passport To Beauty, proudly takes her Power Beauty Living brand global on February 29th, 2016 at the United Nations alongside IMPACT Leadership 21, for an exclusive VIP POWER UP Networking and Cocktail event.
Vadhera was recently appointed to IMPACT Leadership 21’s Global Advisory Council (GAC) as its newest member. A global leadership platform that provides solutions to creating inclusive economies, IMPACT Leadership 21’s GAC is comprised of men and women in diverse leadership backgrounds and influence from multi sectors.
“We are thrilled to add such a dynamic, passionate leader with a strong track record of success and zest for empowering women to the GAC. Shalini’s extensive entrepreneurial experience and industry knowledge is a welcomed addition to our team, especially as we expand our international reach,” said Janet C. Salazar CEO and Co-Founder of IMPACT Leadership 21.
On February 29th 2016, Vadhera will be unveiling her experiential Power Beauty Living platform – a holistic approach to powering up your business, beauty and life for women, by women – at IMPACT Leadership 21’s 3rd Annual POWER of COLLABORATION Global Summit at the Power Beauty Living VIP Networking and Cocktail reception, at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. Vadhera will be showcasing how to live powerfully and beautifully to over 150 country heads, diplomats, ambassadors and high-level executive women from the United Nations. One of summit’s highlights will include a diverse panel of global thought leaders in the beauty, health and wellness space, curated by Vadhera, to discuss initiatives they’re implementing to turn conversations into action. Distinguished guests will also be treated to an enriching Power Beauty Living interactive experience and receive exclusive VIP gift bags from highly curated beauty and lifestyle brands.
“IMPACT Leadership 21’s Global Advisory Council is a first-class team of passionate innovators, creators and entrepreneurs and I’m thrilled to be a part of such a trailblazing group. I’m confident that together we will find unique ways to thrive in today’s increasingly diverse workplace and create game changing programs to help women live empowered and to lead their best lives. I’m excited to be bringing my Power Beauty Living platform to the United Nations to inspire women to be strong leaders while living their best life,” said Shalini Vadhera.
Vadhera created Power Beauty Living based on her own business experiences as an entrepreneur and the lack of mentorship, community and resources for women by women, in building their businesses and balancing their lives. She felt a strong desire to create a destination for women to get the insight and tools they needed to empower themselves in business, by providing mentorship, in beauty and in living a blissful balanced life.
Shalini Vadhera is an award-winning global beauty and lifestyle expert, founder of Power Beauty Living, a social platform for women, and best-selling author of Passport To Beauty. Her global influence with women and young girls stems from her entrepreneurial passion to build companies and create products to empower women. Vadhera’s rise from jewelry and fashion entrepreneur, celebrity make-up artist and best-selling author, to a regular contributor on Dr. Oz, The Today Show, and The View and the founder of a multi-million dollar global cosmetics company is nothing short of remarkable. Vadhera has transformed this platform while using her business acumen to create global beauty, lifestyle and business solutions to empower women around the world. Vadhera was named the #1 Person To Watch by The Economic Times of India, Winner of the Game Changer Of The Decade Award in Beauty and winner of the coveted Oprah Beauty O~Ward.
A new trip to India from the London-based travel company Wild Frontiers is inspired by the Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling’s famous collection of stories. The trip is in commemoration of a new adaptation of the 1967 Walt Disney Pictures animated film based on the stories and opening in theaters on April 15. Called the Jungle Book Tour, the 12-day itinerary takes travelers to Tadoba and Kanha National Parks, two of India’s most famous tiger reserves, where they take part in twice-daily game drives in search of tigers, leopards and other wildlife, and Satpura National Park for walking safaris. These rich landscapes, according to the Wild Frontiers founder Jonny Bealby, gave Mr. Kipling the inspiration for the characters in his stories such as the “man cub” Mowgli, the fearsome tiger Shere Khan and Toomai of the elephants. The itinerary also includes a stop in Bhopal to see the renowned Bhimbetka cave paintings. The tour includes most meals, accommodations, transfers, entrance fees to parks and guided excursions. The cost is $4,250 a person. Departure is Oct. 18.
(Dallas, Texas – February 24, 2016) The 2016 Dallas/Fort Worth South Asian Film Festival (www.dfwsaff.com) presented 13 ground-breaking, sold-out screenings of shorts, documentaries and feature films during its three-day festival (Feb. 19th to the 21st) at the Perot Museum in downtown Dallas and the Angelika Film Center in Plano. More than 350 people attended the opening night film, red carpet and festivities at the Perot, followed by another 1200 cinephiles at the Angelika on Saturday and Sunday. Every film was either a Texas or U.S. premiere, and the festival’s closing night film, Hansal Mehta’s “Aligarh,” was the North American premiere. Ravi Kapoor’s “Miss India America” and Prashant Nair’s “Umrika” were the opening night and centerpiece films, respectively. The entire lineup of films, including trailers and synopses, is available on the festival’s web site: www.dfwsaff.com.
Categories included education programming, arts programming, youth programming, women’s programming, men’s programming, family programming and LGBT programming. The topics explored varied in scope from slave brides in Rajasthan to the effects of depression & mental illness on the South Asian community to the plight of the LGBTQ community in India.
“The responses we got from our audiences were overwhelmingly positive,” said founder and festival director Jitin Hingorani. “People thanked us for bringing this revolutionary programming to North Texas, and they said they are already excited for next year’s festival.”
The festival, produced by JINGO Media, a NYC & Dallas-based PR & events boutique firm, also presented networking events, after-parties and post-screening Q&A sessions with 14 filmmakers and actors in attendance from all over the world.
Celebrities who walked the red carpet included: Suraj Sharma (Umrika, Life of Pi, Homeland, Million Dollar Arm); Tiya Sircar (Miss India America, The Internship, Friends with Benefits, Vampire Diaries); Meera Simhan (Miss India America, Anger Management, Date Movie); Tanima Bhattacharya (Shackle); and Viveck Vaswani (Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman, Pathar Ke Phool, Rough Book).
According to reports, 27 mainstream and South Asian brands supported the 2016 festival as sponsors and partners, including Wells Fargo; Etihad Airways & Jet Airways; Mercedes Benz of Plano; Civitas; Cambria Hotels & Suites; The Container Store; Shraman South Asian Museum; Parish Episcopal School; American India Foundation; and Milaap USA.
Community Partners, who had joined the efforts included, Selig Polyscope Company; Patrick O’Hara Salon; U.S. India Chamber of Commerce DFW; Dallas Video Fest; Women in Film; Indian Association of North Texas; Women Entrepreneurs DFW; Forever Rakhi; and World Affairs Council.
Actress Sunny Leone’s message to youngsters who have not smoked till now and are thinking about it is to avoid picking up the cigarette. “For the youngsters out there, if you haven’t started smoking yet or are thinking about it, don’t pick up that first cigarette. It’s not worth it in the long run, and it’s not cool. If you want to try, just think twice before trying it,” said Leone at the launch of a special anti-smoking advertisement featuring her and “Tanu Weds Manu” actor Deepak Dobriyal.
“Smoking is bad for your health. This is something very close to my heart; my father passed away from cancer from smoking cigarettes,” she said. “I want people to stop smoking, and live a happier, healthier life. Unfortunately, you can’t force anybody, but you can tell people not to smoke around them. Maybe if the government, restaurant owners say that they don’t want smoke inside their buildings, then that would be the first step,” she added.
The informative advertisement titled “No Smoking #11minutes,” which also stars actor Alok Nath, has been directed by “Hawaizaada” director Vibhu Puri. The concept revolves around Dobriyal’s character, who is on his deathbed, and his near and dear ones trying to identify and fulfill his last wish of meeting up with Leone’s character, which creates a humorous climax.
About her own experiences of smoking, Leone mentioned about her first time: “It was gross, disgusting. It never has been for me, and it’ll continue to be that way.”
She also said, “I’ve been lucky; my co-stars that smoke cigarettes always are very respectful and say, ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ I tell them it’s fine if they go a bit far. I personally don’t like second-hand smoke; it is as deadly as smoking a cigarette.” The “#11minutes” refers to the amount of life which apparently gets cut down with each cigarette.
ENGLEWOOD, Colo., February 23, 2016 – Sling TV and DISH today announced they have expanded their strategic relationship with Willow TV International for the Willow cricket channel. The agreement brings some of the world’s most popular cricket matches and events including ICC, India, Pakistan, Australia, South Africa, West Indies and other top teams to cricket fans in the U.S., in high definition, as well as arrangements for coverage of live overlapping matches. With Willow included in most major South Asian packages, Sling TV and DISH customers will have access to the most extensive cricket programming available in the U.S.
This agreement marks the first time that major ICC events, including the highly anticipated ICC World Twenty20 2016, which begins March 8, 2016, will be provided at no additional charge on the Willow cricket channel. Previously many of these events have only been available via pay-per-view.
“We are proud to have supported the launch of the Willow cricket channel in 2010, and by extending this longstanding relationship, we are not only bringing our customers the best in live cricket for years to come, we’re delivering on our commitment to make Sling TV and DISH ‘your home for cricket’,” said Chris Kuelling, senior vice president of international programming for Sling TV and DISH. “With this agreement we are now able to bring U.S. viewers the most comprehensive cricket offering in the market, all in high definition.”
“In just over five years since we launched Willow on DISH, we have expanded our coverage of live international cricket to unprecedented levels,” said Vijay Srinivasan, CEO of Willow TV International. “We are extremely pleased to further strengthen our partnership with Sling TV and DISH, and to announce the availability of the ICC World Twenty20 2016 and other ICC events on the Willow cricket channel for Sling TV and DISH viewers.”
Willow is available across South Asian packages on both Sling TV and DISH. More information on Sling TV’s cricket offering can be found here, and detail on DISH’s cricket offering can be found here. New Sling TV viewers can try the service free for seven days, and DISH is currently offering the Hindi Mega Pack, which includes Willow, at 50% off for new subscribers.
Willow TV International, Inc. is the premier broadcaster of cricket in the U.S. Willow distributes a high definition linear television channel dedicated exclusively to cricket in the U.S., and provides television and digital production services to its global partners. Willow is an Official Broadcast Partner of the International Cricket Council (ICC) and several major international cricket boards and leagues.
Sling TV L.L.C., a subsidiary of DISH Network Corporation (NASDAQ: DISH), provides over-the-top television services including domestic and international live and on-demand programming. It is available on televisions, tablets, computers and smartphones. The Sling TV programming portfolio includes content from Disney/ESPN, HBO/Cinemax, AMC, A&E, Turner, Scripps, EPIX, The Weather Company and Univision. Sling Latino offers a suite of standalone and add-on Spanish-language programming packages tailored to English-dominant, bilingual and Spanish-dominant U.S. households. Sling International currently provides more than 200 channels in 19 languages across multiple devices to U.S. households. Sling TV is a next-generation service that meets the entertainment needs of today’s contemporary viewers. Visit www.Sling.com.
DISH Network Corp., through its subsidiaries, provides approximately 13.897 million pay-TV subscribers, as of Dec. 31, 2015, with the highest-quality programming and technology with the most choices at the best value. DISH offers a high definition line-up with more than 200 national HD channels, the most international channels and award-winning HD and DVR technology. DISH Network Corporation is a Fortune 250 company. Visit www.dish.com.
