Maha polls: Sanjay Dutt hopes Aaditya Thackeray wins elections

Feb 3: Actor-cum-activist Swara Bhaskar on Sunday targetted the Central government over granting Padma Shri to Pakistan-origin singer Adnan Sami who became an Indian citizen in 2016.

Addressing "Save the Constitution, Save the Country" rally here in Madhya Pradesh, Bhaskar said that passing the new citizenship amendment act tantamount to "betrayal" of the Constitution.

Sami, born in London to a Pakistani Air force veteran, applied for Indian citizenship in 2015 and became a citizen of the country in January 2016.

He was one of the 118 people chosen for the Padma Shri awards by the Centre last month.

"The legal process to grant citizenship to refugees and arrest infiltrators already exists in India. You (the government) have granted Indian citizenship to Adnan Sami and now selected him for Padma Shri through that process. (If this is the case) What is the need and justification for the Citizenship Amendment Act?" Bhaskar asked.

"On the one hand you abuse us (anti-CAA protesters), cane-charge us, slap us, hurl teargas shells at us and on the other hand you award Padma Shri to a Pakistani," she said

Bhaskar said the government labels some people as the members of "tukde-tukde gang" and anti-nationals" as per its convenience.

"Supporters of the CAA and the NRC keep harping about the so-called infiltrators having entered our country. If that is the case then why are we unable to see these intruders?" she asked.

"The problem is that they have intruded into the minds of the government and the ruling party," she said.

Bhaskar said the government seems to have "fallen in love with Pakistan".

"It sees Pakistan everywhere. My devout grandmother doesn't chant Hanuman Chalisa as often as this government keeps chanting the Pakistan mantra," she said.

Without naming the RSS, the actor said, "Sitting in Nagpur, these people are spreading politics of hatred".

Bhaskar said Pakistan chose to become a religious nation after the Partition in 1947 unlike India which opted to become a "secular republic where one's religion has nothing to do with citizenship".

"(Pakistan founder Mohammad Ali) Jinnah died a long ago, but his admirers want to divide the country again in the name of a religion," Bhaskar said.

She criticised BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya for his controversial remarks about the 'presence' of Bangladeshi infiltrators in Indore, after some labourers were found eating poha and not rotis.

"If poha is Bangladeshi cuisine, then Kailash Vijayvariya, who grew up eating poha (in Indore), should be required to show his Indian citizenship papers," she demanded.

Los Angeles, Feb 21: Nepalese-Australian actor Dichen Lachman has joined the cast of the third film in the Jurassic World franchise.

Lachman, best known for Netflix series Altered Carbon and TNT show Animal Kingdom, is the latest addition to the Colin Trevorrow-directed picture, reported Deadline.

Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment project will see Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard reprise their roles. Mamoudou Athie and DeWanda Wise are also part of the cast.

The movie marks the return of original Jurassic Park stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum.

Trevorrow has co-written the script of the new film with Emily Carmichael. He will also executive produce the film with Steven Spielberg.

Jurassic World 3 hits theatres on June 11, 2021.

Los Angeles, Jan 27: Lil Nas X, Lady Gaga, Beyonce and... Michelle Obama?

Yep.

The former first lady can now add Grammy winner to her resume, after snagging the award on music's biggest night for Best Spoken Word Album, for the audiobook of her memoir Becoming.

Her win on Sunday gives the Obama household its third Grammy: former president Barack Obama has already snagged two Grammys in the same category for his books.

She faced an eccentric group of rivals that included Michael Diamond and Adam Horovitz of the Beastie Boys for Beastie Boys Book and John Waters, the director-performer known for his transgressive cult films, for Mr. Know-It-All.

 Released in late 2018, Becoming saw the former first lady slam U.S. president Donald Trump for questioning her husband's citizenship and promoting the notion that he was born abroad.

"The whole [birther] thing was crazy and mean-spirited, of course, its underlying bigotry and xenophobia hardly concealed," Obama wrote.

America's first black first lady also dug into her personal life in her book, expounding on issues including a miscarriage, using in-vitro fertilization to conceive her daughters and marriage counseling.