Bollywood star Preity Zinta’s wedding to American beau Gene Goodenough, is planned to be held this month, there is some news that the couple will actually tie the knot in Los Angeles in spring (March-April) with only close friends and family flying down. Goodenough is a financial analyst and met Zinta during one of her U.S. trips.
According to media reports, the white wedding will, however, be followed by a proper and ostentatious Rajput wedding in Mumbai. This grand celebration will have the film industry in attendance, as Zinta has developed a lot of goodwill in the industry. The bubbly and forthright actress, who has always stood up for her convictions and principles, has barely been seen in the millennium’s second decade because of her other priorities.
She was last seen in her home production “Ishqk in Paris” in 2013, followed by a cameo in “Happy Ending.” Though closest to Salman Khan among the ruling stars, Zinta has worked with every A-lister and a lot of heroines, and is on great terms with all of them as well as top filmmakers.
Zinta is said to auction off her wedding pictures for charities that she supports, including for educating children and for old-age homes. Zinta and Goodenough want to help society even with this happy occasion in their lives. While this move is a first among Indian stars, Hollywood couples like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, and George Clooney and Amal Alamuddin have reportedly done it before overseas.
Bloomington, IN : The Mathers Museum of World Cultures has put up a new exhibition as part of three distinct exhibitions on Indian American experiences and their cultural contributions to United States & the American life.
“Beyond Bollywood: Indian Americans Shape the Nation” is the first of these three exhibitions which is a traveling exhib on loan from the Smithsonian Institution and will be on display until April 10.
Judith Kirk, assistant director of the museum, said alumnus Robert Johnson, who is on the board of the Asian Pacific American Center committee at the Smithsonian, suggested the idea to Provost Lauren Robel after a visit to Mathers.
“When it was discovered that ‘Bollywood’ was going to travel, we started working to bring it here,” Kirk said. “We were so fortunate in that we have an incredible India studies program, Dhar India Studies. They were very enthusiastic about being our partners.”
In conjunction with this exhibit, Mathers planned visits by prominent speakers and a few other events, such as films playing at the IU Cinema.
The next speaker in the series, Vijay Prashad, author of a work called “The Karma of Brown Folk,” will speak on March 10. Prashad will be speaking about the complicated status of Indian-Americans as the “model minority” and the issues with that term, Kirk said.
Another speaker, Vivek Bald, will visit March 24 to discuss the “lost history” of Bengali Harlem, and the movement of Asian immigrants into existing neighborhoods during the era of Asian exclusion — the 50 years leading up to the 1940’s.
“There were individuals, mostly men, who were involved in merchant marines, were seamen and other merchants, who ended up settling here,” Kirk said. “These were groups of men who, despite the exclusion-era laws, primarily settled in places like Harlem and New Orleans, communities that were typically African-American or Puerto Rican.”
These neighborhoods provided a community of support, opportunity and home, and Bald will speak to this relationship and his research on this period during his lecture, Kirk said.
Sonika Vaid, 20, from Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, is being touted as an early favorite to win the last season of American Idol, after just one soulful rendition which wowed the judges on the show. Vaid impressed the judges – Jennifer Lopez, Keith Urban and Harry Connick Jr – with her beautiful cover of ‘Look at Me’, the hit by former Idol winner Carrie Underwood, reported The National.
Sonika Vaid, a sophomore at William Smith College in New York, who grew up in Weston, Massachusetts, advanced to the top 10 of the reality competition American Idol, wowing judges on the way. Vaid was one of the 10 singers who advanced last week from the 14 who were left to participate for the cut-off voting stage.
“This is one of the only times this particular season that I saw somebody that I actually think can win this thing,” said Connick. “You sang beautifully. Perfect performance. I was totally engaged. Terrific job.” Lopez also congratulated Vaid, saying: “I love it, I love it a lot.” Urban added: “How beautiful that you just let it go, too? You didn’t stack it with a bunch of clever runs. You just sang.”
Vaid’s strong performance of “I Surrender” by Celine Dion got a standing ovation from judge Jennifer Lopez. She had also performed superbly “Bring Me to Life” by Evanesence. Vaid sang the Celine Dion classic, “I Surrender” for the first time for Idol audiences and on the American Idol stage. The song showed off Vaid’s powerful and commanding voice as well as her contemporary yet classic singing style, reported Romper.
“The song highlighted what a vocal powerhouse Vaid truly could be, while also offering audience members a glimpse as to what she would be like as a performer if voted into the Top 10. The performance showed off a true star quality to the 20-year-old from Massachusetts that viewers of the show had never seen in Vaid before. In other words, she killed her performance — and that is putting it lightly. Judging from the reactions of the judges and Twitter, everyone else seemed to agree” Romper noted.
The performance started off slow, with Vaid’s vocals accompanied only by a piano. When the backing band kicked in with the chorus of the song, Vaid’s voice truly began to shine. “I said your voice was from God in the (video) package. Its so true,” Lopez said. “I don’t think I’ve ever gotten goosies on my face. That was the first time!” Lopez added, referring to the goose bumps Vaid’s voice gave Lopez from her performance of the song. “The way your voice sits in the music is so out of this world,” Lopez continued. “It is insane! So beautiful!”
The rest of the judging panel, comprised of Harry Connick Jr. and Keith Urban resisted the urge to speak about the performance due to the show’s timing, but you could tell they were dying to comment on the stellar performance, said media reports. “You know, you sang beautifully. That was a perfect performance. . . . That’s a pure, God-given voice,” Connick Jr. said. Fans of Vaid and viewers at home seemed to agree with Lopez’s comments, taking to Twitter to praise the performance.
“The first time I remember singing was when I was 3 at my sister’s first birthday,” said Vaid, a summer resident of Martha’s Vineyard, and a 2013 graduate of Weston High School. The first season of “American Idol” aired when she was about 5 years old. “I was an on-and-off ‘Idol’ fan growing up,” she said. “I thought, ‘This is the last [season]. This is the last opportunity I’ll get” to try out.
Singing for judges and an audience and millions of at-home viewers is “an out-of-body experience. It’s beyond me,” said Vaid, who “hated the thought of singing” in public as a little kid. A pianist since age 4, she loved that “I could hide my face behind the piano. Then in ninth grade, there was a talent show. My friends wanted me to sign up, and I was like, ‘No. I don’t want to do that.’ I was so shy,” she recalled. Vaid got up the gumption, sang “Believe in Me” by Demi Lovato in front of the whole school, then promptly ran out into the hallway and “started freaking out,” said the Globe report. Vaid won.
Vaid’s parents, Kuldip and Ananya, were born in India and moved to the US as kids. Vaid, the oldest of four children, said her “entire family is musical . . . except for my dad.” “The sayonara season of American Idol has only just begun, but we may already have a winner,” The Boston Globe reported.
American Idol’s latest season is its 15th and final edition. Since its premiere in 2002, only two contestants of South Asian origin have reached the final 12 stage of the competition: Sanjaya Malakar, who finished seventh during season six, and Anoop Desai, who placed sixth during season eight.
Jhanvi Kapoor has been preparing for a career in Bollywood. While the young girl is already a red carpet regular with a keen sense of style, she’s also training to be an actor. Bollywood stars Sridevi’s and Boney Kapoor’s elder daughter Jhanvi Kapoor has also joined the Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute in Los Angeles, reports here say.
Though Sridevi had been constantly denying all reports that Jhanvi Kapoor will be aspiring to act in films, and Jhanvi Kapoor herself was aiming for a career in fashion designing, she has clearly done a Sonakshi Sinha and moved towards cinema, without a mentor like Salman Khan and with admission into the iconic institute.
From the second Kapoor family, she is now the fifth Kapoor to come into films after Anil Kapoor, Sanjay Kapoor, Sonam Kapoor and half-brother Arjun Kapoor. Many other Bollywood actors including Ranbir Kapoor are alumni of this prestigious institute. According to a report in Miss Malini, the 19-year-old is taking up acting classes in Los Angeles, from The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute. And filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s niece will most likely be her classmate. The two have been rehearsing together.
Jhanvi has reportedly received many Bollywood offers but she’s still on the lookout for a perfect project for her big debut in the industry. Both Jhanvi and Khushi usually accompany mother Sridevi to various Bollywood events.
Indian American mega producer Jeff Bhasker, who is one of the hottest pop and hip-hop and in-demand producers in the American music industry, walked away with a Grammy in the ‘Producer of the Year’ (Non-Classical) category during the 58th edition of the coveted awards held Feb. 15 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
One of the biggest hits of 2015, “Uptown Funk,” featuring artist Bruno Mars, which Bhasker co-produced in conjunction with Mark Ronson, also won the ‘Record of the Year’ award. The prolific producer behind much of Kanye West’s “808s & Heartbreak” was bestowed the ‘Producer of the Year’ honor for helming songs such as Elle’s King’s “Aint’s Gonna Drown and “Last Damn Night,” Mikky Ekko’s “Burning Doves” and Cam’s “Runaway Train,” among others.
Bhasker, the son of an Indian American physician and a piano-playing American mother, has created breakaway hits for artists such as Beyoncé, Alicia Keys, Taylor Swift, Snoop Lion, the Rolling Stones, Blige, Kid Cudi, Jay-Z and Drake.
“Amy,” the documentary by Indo-British filmmaker Asif Kapadia about the life of late pop star Amy Winehouse, won a Grammy Award in the ‘Best Music Film’ category. Kapadia also secured a British Academy Film and Television Award, or BAFTA, for “Amy,” in the ‘Best Documentary’ category during a glittering ceremony held Feb. 14 at the Royal Opera House in London, England.
Asif Kapadia
At the Grammy Awards, “Amy” beat out “The Wall,” “Sonic Highways,” “What Happened, Miss Simone?” and “Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown.” For the BAFTA, Kapadia’s “Amy” was up against “Cartel Land,” “He Named Me Malala,” “Listen to me Marlon” and “Sherpa.”
Paying tribute to one of the biggest music icons in British history, Kapadia said onstage during BAFTA: “We really fell in love with her when making the film. And our aim and mission was really to try and tell the truth about her. To show the world what an amazing person she was, how intelligent, how witty, how beautiful she was, before it all kind of got out of control and went a bit crazy.”
Kapadia has won the BAFTA honor twice in the past. In 2012, he picked up a BAFTA for “Senna” and in 2003 for “The Warrior.” The documentary uses previously unseen footage of the “Back to Black” star who died of alcohol poisoning in 2011, at the age of 27. Winehouse’s family initially endorsed the project but later disassociated itself from the film.
The biggest night of the year in music also secured a win for world renowned Indian American alto saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa, who featured in the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, “The Afro Latin Jazz Suite,” which snagged the top honor in the ‘Best Instrumental Composition’ category.
Acclaimed sitarist Anoushka Shankar, who presented at the 58th annual Grammy Awards, said she had “fun” being backstage with the people she admires. Anoushka was also nominated for an award in the Best World Music Album category for her solo album “Home” but she couldn’t grab the coveted trophy. This was the fifth time that Anoushka was nominated for the Grammy Awards. She lost out to Beninese singer Angelique Kidjo. “I teased Angelique to stop beating me in that category! She’s an amazing artist and woman and deserves every win though,” Anoushka sportingly said about her defeat.
Shankar praised Indo-British filmmaker Asif Kapadia for winning Best Music Film award for “Amy”, a documentary on the life of late singer Amy Winehouse. “Oh, without doubt he deserved that win. ‘Amy’ is an incredible documentary into the life of a unique artist and the trials of an addict. Recovery is something very close to my heart for personal reasons and therefore, the film impacted me greatly,” she said.
NAMAM Excellence Award Night Show has been planned for Saturday, March 19th at 5.00 pm in Edison, New Jersey. “As all you know NAMAM is a leading Cultural organization engaged in various community outreach programs and activities in the Tri-state area,” said Madhavan B Nair, NAMAM Chairman.
“The opportunity to attend this function can open to the door to meet many individuals that have played an important role in the development of our community,” Nair said. “It is an opportunity to introduce you and create a vast profile within the Indian and American community as well. It will be an honor for us if you could attend this function. We are looking forward to hearing from you with a positive response soon.”
Over the last 7 years, this vibrant organization has been successfully conducting cultural, educational and charitable programs, with the participation from various Indian communities in Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and Philadelphia. NAMAM has established a tradition of celebrating its annual day by presenting its Excellence Awards at a magnificent Banquet that is attended by many. NAMAM Excellence Awards are given to 6 extremely accomplished individuals from various fields who have made significant contributions to the society.
In addition to the cultural events we will be providing Ethnic Indian Food as Banquet .We will also have a variety of entertainments preceding the business meeting. We expect the attendance this year to be the highest ever; in the area of 900 participants and 7 award Winners We will be glad to reserve seats for you all. Please let us know the availability. The focus of the business meeting is to help and rebuild a strong Indian American community strength in Tristate area with help of all professional and cultural associations and with fellow politicians.
NAMAM is an Indian cultural organization that was formed in the United States in 2010. Under the strong and inspiring leadership of Mr. Madhavan B. Nair, the founder and president of NAMAM, a team of enthusiastic people with unswerving dedication has transformed the organization into a platform for families to come together and experience a wonderful sense of belonging and oneness. Though, primarily an association of the Nair families in the US, NAMAM functions as a juncture of like-minded individuals across the community to engage in social and cultural activities.
NAMAM has been reaching out to the community with varied cultural programs, social gatherings and humanitarian aid efforts. It is our priority to pass a deep awareness about the rich heritage, unique customs and eclectic culture of Kerala to the younger generation in the us, so that they can appreciate and take pride in their genealogy. For more information, please visit:www.namam.org
The New York Indian Film Festival, the oldest, most prestigious South Asian Film Festival in North America has been scheduled from May 7-14, 2016, a press release said. NYIFF screens feature films, documentaries and shorts by filmmakers with a heritage in the Indian Sub-Continent for a week in New York City. Premiere screenings on four screens the entire week, Industry Panels, Post-screening discussions, Special Events, Retrospectives, Award Ceremony, networking with directors and cast, Galas, cocktail parties, red carpets, packed theatres and amazing media attention. NYIFF 2016 Opening Night on May 7 and the Closing Night on May 14 will be presented at the Skirball Center for Performing Arts, while the rest of the festival May 8-14 will be presented at the Village East Cinemas, NYC.
We are so proud of our award--winning filmmakers and ALL the filmmakers who have showcased quality, independent cinema at our festival over the past week,” said Aroon Shivdasani, NYIFF Director. “The response from the community has been phenomenal, and we hope NYIFF continues to make a mark on the New York independent film circuit.”
Of the 50 features, documentaries and short films showcased at the 15th edition of the New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF), jury members gravitated toward awarding movies like LABOUR OF LOVE, MARGARITA WITH A STRAW, HARAAMKHOR, KAAKA MUTTAI and DAUGTHERS OF MOTHER INDIA. The longest-running, most prestigious South Asian film festival in the Untied States was attended by Indian film industry glitterati such as Kalki Koechlin, Vishal Bhardwaj, Hansal Mehta, Shonali Bose, Anant Mahadevan, Mohan Agashe, L. Subramaniam, Kavita Krishnamurthy, Sharat Katariya and Vibha Bakshi, just to name a few. Young, up-and-coming filmmakers also showcased their films at the festival: the likes of Samrat Chakrabarti, Jaydeep Sarkar, Anshuman Jha, Abhay Kumar, Manu Warrier, Shlok Sharma, Manoj Nitharwal and Ravi Kapoor. In addition to screenings, the festival boasted a week of special events, industry panels and networking parties.
The Indo-American Arts Council is a registered 501(c) 3 not-for-profit, secular service and resource arts organization charged with the mission of promoting and building the awareness, creation, production, exhibition, publication and performance of Indian and cross-cultural art forms in North America. The IAAC supports all artistic disciplines in the classical, fusion, folk and innovative forms influenced by the arts of India. We work cooperatively with colleagues around the United States to broaden our collective audiences and to create a network for shared information, resources and funding. Our focus is to work with artists and arts organizations in North America as well as to facilitate artists and arts organizations from India to exhibit, perform and produce their works here.
The New York Indian Film Festival (originally the IAAC Film Festival) opened their doors in 2001 following the devastation of the September 11attacks on New York City. This festival creates an awareness and better understanding of the people and stories from the Indian Diaspora by bringing the most acclaimed feature films, documentaries, and shorts from that region to America’s biggest and most remarkable city. Merchant-Ivory’s Shakespearewalla was the festival’s Opening Night, while Mira Nair’s ‘Monsoon Wedding’ closed IAAC’s first film festival before its worldwide theatrical release.
Since then, the festival has provided first-looks at many acclaimed films, including Deepa Mehta’s Oscar-nominated ‘Water,’ and ‘Midnight’s Children’, Nair’s ‘The Namesake,’ and ‘The Reluctant Fundamentalist’ and the New York Premiere of Danny Boyle’s ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ which won eight Oscars including Best Picture.
Some of the artists who support the festival include Mira Nair, Salman Rushdie, Madhur Jaffrey, Padma Lakshmi, Shabana Azmi, Rishi Kapoor & Neetu Singh Kapoor, Shashi Tharoor, Sarita Chaudhury, Sakina Jaffrey, Anurag Kashyap, Shyam Benegal, Mani Ratnam, Aparna Sen, the late filmmakers Ismail Merchant and Rituparno Ghosh. NYIFF’s 15th anniversary will include premiere film screenings, discussions, industry panels, nightly networking parties, special events, an awards ceremony, and red carpet galas. The festival will run May 4th to 9th at a variety of prestigious New York City venues, including the Skirball Center for Performing Arts, the Paris Theatre and the Village East Cinemas. For the latest news, updates and information about The 15th Annual New York Indian Film Festival, presented by The Indo-American Arts Council, please visit www.iaac.us
Los Angeles, CA: Recognizing the fact that India today leads the International cosmetic empire, leading Indian herbal beauty expert Shahnaz Husain has been invited to speak on “Ayurveda – India’s ancient Cosmetic Science” at the Pre-Oscar function, part of the Oscar Award event, highlighting the dangers of chemicals and power of herbs, to be held in Beverly Hills, California.
According to Siddhartha Sengupta, Chief General Manager of Corporation Communications, the formal invite mentions “Ayurveda is the only natural alternative – this is just what Beverly Hills and Hollywood is looking for.”
Shahnaz Husain has brought her unique range of products aimed at alleviating the effects of chemotherapy on the skin and hair around the world. The Shahnaz Husain story is the story of the spirit of true entrepreneurship. It provides a rare insight into the individual qualities that make one person stand apart from the rest. It is the story of a woman, a first generation entrepreneur, a pioneer, visionary and innovator, who introduced a totally new concept of Ayurvedic Care and Cure worldwide, with universal appeal and application. It is the story of a woman who created a brand and an international market for Ayurvedic beauty and health care. In a world ridden with environmental degradation, Shahnaz Husain opened the windows of the world to Nature and its healing powers, taking the Indian herbal heritage of Ayurveda to every corner of the globe with a crusader’s zeal.
Shahnaz Husain, the pioneer of organic beauty care, has achieved unprecedented international acclaim for her practical application of Ayurveda, the ancient Indian system of herbal healing. Just when there was a worldwide “back to nature” trend, Shahnaz Husain recaptured an ancient herbal system and made it relevant to modern demands. Almost four decades ago, she adopted the principle of Ayurveda, based on an integrated system of clinical treatments and product ranges. In fact, her career has been a constant search for a better alternative. Her study of Ayurveda, the Indian holistic system of herbal healing, strengthened her faith in nature, finding that it could offer the ideal answers to protective, preventive and even corrective cosmetic-care. Today, her name has become the brand and she is herself the brand ambassador. She heads the largest organization of its kind in the world, with a chain of over 400 franchise clinics, shops, schools and spas worldwide, as well as Ayurvedic formulations for skin, hair, body and health care. Her journey, from one herbal clinic to a worldwide chain, is one of unprecedented success.
Born into a conservative family, Shahnaz had to comply with existing traditions and was married at the tender age of 15, becoming a mother by the time she was 16. She trained for ten years in cosmetic therapy and cosmetology, at leading institutions of the West, like Helena Rubinstein, Swarzkopf, Christine Valmy, Lancome and Lean of Copenhagen. Adopting the principle of “Care and Cure,” she set up her own herbal clinic, in her own home, with very little capital investment, formulating products for skin, hair and body care, based on the Ayurvedic system and devising clinical treatments for specific problems. Her formulations and treatments have become breakthroughs in natural beauty care. In fact, she has also become known for specialized treatments for specific skin and scalp disorders.
Nandita Shenoy’s “Washer/Dryer,” a new comedy play that examines the pressures of modern-day marriage against the backdrop of New York City, opened in Beckett Theater in Manhattan Feb. 2 and will run till Feb. 20. Nandita Shenoy is a writer-actor from Buffalo, and now living in New York City.
The play, which recently held its world premier in Los Angeles, revolves around the obstacles of wedded bliss of Sonya (Shenoy) and Michael (Johnny Wu) who are just married because Shenoy did not mention to Michael that her co-op apartment is single-occupancy and so he can’t legally live there, but she refuses to give it up because of the washer and dryer that came with the place.
They realize that there’s nothing like a hostile co-op board to wreck a honeymoon. The apartment is tidy, but friends, family and co-op rules are a mess.
When the tyrannical co-op board president, Wendee (Annie McNamara), starts sniffing around, Sonya denies being married, saying Michael is her “best gay boyfriend,” according to a New York Times report. This lie will sow much confusion when it reaches Michael’s imperious mother, Dr. Lee (Jade Wu).
Presented by Ma-Yi Theater Company at the Beckett Theater at Theater Row, “Washer/Dryer” is “only partly in keeping with Ma-Yi’s mission of producing “new and innovative” work by Asian-American playwrights, the report noted.
“After a week of packed houses in previews, not to mention a blizzard, I am about to open my first Off-Broadway show which I wrote and in which I star. I am over the moon with delight on arriving at this point in my journey. Three years after first writing it, “Washer/Dryer” has finally arrived in New York where it seemed always to belong,” Shenoy writes on her website.
Papa CJ, one of India’s leading stand-up comedian and a pioneer of the ‘Stand-up’ movement in India, has been invited to perform at Carolines on Broadway, New York’s premier stand-up comedy nightclub.
Papa CJ who is bringing his acclaimed new show Naked will perform for two nights – on Feb 10 and 11. ‘Naked’ is the first ever show from an Indian comedian to be invited to premiere at the prestigious Soho Theatre in London. It was also the first show by an Indian comedian to be invited to premiere at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. The show also represented India at the Shared History Festival in South Africa where it received standing ovations at every show.
Papa CJ has won awards for both Asia’s and India’s ‘Best Stand-up Comedian’. Forbes Magazine called him ‘the global face of Indian stand-up’ and Toastmaster International called him one of the most influential comedians around the world. He has performed over 2000 shows in 19 countries.
His work has been broadcast on NBC, BBC, Comedy Central, Showtime, MTV, Paramount, The Comedy Channel, ITV and a host of other international networks. He taped a Showtime USA Stand-up Comedy Special with Russell Peters in Amsterdam and in the American TV show Last Comic Standing, and was adjudged one of the top ten acts from over 3000 contestants across the world. Papa CJ also holds an MBA degree from the University of Oxford and has worked as a motivational speaker and executive coach.
CHICAGO, IL — Air India, Chicago organized a special screening of Akshay Kumar’s latest Hindi blockbuster movie, “Airlift–Air India’s Call for Duty”, on January 31 at Movie Max (Big Cinemas), 9180 W Golf Road, Niles, IL 60714.
Among the 200-plus eminent people who watched the film included staff of Indian Consulate General, community leaders, corporate and retail customers of Air India, travel agents, airport service providers of Air India.
D B Bhati and O P Meena Consuls at the Consulate General of India in Chicago Vinesh Virani from The Art of Living foundation and Minhaj Akhtar, president, FIA, Chicago were the special guests at the screening.
The movie showcases the daredevil mission of airlifting of a staggering 1,11,711 Indians who were rendered penniless and homeless, consequent upon Iraq’s attack on Kuwait in 1990.
The mission, which was accomplished by Air India, involved 488 flights spread over a more 59 days, is considered to be the largest air evacuation in the history of mankind and the most glorious chapters in Indian civil aviation history.
Air India, thus, entered into Guinness Book of World Records for the civil airline that had evacuated the most people till date.
Nakul Chand, manager-Midwest, Air India, said that ‘Airlift’ was an uplifting, entertaining, and edge-of-the-seat thriller that every Indian, and every Bollywood buff looking for genuinely high quality storytelling, must watch.
Nakul Chand was courtesy-personified. Being the perfect host, he informally interacted with all the guests and thanked them profusely for gracing the occasion.
‘Airlift’ has been directed by Raja Krishna Menon, presented by T-Series and Cape of Good Films, and produced by Crouching Tiger and Emmay Entertainment.
Santa Clara, CA: The Super Bowl held this weekend in California had an Indian flavor. Even as millions around the world watched the most popular sport in the US, Coldplay, the rock band decided to use the Pepsi Super Bowl 50 platform to show just how fascinated they are with India and its myriad colors during their Super Bowl halftime act at Levi’s Stadium on February 7 in Santa Clara, Calif.
Coldplay’s latest video featuring Beyoncé, “Hymn for the Weekend,” which was shot in India, stirred much controversy, with many calling it a perfect case of cultural appropriation. And with more than 100 million people estimated to be tuned into the game night, they sure had a huge audience.
Though the British rockers did not render “Hymn for the Weekend,” they performed on a brightly-colored Super Bowl stage that was adorned with marigold flowers and multi-hued garlands. Even their drum-sets and amplifiers had the band’s name written in Hindi. The four-minute video of the song, “Hymn for the Weekend,” shows Coldplay being chased and pelted with color as residents celebrate Holi, the Indian festival of color.
Many Indians say it stereotypes India as the land of holy men and pagan festival rituals. They say the video ignores changes in India following the economic boom that has changed the face of Indian cities and towns. The music video, shot almost entirely in India’s entertainment capital, Mumbai, also has a two-second appearance by Sonam Kapoor, an up-and-coming Bollywood actress.
The video has triggered a debate among India’s English-speaking elite about cultural appropriation as Beyoncé appears dressed in typical Indian wedding finery, on billboards and in a bioscope painted in many hues.
SAN LEANDRO, CA: Indian American songwriter-producer Savan Kotecha’s song in the film “Fifty Shades of Grey,” has been nominated for the Grammy award in the Best Song Written for Visual Media category. The 58th annual Grammys will be presented live from the Staples Center in Los Angeles on February 15th.
The Texas native, who now has plenty of musical success stories, began pursuing songwriting as a career when he was a teenager. “My earliest memory of a song is Diana Ross’ ‘Upside Down’ that my dad would listen to,” Kotecha recalled. “Also buying my first 12 inch vinyl, which was the ‘Thriller’ single I got from Kmart.”
The budding songwriter got a break in 1999 at the age of 21, when music publishing giant BMG took a chance on him and sent him to Sweden. It was also in Sweden that Kotecha was lucky enough to team up with star songwriter Max Martin, whose work with the Backstreet Boys, Katy Perry, Pink, N Sync, Taylor Swift and Britney Spears has had an influence over global pop that can’t be overstated.
Kotecha’s name might not sound very familiar, but the gazillion amazing pop tunes that he has written for the who’s who of the industry most definitely will. One of those ultra-catchy numbers is “What Makes You Beautiful,” which launched the band One Direction into stardom. Since then, Kotecha has penned several songs for the English-Irish pop band, including “One Thing,” “Live While We’re Young,” “I Wish” and “Kiss You.”
Kotecha has written Platinum-selling hit songs for artists like Justin Bieber (“Beauty and a Beat”), Christina Aguilera, Maroon 5 (“One More Night”), Britney Spears (“If U Seek Amy”), Usher (“Scream,” “DJ Got Us Fallin’ in Love”), Demi Lovato, Celine Dion, Westlife and many others — including most notably the pop music phenomenon One Direction, the British boy band whose 2011 debut album, “Up All Night,” sold more than 4.5 million copies. They are embarking on a world tour this year.
Kotecha first popped up on this writer’s radar as a songwriter and vocal coach for One Direction, for whom he is credited as a writer on such songs as “What Makes You Beautiful,” “Up All Night,” “One Thing,” “I Wish” and “Save You Tonight.”
When 1D’s second album, “Take Me Home,” was released in 2012, it topped the charts in more than 35 countries, and was the fourth best-selling album of 2012, selling 4.4 million units. Kotecha is credited as a writer on that album’s singles “Live While We’re Young” (which went Platinum and became YouTube’s most-viewed video debut ever), “Kiss You,” “Last First Kiss,” “Heart Attack,” “Change My Mind” and “Back for You.” Their latest album, “Midnight Memories,” features another Kotecha composition, “Happily.” Kotecha even appears in a scene in the band’s 2013 3D concert movie “One Direction: This Is Us.”
“It’s been an amazing year, and I feel really lucky that a number of my songs have connected with the public,” Kotecha said. “The Golden Globe nomination is especially exciting as it’s outside the music business and something new. Every year I can continue to do what I love, (which) is a blessing.”
Kotecha shares a co-writing credit with Martin on “Love Me Like You Do,” along with Tove Nilsson, Ali Payami and Ilya Salmanzadeh. Talking about his musical collaborations, Kotecha said that he feels “confident” working with artists as big as Maroon 5 and Usher, but when it’s not a super star act, it’s hard to tell what will work, he said.
Born to Indian immigrant parents, Kotecha admits that he is just not into Bollywood music but nevertheless doesn’t rule out the possibility of a future collaboration. “But I’m very interested in one day finding the right project to fuse the world I’m in into the Bollywood world,” he said. Having already worked with the best in the industry, Kotecha now has other plans.
“I feel now I’ve worked with most of the people I could’ve ever dreamed to work with,” he said. “Now it’s just about continuing those relationships and finding new artists who are the next big thing.”
PHILADELPHIA, Penn. — Indian American musician-composer Chitravina N. Ravikiran set a new record of sorts in world music during his recent trip to Chennai in January. There, Ravikiran set a composing record by setting music to 1330 Tirukkural verses in 16 hours. To put things in perspective, this is comparable to completing a 26-mile marathon in barely 15 minutes, according to a report on PRNewswire. Tirukkural, composed by Tamil philosopher Tiruvalluvar during the 2nd-4th Century BC as couplets, are replete with themes ranging from moral codes of conduct to romance.
While there have been a few attempts to set them to music, Ravikiran’s 16-hour feat is unprecedented in world music. A project of this magnitude in any type, style and language would normally require several weeks to months for even the most creative composers at an average of eight to ten minutes per verse, the release said.
“To me, it is not just a record but more of a miracle, which cannot be measured in human terms. To be honest, I don’t even know if I can take credit for this! Things just flowed automatically,” said Ravikiran, speaking to the media at the end of the final session.
Massachusetts-based Indian American singer Sonika Vaid has secured a place in the Top 24 of the farewell season of “American Idol.” “Sonika! Welcome to the top 24!” exclaimed “American Idol” judge Jennifer Lopez on the Feb. 4 episode of the show.
The 51 remaining singers gave one final performance for the judges during the last night of Hollywood Week following which the Top 24 were chosen.
Twenty-year-old Vaid rendered a cover version of the classic pop number, “I Surrender” by Celine Dion, during the last night of Hollywood Week. Though Vaid has garnered praise for the originality in her voice, the judges felt she still needed to work on her performance skill.
“You gave a great performance yesterday vocally,” Lopez said. “But we worry in that there’s just something missing in your performance. There’s something that needs to come alive, and that’s what we argued over.”
“So after much debate, we decided that we would like you to be part of the Top 24, and maybe work on that part of things because of that amazing voice you have.”
“Oh, my God, I’m so excited, I can’t believe this!” said an ecstatic Vaid on the show. The competition continues next week, which will see the remaining singers perform in groups of 12. Six former “Idols” will perform duets with them.
February 8, 2016 –Arka Mediaworks and acclaimed filmmaker S. S. Rajamouli, announced a partnership with leading character entertainment company, Graphic India to take to epic blockbuster film Baahubali: The Beginning, beloved by millions of fans across the country, and extend it s story world beyond movies into original comic books, novels, animation and video games.
Graphic, currently in production on a number of digital comics and mobile shorts which will be released later this year, is working on various trans-media opportunities and partnerships for the film property across gaming, digital content, novels and merchandise.
“Extending the World of Baahubali beyond movies allows us to reach a larger audiences and that is really exciting for me,” said director SS Rajamouli. “We are happy to be collaborating with Graphic India who I believe have the best knowledge and experience in this space”.
CEO of Arka Mediaworks, Shobu Yarlagadda said “Having created so many iconic stories and characters, there is no one more equipped than Graphic India, to take the story of Baahubali forward. We are very excited for what’s to come.”
Graphic and Arka are also working on a larger animated project, tentatively entitled, “Baahubali: the Lost Legends,” which is being developed and produced by Rajamouli, Shobu Yarlagadda, and Graphic India Co-Founder Sharad Devarajan. More details on that project will be released in the coming months.
“The epic storytelling and groundbreaking visuals that S. S. Rajamouli created have captivated millions of fans including myself, and the future of Indian cinema shall now always be defined as ‘before Baahubali’ and ‘after Baahubali’. I am so deeply honored and humbled to work with, and learn from Rajamouli, Shobu and the Arka team as we bring their epic world into comics, animation and gaming,”added Graphic India Co-Founder & CEO, Sharad Devarajan. “
Through comics and animation, millions of fans will finally be able to experience secret stories and hidden legends about the world and characters from Baahubali. Two brothers competing to rule the greatest kingdom of its age and the epic adventures they must endure to prove they are worthy to one day wear the crown. One shall rise to be King of the throne, while the other shall become King of the people.
Political intrigue, betrayal, war, action and adventure – through dense forests, epic mountain tops, raging seas and hidden underground caves, Prince Baahubali’s adventures will take him beyond what was seen in the film, exploring different kingdoms, fighting strange and deadly warriors, saving villages from tyrannical warlords, and rescuing the innocent from certain death. Experience an age of legends and heroes; learn back stories and secrets about your favorite characters from the film and clues about the upcoming sequel.
GRAPHIC INDIA is a character entertainment company focused on creating leading characters, comics and stories through mobile and digital platforms. Led by media entrepreneur Sharad Devarajan, Graphic India is owned by U.S. comic book Company, Liquid Comics LLC, CA Media LP, the Asian investment arm of The Chernin Group, LLC (TCG) and NYC Media Group, Start Media. The company’s partners and investors bring together decades of experience in building businesses in character entertainment, media and India.
Graphic’s stories include Chakra The Invincible, the first superhero for India from legendary creator Stan Lee, which launched on Cartoon Network and has over 40 million views from worldwide audiences on Angry Bird’s ToonsTV platform;Astra Force, created with legendary icon, Amitabh Bachchan and in production as an animated TV series for Disney; 18 Days, a reimagining of the great eastern epic, the Mahabharata, by acclaimed Batman writer, Grant Morrison; Devi, from acclaimed filmmaker, ShekharKapur; Ramayan 3392A.D., The Sadhu, Titans and The Leaves, all currently in development as Hollywood feature films; and numerous other heroes and stories.
Graphic believes that India is home to some of the most creative talent in the world, with more than 500 million people under the age of 25 and more than 850 million mobile phone users in the country. The Company’s mission is to create enduring stories and heroes that foster the imaginations and fuel the inspirations of a new globalized generation of youth in both India and around the world. www.GraphicIndia.com
Sonika Vaid from Massachusetts, who blew the “American Idol” judges away with her sterling vocals during the auditions, is turning out to be an early favorite in the show’s latest and final edition. Accroding to reports, the 20-year-old student from Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., has now made it through the ‘Hollywood Week’ group round, and is increasingly being touted as one of the top contenders for the title.
Vaid, who is amassing a huge fan following that includes “American Idol” alum Carrie Underwood, sailed into the next round Jan. 28, after performing a perfect group rendition of Ariana Grande’s “Problem” with two other contestants.
Underwood had earlier tweeted her support in response to a clip of Vaid’s audition that stated: “@AmericanIdol Wow. I might have found a season favorite already! What a beautiful voice…”
Sonika Vaid, 20, who came all the way from Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., to deliver her pretty, tasteful take on Carrie Underwood’s “Look At Me.” Lopez said she loved it “a lot” – and Connick perhaps even more. He called it “a perfect performance,” said Vaid had a “beautiful” voice that “touched him,” and predicted she could win the whole thing.
During her audition, Vaid impressed the judges with her cover of Underwood’s “Look At Me,” a performance that elicited a bold response from Judge Harry Connick, Jr., who remarked that she had a winning voice. “That was a perfect performance. This is one of the only times, this particular season, that I saw somebody that I can think can actually win this thing,” he said.
“I’d like to say I gave it a try,” Vaid said before her performance. “Looking around the room, there are a lot of girls, and they are beautiful and talented and I hope I stand out to the judges.”
In an interview with Fox 25 News, Vaid said that she had been singing since she was three years old, and grew up performing at a park near her home for special events.
Palo Alto, California; January 24, 2016: The vibrant cultural experience of the Indian state of Kerala captured the imagination of corporate leaders attending a “Kerala Evening” in Silicon Valley, which is home to the world’s top technology companies.
Kathakali and Kalaripayattu performers enthralled a packed venue of the event organized by Kerala Tourism in partnership with Confederation of Indian Industry(CII) and US-India Business Council on Thursday in Palo Alto, California.
“It is a significant day in the history of our state’s tourism sector,” said Kerala tourism minister AP Anilkumar. “The United States is a key market for Kerala Tourism. In-bound tourism from America to Kerala has grown about 40 per cent in the past two years,” he said.
“Our first-ever corporate meet in the Silicon Valley is a crucial step to further increase those numbers.” The executives of over 50 companies in Silicon Valley attended the corporate meet addressed by Kerala tourism principal secretary G Kamala Vardhana Rao.
Tourist arrivals from the US have registered a 39.24 per cent growth during 2012-14. In 2014, the number of American tourists who visited Kerala was 76,616 compared to 55,741 in 2011, according to a media release
Kerala Tourism event was intended to introduce Kerala as a tourist destination and also to portray the state as an investor-friendly destination to the companies in the Silicon Valley.
On behalf of Kerala State Industrial Development Corporation (KSIDC), Rao also presented the various investment opportunities available in the state. Rao invited the technology community in California to come visit the state as well as invest in Kerala’s progress.
“Kerala is growing as a destination for corporate leaders and executives around the world because of its beautiful as well as peaceful locations to talk and do business. There is no better place than Kerala for the Silicon Valley executives to come and relax and even work,” Rao said. “With a large concentration of highly qualified software professionals and entrepreneurs, Kerala is an ideal destination for investment by the Silicon Valley companies,” he added.
New York, NY: January 24, 2016: Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra has been nominated at the 8th Annual Shorty Awards in the Actress category. Priyanka, who has nearly 31 million followers across various social media platforms, is nominated alongside actresses like Amandla Stenberg, Cara Delevingne, Elizabeth Banks, Gabourey Sidibe, Kerry Washington, Maisie Williams, Olivia Wilde, Reese Witherspoon, Taraji P. Henson, Uzo Aduba and Zendaya at the Shorty Awards under the Arts and Entertainment categories, reports hollywoodreporter.com.
A former beauty queen, Priyanka won the Favourite Actress in A New TV Series award at the 42nd People’s Choice Awards for her role in American TV thriller series Quantico earlier this month. The Shorty Awards honour the best of social media by recognising the influencers, brands and organisations on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, YouTube, Instagram, Vine and Periscope.
In the Actor category for the awards, Ansel Elgort, Dwayne Johnson, Jared Leto, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Matt McGorry, Michael B Jordan, Nathan Fillion, Ryan Reynolds, Taye Diggs, Tom Hanks and Zac Efron have been nominated.
For the Celebrity category, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Caitlyn Jenner, Chrissy Teigen, Jimmy Fallon, Kim Kardashian, Miss Piggy, RiFF RAFF, RuPaul, Ryan Seacrest, Snoop Dogg, Tavi Gevinson and Weird Al have been lined up.
For Singer award, among the nominees are Adele, Alicia Keys, Diplo, Drake, Kanye West, Nicki Minaj, Pearl Jam Pharrell Williams, Ryan Adams and St. Vincent for Musician award and Demi Lovato, Ellie Goulding, FKA twigs, Rihanna, Selena Gomez and Taylor Swift.
Founded and produced by Sawhorse Media, the Shorty Awards will be held in April and will be available via live stream at ShortyAwards.com. Finalists in each category – recognising content for sports, journalism, fashion, humor and more – are determined by rankings from The Real Time Academy, as well as votes from fans via social media.
Tamil-Hindi actor Dhansuh is all set to make his Hollywood debut with Uma Thurman starrer film “The Extraordinary Journey of The Fakir.” Directed by Iranian-French director Marjane Satrapi, the film also stars Alexandra Daddario, “Captain Phillips,” actor Barkhad Abdi and Laurent Lafitte, reported Variety. The film also stars “Kill Bill” actress Uma Thurman.
Dhanush is a popular actor in India, and he has worked in both Bollywood and the southern film industry. His last Hindi release was “Shamitabh” in which he starred with Indian cinematic icon Amitabh Bachchan. “The Extraordinary Journey of The Fakir”, directed by Iranian-French director Marjane Satrapi, will also see “Bandit Queen” actress Seema Biswas, reports variety.com.
Apart from them, the film, which will be shot in Paris, Rome, Jodhpur and Casablanca, will also feature Alexandra Daddario, Barkhad Abdi and Laurent Lafitte. The film will mark the most ambitious project undertaken by Satrapi, who earlier helmed films like “Persepolis” and “Chicken With Plums”. Satrapi made her English language debut with “The Voices” starring Ryan Reynolds.
“The Extraordinary Journey of The Fakir” is a comedy adventure tale based on Romain Puertolas’s bestselling debut novel “The Extraordinary Journey of The Fakir Who Got Trapped In An Ikea Wardrobe” which came out in 2014 and has been translated into 35 languages.
The novel relates the pilgrimage of a con man from India to an IKEA in Paris which turns into a philosophical odyssey. The film will follow his journey from New Delhi to Paris where he falls in love with a woman and accidentally gets deported along with a band of African refugees to the far corners of Europe against his will.
“It’s a story about love, magic and adventure and it takes place across three continents. I’m drawn to fantasy stories and I love creating worlds that don’t exist, imagining things in bigger and more beautiful ways,” Satrapi said. The shooting of the film will begin in June.
Chicago IL:January 23, 2016: Iftekhar Shatreef, an eminent Businessman and Community Leader, released trailer of the upcoming Hyderabadi film, ‘Dawat-e-Shaadi’, in the presence of a number of eminent persons from different walks of life,on January 08, 2016 at Monty’s Elegant Banquets,703 S York Rd, Bensenville, IL Chicago. The film, which has been shot in the beautiful and aristocratic locations of Paigah Palace Begumpet, is a hilarious situation-based comedy and gripping love story in the backdrop of the traditional weddings of Hyderabad.
Iftekhar Shareef said that while “Dawat-e-Shaadi” is devoid of vulgarity, it guarantees a heavy dose of high-voltage entertainment and hard-hitting punches, which will be enjoyed by the entire family. “The non-stop laughter ride and the subtle message to the audience would result in a positive word-of-mouth publicity to the film”, he added.
“It is a moment of pride that ‘Dawat-e-Shaadi’, is being distributed and released by Rajshree Productions under its banner in February 2016, with a big bang”, said Syed Hussain, Director of the film.
“The release of our film by Rajshree Productions, which has produced a number of blockbusters in India, will take the Hyderabadi cinema up a notch like never before and catapult it into the higher echelons of film appreciation, added Hussain, with a sense of accomplishment.
“While the Hyderabadi Film Industry has been confining itself, since its inception in 2005, to making small budget films for niche market, ‘Dawat-e-Shaadi’ is pioneering in nature and first of its kind, considering the fact that it is a Bollywood-type big-budget film which is rich in terms of exquisite quality, pan-India appeal, breathtaking locations, and high-end technology” said Mast Ali, a. k. a. Saleem Pheku, the king of comedy, who acted in over 20 film and brought laurels to Hyderabad.
“For action and adventure, the movie lovers watch Hollywood films, for songs and dances, they prefer Bollywood films, and for pure and unadulterated comedy, they throng to the Dollywood films, that is, Hyderabadi Films”, said Mast Ali. “The fans of Hyderabad Film Industry will definitely bless ’Dawat-e-Shaadi’ with resounding success, considering its high entertainment quotient”, he added.
Mast Ali said that all the films of Hyderabad, without any exception, registered huge success, both at the box office and in the video market. Considering the Hyderabadi films to be a safe bet, many people came forward to invest in their production. “Dawat-e-Shaadi”, with a blitzkrieg of aggressive promotion and marketing campaign, unleashed by the Rajshree Productions, is poised to break many records of success”, he added.
Aziz Naser, the popular and powerful actor with over 15 films under his belt, said that “Dawat-e-Shaadi” will entertain the audiences thoroughly, irrespective of their linguistic backgrounds. “The movie lovers of the entire Indian Subcontinent, including those from Pakistan, can easily understand the ”Hyderabadi Urdu, the lingua franca of the streets of Hyderabad, which is a unique mix of Urdu, Hindi, Telugu, and some Marathi”, he added.
Aziz Naser said that Hyderabad Film Industry, in future, will join hands with Bollywood stars and would churn out great movies by combining their respective success formulae.
Feroz Khan, who has essayed a negative role in “Dawat-e-Shaadi” said that Hyderabadi cinema has come to attain the status of a genre unto itself, not just considering the typical lingo of the City of Pearls, but even given the culture and traditions of the Deccan.
Dawat-e-Shaadi”, which has been produced by an Australian-based duo, Samiullah Fayyaz and Syed Waseem Yaba features three heavy weights of the Hiderabad Film Industry–Mast Ali, Aziz Naser, Feoz Han, and above all, Adanan Sajid Khan a. k. a. Gullu Dada. Three beautiful leading ladies, Kavya, Madhavi, and Manisha too are playing interesting roles in the film.
Mast Ali, Aziz Naser, Syed Hussain, and Farhan Khan thanked Iftekhar Shareef for his help, in a variety of ways, in getting the trailer of “Dawat-e-Shaadi” in Chicago. They thanked Layeeque Ahmed and Shoukat too for their support to them.
Netflix Inc’s global expansion is set to reach movie-mad India, industry executives said, where high-speed Internet connectivity is rapidly spreading among a vast population used to paying pennies for their latest Bollywood fix.
Slowing growth at home in the United States has put pressure on video-streaming service Netflix to grow internationally and India, where a fifth of the country’s 1.3 billion people are online, is widely seen as a likely next step in Asia.
Netflix declined to comment on its plans but industry executives told Reuters they expect an India announcement as early as this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, where co-founder and Chief Executive Reed Hastings is scheduled to talk about the company’s international expansion. “Netflix is entering India at the right time,” said analyst Tarun Pathak at Counterpoint Technology Research.
Most Indian Internet users go online via smartphones, which are increasingly capable of connecting to the latest, fourth-generation network (4G) which cuts streaming times considerably.
“We expect at least one in two mobile devices sold this year to be 4G equipped,” Pathak said. The challenge is convincing Indians to spend, analysts said. Netflix’s average revenue per user (ARPU) in the third quarter was $25.29 in the United States and $21.59 abroad.
In India, where a movie can cost 29 rupees (44 cents) and monthly subscriptions are as little as 200 rupees, analysts expect ARPUs to be a fraction of that.
With most Indians getting online with smartphones, a telecom partner could speed Netflix’s market entry a year after Hotstar – from Twenty-First Century Fox Inc controlled Star Network – and three years after Singapore-based Spuul.
Netflix paired with SoftBank Group Corp for its Japan launch, piggybacking on the one of the country’s mobile network providers for its first foray in Asia in September.
Netflix’s U.S.-listed Indian rival Eros International PLC announced a partnership on Monday with Idea Cellular Ltd, the country’s third-biggest mobile carrier with 167 million subscribers.
For telecoms companies, streaming services increase data consumption which is more lucrative than telephone calls. Moreover, movie subscriber numbers are widely expected to jump with the large scale introduction of 4G services, led by the Jio network of Reliance Industries Ltd. But in price-sensitive India, reaching new customers with big-budget content is likely to prove far easier than fending off the appeal of cheap, easily available pirated copies.
“In India our biggest worry is not Netflix,” said Michael Smith, chief technology officer at startup Hooq, backed by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd, Time Warner Inc and Sony Corp.
“It’s the 20 cent copy of a movie that has just been released.”
Bollywood actress and former Miss World Priyanka Chopra made India proud yet again by winning a People’s Choice Award for her international debut as FBI agent Alex Parish in American TV thriller series “Quantico”. She is said to be the first South Asian actress to win the honor.
Priyanka was named the Favorite Actress in a New TV series at the gala on the night of Jan. 6
Ecstatic with the victory, she said: “I’d like to thank everyone who voted for ‘Quantico’. It is my first year in the US, and to come to another country and actually get this kind of acceptance is I guess what America is all about.
“So, thank you for accepting me, thank you to my mom, my manager, the cast and crew, the writer, ABC…everyone. I’m really overwhelmed.” The 33-year-old star was given the trophy by Hollywood action star Vin Diesel, who also gave a touching tribute to his late “Fast and Furious” co-star Paul Walker by singing the song “See you again” during the course of the show.
“Furious 7″, Walker’s last film before he passed away in November 2013 in a car accident, was named the Favorite Movie and the Favorite Action Movie at People’s Choice Awards 2016.
Other Hollywood celebrities who received awards at the ceremony held here at the Microsoft Theater were Ellen DeGeneres, Sandra Bullock, Chris Hemsworth, Johnny Depp and Meghan Trainor. Hosted by Jane Lynch, the gala honored the best in movies, TV and music, on the basis of public voting.
Melissa McCarthy, Taylor Swift and Ellen DeGeneres were some of the other winners. While McCarthy won the Favorite Comedic Movie Actress and Favorite Comedic TV Actress awards, DeGeneres took home the trophies for Favorite Daytime TV Host and Favorite Humanitarian.
The Favorite Female Artist and Favorite Pop artist awards were given to Swift. In the movies section, Channing Tatum was chosen as the Favorite Movie Actor, while Bullock was announced as the Favorite Movie Actress. The Favorite Action Movie Actor award was taken by Chris Hemsworth and Shailene Woodley was honored as the Favorite Action Movie Actress award.
Other winners included the Favorite Comedic Movie award to “Pitch Perfect 2”, Favorite Comedic Movie Actor to Kevin Hart, Favorite Dramatic Movie to “The Martian”, Favorite Dramatic Movie Actor to Johnny Depp, Favorite Dramatic Movie Actress to Dakota Johnson, Favorite Family Movie to “Minons” and Favorite Thriller Movie to “Taken 3”.
On the small screen, the Favorite TV Show award was given to “The Big Bang Theory”, which was even named the Favorite Network TV Comedy trophy. The awards for Favorite Dramatic TV Actor and Actress were given to Taylor Kinney and Ellen Pompeo.
“Homeland”, which featured Bollywood actress Nimrat Kaur, won the Favorite Premium Cable TV Show.
Other winners in the television category included Jim Parsons as Favorite Comedic TV Actor, “Grey’s Anatomy” as Favorite Network TV Drama, “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” as Favorite Cable TV Comedy, “Pretty Little Liars” as Favorite Cable TV Drama, Kevin Hart and Sasha Alexander as Favorite Cable TV Actor and Actress, Dwayne Johnson and Kristen Bell as Favourite Premium Cable TV Actor and Actress among others.
Meanwhile, in music categories, singer Ed Sheeran was given the award for Favorite Male Artist, American girl group Fifth Harmony was chosen as Favorite Group and singer Shawn Mendes was given the Favourite Breakout Artist award.
The Favourite Male and Female Country Artist awards went to Blake Shelton and Carrie Underwood. Singers Nicki Mnaj and Meghan Trainor were given the awards for Favorite Hip-Hop Artist and Favorite Album respectively. And Justin Bieber’s hit single “What do you mean?” was announced as this year’s Favourite Single. Madonna was announced as the Favourite Music Icon.
Amongst other popular categories, Britney Spears was named as Favorite Social Media Celebrity; the Favourite Social Media Star award was taken by Matt Bellassai; Candy Crush Saga was picked as the Favourite Mobile Game, Super Smash Bros was named as Favorite Video Game and Connor Franta called the Favorite YouTube Star.
Apart from that, the People’s Choice Awards 2016 also featured some power-packed performances by Jane Lynch, Shawn Mendes, Camila Cabello, Jason Derulo, Jordan Smith and David Foster.
“I feel whatever we shot for ‘Mastizaade’ is not wrong and I am not worried about people’s reaction towards me,” Sunny Leone, an Indo-Canadian adult film star, who will soon be seen in sex comedy film “Mastizaade”, said. According to her, the film director made her feel so comfortable that she never felt “wrong” shooting for the movie. “Every actor and actress have their own dos and don’ts and in this film (‘Mastizaade’), there were lots of don’t but me and Milap Zaveri (the director of the film) sat together and decided what we can do. He made me so comfortable.
“I want to tell this to everyone that Mastizaade is not a sex comedy, it’s an adult comedy for adults. As far as the censor board is concerned… the board is doing their job and it’s our job to push boundaries and create something different,” the actress told the media.
Co-produced by Pritish Nandy and Rangita Pritish Nandy, “Mastizaade” will release on January 29. The film also features Tusshar Kapoor and Vir Das, among others. Sunny feels that people have different perceptions about her but she never took it seriously.
“If people think I can do anything onscreen then that’s a natural thing for them to think. I can’t do anything about that. As an actor when you start putting limitations, you don’t have an open mind to explore.”
“Every actor and actress have their own dos and don’ts and in this film (‘Mastizaade’), there were lots of don’t but me and Milap Zaveri (the director of the film) sat together and decided what we can do. He made me so comfortable. “I feel whatever we shot for ‘Mastizaade’ is not wrong and I am not worried about people’s reaction towards me,” she added.
Joy TV Network, the first Indian owned broadcasting station in the South Eastern United States, announces their operations in Atlanta. This broadcast, anchored at Channel # 21, is a FREE TV network available to all residents in the coverage area. Apart from the HD television Channels, Joy TV will also be airing a number of 24×7 Radio channels in various Asian languages. There will be a free app available for download, which will enable live/recorded telecast of the programs.
Apart from English and Spanish channels, Joy TV will have multiple channels in various Asian languages, including Hindi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Korean, Chinese and Vietnamese. Unlike other Asian Channels, which are available only by live-streaming through internet, these channels will be available Free-on-air.
Joy Television Network has a state-of-the-art recording studio and equipment. The programs are slated to go live in March 2016. It will have facilities for recording Local/National News, cultural events, health, sports, test kitchen and spotlight young entrepreneurs and educational/informational programs. Major local News and events will be broadcast live, while other events from around the US will also share prime airtime.
Initially the programs of Joy TV is scheduled to cover nearly 5 million viewers while efforts are on to broadcast through Cable carriers to telecast these programs to a wider audience. Joy TV is open to partnering with Producers to Develop programs for open/targeted audiences. It is also possible for interested parties to lease air-time from Joy TV’s channels. Joy TV welcomes inquiries from media corporations and Public relations organizations about leasing an entire TV channel to broadcast their own programs.
Mr.P.I. Joy, the Chairman of Joy TV Network, said “There is a huge market out there that is waiting to tap into the demand for Asian and Hispanic culture and programs. Also, we cannot express ourselves effectively as a community, unless we are represented by a strong media. I am certain our US Pan Asian American community’s voice will now be heard, even in the capital and overseas.”
For more information about leasing on the TV and Radio broadcasting on Joy TV Network, please contact the
1. P I Joy at pi@joytvn.com (Chairman) / +1 (678) 283 3636
Asia Society is presenting the New York premiere of Invocation, Pakistani-born jazz guitarist Rez Abbasi’s quintet featuring pianist Vijay Iyer, saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa, Johannes Weidenmueller (acoustic bass), Dan Weiss (drums), and Elizabeth Means (cello). In this special performance, the group unveils a new project that explores Carnatic classical music from Southern India through the idiom of jazz.
Titled Unfiltered Universe, this is the final installment in a trilogy that puts a jazz lens on the musical traditions of South Asia. Their 2009 debut, Things To Come, employed Hindustani North Indian music and featured Indian vocalist Kiran Ahluwalia. DownBeat magazine chose the album as one of the decade’s best. Suno Suno was released in 2012. Featuring compositions that were influenced by Abbasi’s long time love of Pakistani Qawwali music, it also received many accolades.
Abbasi is one of the foremost guitar players in modern jazz, and was recently cited as one of the “best guitarists” inDown Beat magazine’s International Critics Poll. A product of the Manhattan School of Music, he made a pilgrimage to India early in his career to study with tabla master Ustad Alla Rakha, father of Zakir Hussain. Abbasi — along with Iyer and Mahanthappa — is one of a trio of jazz musicians who are forging distinctly South Asian-inflected voices on the contemporary scene.
These talented composer/musicians have worked together for years, playing in each others ensembles and building a musical community. Asia Society has a long-term commitment to the creative work of these musicians. Starting with Asia Society’s commissioning of Vijay Iyer’s In What Language (with Mike Ladd) in 2003, and continuing with the commission of Kinsmen in 2006, Asia Society has presented ensembles lead by these three artists over the ensuing decade.
The mission of Invocation’s music, Abbasi declares, is “to create a global-based music steeped in jazz. This tradition follows in the footsteps of some of the greatest jazz musicians. Coltrane, Ellington, and Gillespie all immersed themselves in music from around the world.”
This performance of Rez Abbasi’s Invocation, presented in collaboration with Duke Performances and Walker Art Center, is supported by the Presenter Consortium for Jazz, a program of Chamber Music America funded through the generosity of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.
Chicago IL: India House, in association with Desi Junction, a Worldwide On-line Radio Station, presented a high impact making New Year Eve Bash -2016 at Pearl Banquets in Roselle, IL. The event was attended by over 600 persons. Captivating music and dance performances by professionally-trained local talent and comedy programs aimed at entertainment of entire family captured the hearts of the audience. The event, which was conceptualized innovatively and executed professionally, turned out to be a complete package in its own right, in terms of high-end entertainment, state-of-the-art decoration, attractive lighting, balloon drop, champagne toast at midnight, and above all, the wholesome food.
The specialized, professional, and enthusiastic team of Desi Junction put together a vibrant and mind-boggling entertainment program, consisting of soulful singing, electrifying dancing, and hilarious comedy. Their versatile singers, including Sudesh Saraf, Ajai Kumar, Suman Sharma, Ruchi Vijayvargia, and Nisha Saraswat mesmerized the audience by rendering hit Bollywood tracks.
The highlight of the evening was a high-energy quwalli parody, which was presented by Desi Junction team, comprising Ruby, Maegha Saraf, Ashita, Megha Mathur, Ankit Mahajan, Prateek Tanna, Irfan Khan, Kartik Saraf, and Dhiraj D’Stylz. Ajai Kumar, considered to be the Kishore Kumar of Chicago, sang hit number of Kishore Kumar and paid rich tributes to him.
Chicago Bollywood Dance Group, Megha Mathur, and Maegha Saraf presented gripping dance performances. A good number of members of the audience, especially their younger counterparts, gave in to the festive mood, joined the dancers on the dance floor, and matched step-for-step with them. The outpouring of the enthusiasm seemed to cast a spell with the entertainment fervor going several notches up.
The skits presented by Comedy Junction team, under the direction of Jassi Parmar, mimicry of Shatru, Big B, Jai, Veeru, Mithun, Gabbar Singh, and Salman, magic show by Mike, and tasting program of newly launched wine, “Somras”, added to the multifaceted nature of the event.
“The event, at which the guests were treated as stars, was a stupendous success. As promised by the organizers, it was truly a clean family event”, said Charandeep Singh.
“This was the only event at which the organizers paid special attention to the kids, which they richly deserve. Many exclusive items were planned and presented in order to entertain them as thoroughly as possible, keeping their typical needs in mind”, said Ritika Mathur.
DJ Dheeraj added great value to the event by appropriately using the magic of music, keeping in view the unique demands of different situations. He kept the audience fully engaged throughout the duration of the event.
Ankit Mahajan, while welcoming the guests, wished them health, happiness, and prosperity in 2016. He said that the true celebration involves specification of the goals for the New Year and initiating action towards achieving them. “Taking the first step is most important, rather than distances to be covered”, he added.
The lead organizers of the event, Jassi Parmar, Surender Mathur, Aslam Qureshi, Ravi Rawat, Pritesh Gandhi, and Gulya were pleased with the overwhelming success of the event; they hope to continue working together in future in order to bringing high-quality entertainment to Chicago.
MC Jassi Parmar, who is considered to be the showman of Chicago, entertained the audience with his unique compeering. He profusely thanked India House Partners, Ravi Rawat and Jagmohan Jayara, and his excellent team, for making exceptionally great arrangements for the event. He acknowledged the support of the sponsors too, especially Air India, and the army of committed volunteers, who contributed handsomely to success of the event.
India House and Bombay Chopsticks served about 100 varieties of finger-licking food items from cuisines from different countries. People really loved sampling everything under one roof, while adults made sure to stop by at the open bar to get their favorite drinks too.
The event was sponsored by Air India, Level Construction, Apex Cosmetics and Spa, A1 Motors, New York Life, Insurance World, Swap Motors, and many others.
Chicago IL: Nick Joshi from Shy Entertainment organized a splendid New Year’s Eve celebration on Thursday, December 31, 2015 at Meadows Club, Rolling Meadows, IL. The gorgeous Bollywood actress, Neha Dhupia, set the stage literally on fire with her foot thumping and show stopping dance performance on a medley of songs that left the audience spellbound on the eve of the New Year. Audiences were house full despite awful weather in Chicago.
The spectacular celebrations also brought together the best of entertainment, beverage, fun, food, and festivities into one power-packed evening. Dramatic technical effects, including three-dimensional projection, stereophonic sound, and cold pyrotechnics accentuated the evening.
In addition to the dance performances, Neha played an exciting game, “Kaun Banega Neha Ka Pati”. To her pleasant surprise, a large number of her hardcore fans, as young as 8 and as old as 80, took to the stage and staked their serious claim to marry her. Neha got everyone involved, asked them interesting questions and had a great time. And of course, all of them got an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to grove to the music and compliment to the moves of the lovely lady on the dance floor and added a sparkling dash of Neha to their New Year’s Eve celebrations.
Bollywood actress Neha Dhupia with event organizer Nick Joshi from Shy Entertainment, Jeen Varghese (Promotions Director) and Performers from The Yeh Cheez Group.
The action-packed and electrifying dance performance by one of the finest, most talented, and best dance groups of the US, Yeh Cheez Group, on the song “Singh is King”, conceptualized by Noman Khan and Farah Khan, uplifted the mood of the audience. Even Neha, who was a part of the song in the film, looked super-excited watching Yeh Cheez Group perform on this medley. The usage of glow swords, formations, and executions were just phenomenal. “One of the best performance that I have ever witnessed; it was really magical”, said Neha who was virtually in a state of shock and awe.
Right after “Singh is King”, there was another dance performance by Yeh Cheez Group, which was interrupted by Noman Khan in the middle. He requested Neha to join them on stage and shake a leg. Neha was very hesitant, but when the crowd, with their loud scream and applauses, requested her to dance, she could not say “No”. She joined Yeh Cheez Group and they did a mind blowing dance performance which got everyone on their feet and the performance literally ended 10 seconds before the countdown for the New Year. It ended on the song “Abhi To Party Shuru Hui Hai”.
The versatile trio, Pratibha Jairath, Rinki Talati and SanketMohan Patel rendered hit and happening Bollywood tracks, including “Prem Ratan Dhan Payo”, “Chikni Chameli”, “Mainu Pyar Na Mile Na Mile To Mar Jawan”, “Ram Ji Ki Chal Dekho”, and many more and mesmerized the audience.
There was a belly dancing performance by Alexandra Constantinescu and Dimitra Louloudaki, which proved to be a riotously colorful and entertaining spectacle. It offered an intriguing glimpse into the world of belly dance, which was a scintillating mix of myth, history, folklore, and fantasy.
The DJ, Prashant Shah, played hits of yesterday, today, and tomorrow for the audience to dance their feet off into 2016.
There were raffles in between the performances and the organizers gave away a lot of exciting gifts to the raffle winners sponsored by Studio Elite, Holiday Inn (Itasca), Expressions Boutique, etc.
“What an amazing night and what a superb way to bring in 2016! The crowd at the Meadows Club was tremendous, responsive, and supportive. With their fabulous and unstoppable energy, they truly inspired me as a performer”, said Neha with sense gratefulness.
“We set out to create a memorable night and going by the response we all received, the evening was a super success. Thank you for being such a wonderful audience. You have given us a great start to 2016″, said the team of artists unanimously.
The team of artists further stated that the presenters of the event dared to dream big and inspired everyone involved to make this happen. “Their attention to detail, artistic vision, and quest for perfection pushed us all as a team to go above and beyond to deliver something that we truly hope our fellow Chicagoites will cherish and remember”, they added.
“The audience were fantastic. When we were on the stage, we could feel it. All the different movements and things that we do strikes a response by their applause “said Sagar Bhatt Performer.
Neha posted a picture on all her social media sites (Twitter, Face book, and Instagram) and wished everyone Happy New Year around the world wearing a “New Year 2016” Hat along with the amazing dancers of Yeh Cheez Group.
The Yeh Cheez Group comprised the following 16 Performers: Noman Khan (Lead Performer and Captain), Nishma Patel, Sarvangi Patel, Aliyah Sayed, Naimiti Desai, Pooja Patel, Dipti Vats, Diya Khan, Kajol Topiwala, Madhura Patil, Lovish Thakur, Mahi Thakur, Sagar Bhatt, Ravi Patel, Anand Bhatt, and Anup Kilani
Hair and Makeup for Neha Dhupia by Beauty by Shabana Bhatti, Ruby Rizvi (Expressions Boutique), Vaishali Dev (AKS Entertainment), and Jeen Varghese (Marketing and Promotions Director), was sponsored by Royal Basmati, Suga Builders, Desi Junction, Hi India, Asian media USA, Pearl Banquet, Melange Decour, Studio Elite, Maha Designs, New York Life, Yeh Cheez Group, India Video, Shree, Bridal Lounge Chicago, Nirav Foods, Desi Bazaar, and Makkah Printing.
The presenters profusely thanked Rafi Hussain, Sunil Shah, Hitesh Gandhi, Shalini Saxena, Madan Kulkarni, Hemi Patel, Payal Shah, Siraj Khan, Hina Trivedi, Zainab Zafar, Sandeep Palakkal, Stuti Chris, Erum Hassan, Uroosa Rahim, Fahad Zuberi, Taha Rizvi, Shahida Khan, and Asian Media USA for their valuable help in organizing the event successfully.
The handsome Noman Khan and lovely Tanya Sharma conducted the proceedings of the evening with a professional touch and kept the audience thoroughly engaged and fully involved. Everyone had the great time and the event organizer Nick Joshi from Shy Entertainment left no stone unturned to provide the most entertaining and glamorous event ever done in Chicago.
Dr. Amit Majmudar, a nuclear radiologist from Dublin, Ohio, was last week named Ohio’s first poet laureate, a year after legislation creating the position of the state’s official poet was passed.
Gov. John R. Kasich named Majmudar, a medical doctor who serves as a diagnostic and nuclear radiologist, the poet laureate. Dec. 17 following recommendation for the position by the Ohio Poet Laureate Selection Committee that conducted an extensive statewide nomination and review process.
Throughout his medical career, Majmudar, 36, has nurtured his writing as a poet, novelist and essayist. He has published two novels, Partitions in 2009 and The Abundance in 2011. His poetry has appeared in numerous publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The Atlantic Monthly, Poetry Magazine, The Antioch Review and The Best of the Best American Poetry 1988-2012.
His essays and literary criticism have appeared in a number of publications as well, including the New York Times, The Kenyon Review and Poetry Daily. “Our first poet laureate will bring a unique perspective to this new role and is a powerful example to our young people that regardless of what career path they choose to pursue, they always can tap into their other passions,” Kasich said in a press statement.
During his two-year term, beginning January 1, 2016, Majmudar said he intends to bring an “interdisciplinary approach” to promoting poetry by establishing a link with the existing, thriving Ohio arts community. According to a governor’s office press release, another important component of his outreach will be engaging Ohio high school students through a variety of means to encourage the future of poetry in Ohio.
In 2011, his poetry collection “Heaven and Earth” was named winner of the Donald Justice Prize, a national poetry award presented by the Iris N. Spencer Poetry Awards. His next collection of poems, “Dothead,” will be published in March by Alfred A. Knopf.
Majmudar is a graduate of Northeast Ohio Medical University College of Medicine and received his bachelor’s degree in natural sciences from the University of Akron. He currently works for Radiology Inc. in Columbus. According to Poetry Foundation, an independent literary organization committed to a vigorous presence for poetry in American culture, in his precise, often formally driven poems, Majmudar explores themes of identity, history, spiritual faith, and mortality.
In an interview with the Kenyon Review, the foundation said, Majmudar stated that his credo comes from Eliot, quoting the Upanishads in his notes to ‘What the Thunder Said’: Da, dayadhvam, damyata. Give, sympathize, control.
“That is both the art of life and the art of poetry. It seems fitting to me that they should be identical,” he said. Noting Majmudar’s “expressive grasp of familial, religious, and cultural tensions and allegiances” in a review of Heaven and Earth for Verse Wisconsin, poet Zara Raab praised his ability to compose poems that “reveal tenderness in their humanity and the precision of a surgeon in their details.” Son of immigrants from India, Majmudar was born in New York and grew up in Greater Cleveland.
Chicago IL: “The Hyderabad Film Industry, even though only about 10 years old, has churned out a series of comedy blockbusters and gained popularity not only in Andhra Pradesh and different parts of India but also among the large Diaspora in the Middle-East and the US, thanks to the Internet and DVDs”, said Mast Ali, a. k. a. Saleem Pheku, the king of comedy, who acted in over 20 high impact making films in different languages and brought laurels to Hyderabad, at a Press Conference held on December 23, 2015,: 5.30 PM at Mysore Woodlands, Devon Ave, Chicago. The Press Conference was attended by a huge number of representatives from the Print, Electronic, and Internet Media.
“Our films entertained their audiences thoroughly, irrespective of their linguistic backgrounds, as the Hyderabadi Urdu, the lingua franca of the streets of Hyderabad, which is a unique mix of Urdu, Hindi, Telugu, and some Marathi, is widely understood across the Indian Subcontinent, including in Pakistan”, added Mast Ali.
Mast Ali said that the Hyderabad Film Industry is currently in the growth mode and, hence, there is a great demand for story writers, lyricists, singers, etc. “Currently, we are caught up in all the departments of film making. Once the demand for different professionals is met, we can focus on our core job of acting and on producing high-quality films according to the felt needs of our audience, across the globe”, he added.
“It is a matter of gratification that the Hyderabad Film Industry is currently undergoing a metamorphosis; it is no longer confining itself to making small budget films for its niche market. Instead, it is focusing on producing typical Bollywood films, which are rich in terms of exquisite quality, pan-India appeal, and high-end technology”, said Aziz Naser, a. k. a. Jahangeer, another equally popular and powerful star.
“It is a moment of pride that Dawat-e-Ishque’, a landmark Bollywood-type movie of the Hyderabad Film Industry, is being released by Rajshree Productions under its banner, with a big bang”, said Syed Hussain, Director of the film.
“The release of our film by Rajshree Productions, which has produced a number of blockbusters in India, will take the Hyderabadi cinema up a notch like never before and catapult it into the higher echelons of film appreciation, added Hussain, with a sense of accomplishment.
Feroz Khan, who has essayed a negative role in “Dawat-e-Ishque” said that Hyderabadi cinema has come to attain the status of a genre unto itself, not just considering the typical lingo of the City of Pearls, but even given the culture and traditions of the Deccan.
“Our films, which deliberately shun vulgarity and item songs, considering the culture of Hyderabad, focus mainly on delivering authentic entertainment for the entire family”, he added.
“The stars of Hyderabad Film Industry will present a 90-minute Comedy Show, a charity-oriented event, on December 29th, 2015, 8:00 PM onwards at Northshore Banquet Hall, Devon, Chicago. The Show, comprising a unique combination of funny gags, mimicry, stand-ups, etc. will be laced with typical Hyderabadi-style comedy”, said Mast Ali and Aziz Naser.
“The Show will be our tribute to the worth-emulating success of people of Hyderabad in the US. Hyderabad has been the capital of comedy for decades and we hope that the Show will be instrumental in further improving the relations among the people of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka”, they added.
“On the occasion of the Show, the trailer of the upcoming Hyderabadi film, ‘Dawat-e-Ishque’, produced by an Australian-based duo, Samiullah Fayyaz and Syed Waseem Yaba, which features Mast Ali, Aziz Naser, and Adanan Sajid Khan a. k. a. Gullu Dada, and three beautiful leading ladies, Kavya, Madhavi, and Manisha, will be released”, said Syed Hussain, Director of the film.
Mast Ali, Aziz Naser, Syed Hussain, Farhan Khan, and their team, including Layeeque Ahmed, Shoukat, and Keerthi thanked Iftekhar Shareef, a prominent Businessman and Community leader, for sponsoring the Comedy Show and helping them out in a variety of ways in Chicago as well as in Hyderabad. Iftekhar Shreef requested all the Indian Americans belonging to the Indian Subcontinent in general and Telengana State in particular to attend the Comedy Show, in large numbers.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (MET), one of the world’s largest and finest art museums, is exhibiting “Encountering Vishnu: The Lion Avatar in Indian Temple Drama” till June five next.
“Dramas presented during religious festivals in southern India are an important aspect of popular Hindu celebration. This exhibition highlights five rare wooden sculptural masks that represent a largely unrecorded category of late medieval Indian devotional art”, MET announcement says. Artifacts shown go as far back as 5th century.
Exhibits include sculptures of Narasimhas in sandstone and wood, Hiranyakashipu in wood, Prahalada in wood, Ganesha in wood, Vishnu in bronze, standing Vishnu in copper, Vishnu rescuing Gajendra in stone, Vishnu slaying Hiranyakashipu in stone, standing four-armed Vishnu in terracotta, Yoga Narasimha in copper alloy; besides Vaikuntha Vishnu mask in bronze. In addition, there are paintings of Narasimha, Bhima, Krishna, Putana, Rama-Sita-Lakshmana, Matsya Avatara, Balaskandha, Assembly of Rama, Vishnu-Garuda Wahan, Shri Sheshanarayana and Hiranyaksha.
Commending MET for Lord Vishnu exhibition, Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada today, said that art had a long and rich tradition in Hinduism and ancient Sanskrit literature talked about religious paintings of deities on wood or cloth.
Rajan Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, urged other major art museums of the world, including Musee du Louvre and Musee d’Orsay of Paris, Los Angeles Getty Center, Uffizi Gallery of Florence (Italy), Tate Modern of London, Prado Museum of Madrid, National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, etc., to frequently organize Hindu art focused exhibitions, thus sharing the rich Hindu art heritage with the rest of the world.
Collections of MET, founded 1870 and whose mission includes “to connect people to creativity, knowledge, and ideas”; include over two million works of art spanning 5,000 years of world culture, from prehistory to the present and from every part of the globe. It has the largest assemblage of musical instruments outside Europe and its Costume Institute’s collection is over 35,000. It also undertakes traveling exhibitions, conservation, excavations, etc. Thomas P. Campbell, Daniel H. Weiss and Daniel Brodsky are Director, President and Trustees Chairman of the Museum respectively.
An exhibition of rare and masterful drawings “Drawn from Courtly India” created between 1500s and 1800s, shows Krishna dancing atop many-headed Kaliya demon and six naginis (Kaliya’s part-human part-snake wives); Krishna and the gopis shelter from the rain; festive image of the birth of Krishna; walking Vaishnava disciples; Devi and the Shakti forces attack Nishumbha, Shumbha, and their army; battle scene with demons; etc.
Commending PMA for showcasing drawings about Lord Krishna and other Hinduism subjects, Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada today, said that art had a long and rich tradition in Hinduism and ancient Sanskrit literature talked about religious paintings of deities on wood or cloth.
Rajan Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, urged major art museums of the world, including Musee du Louvre and Musee d’Orsay of Paris, Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Los Angeles Getty Center, Uffizi Gallery of Florence (Italy), Tate Modern of London, Prado Museum of Madrid, National Gallery of Art in Washington DC, etc., to frequently organize Hindu art focused exhibitions, thus sharing the rich Hindu art heritage with the rest of the world.
PMA is also organizing yoga party to “Celebrate the Holidays” on December 30; involving yoga through meditative exercises, yoga postures, and breathing techniques. Calling it a “peaceful stretch”, PMA is also making “Henna tattoos” available at this event.
PMA, which began as a legacy of the great Centennial Exhibition of 1876, claims to have “world-renowned collection” and to inspire the visitors “to discover the spirit of imagination that lies in everyone”. Timothy Rub, Gail Harrity and Constance H. Williams are Director, President and Trustees Chair respectively of the Museum; while Ainsley M. Cameron is the Curator of this exhibition.
Lord Krishna is the eighth avatar (incarnation) of Lord Vishnu and subject of major Hindu scriptures such as the Bhagavad-Gita (Song of the Lord) and Bhagavad-Purana. Hinduism, oldest and third largest religion of the world, has about one billion adherents and moksha (liberation) is its ultimate goal. There are about three million Hindus in USA.
