MISS UNIVERSE APOLOGISES TO INDIA OVER TAJ PHOTOSHOOT

Mar 21: Singer Sonu Nigam has decided to extend his stay in Dubai as he believes travelling amid the coronavirus outbreak can put people around him at risk.

The singer was in the Himalayas earlier and wanted to come to Mumbai for a concert scheduled for March 6 but it got postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic.

He then decided to head to Dubai to be with his wife and son and has been there since a few weeks.

"I am fortunate that my wife and my son are in Dubai. My son studies here and I keep travelling here a lot, Dubai is like my second base. But my father, sister are alone in India. I wanted to come back to India and be at my father's side but I realised that if I do that, I'll be exposing him to the risk of me carrying this virus, who knows the extent of the danger," Sonu told

The 46-year-old singer said everybody is taking precautions and he wants to ensure that the health of those around him isn't at risk.

"I thought let's not outsmart the virus. I thought it's better for me to stay for a bit (till things go normal). Coming back to India, and then going in quarantine will still be a risk.

"I came to Dubai and I thought I'll be able to go back to India but I didn't know it's going to be such an issue eventually. But we are fine here."

On Friday, singer Kanika Kapoor become the first Bollywood celebrity to test positive for the deadly virus in the country and has said she is under complete quarantine and medical care.

The UP police later booked the singer for negligence and committing acts that are likely to spread disease dangerous to life after she attended at least three gatherings in Lucknow, including a party where political leaders were present.

When asked if his decision of staying back was in anyway related to what happened to Kanika, Sonu said that wasn't the case.

"The last time I was contemplating coming to India was on March 16 night, but thankfully my flight got cancelled. Then from March 17, there was this regulation from the government of India that you have to go on a self quarantine for 14 days, compulsorily. I decided I shouldn't take a chance. Being a potential carrier is the worst thing," he said

In Dubai, the singer said the family is taking extreme precautions.

"We all are being safe, staying indoors, not gathering with many people. Careless people shouldn't be around you at this point, people who are too brash, that 'oh nothing will happen.' I don't allow such people in my vicinity. I'm.very hygiene conscious anyway." said the singer.

Sonu said he will be conducting a live music concert on his social media on Sunday.

Patna, Jun 27: As Sushant Singh Rajput’s family tries to come to terms with his loss, they have decided to honour his legacy and celebrate his passion for cinema, science and sports.

In an emotional statement shared on Saturday, the Bollywood actor’s family remembered him as a “free-spirited” person who worked hard to turn his dreams into reality.

“He was free-spirited, talkative and incredibly bright. He was curious about just everything. He dreamed without restraints, and chased those dreams with the heart of a lion. He smiled generously. He was the pride and inspiration of the family,” the statement read.

Rajput, 34, known for films like Kai Po Che!, MS Dhoni: The Untold Story and Chhichhore, was found dead in his Bandra apartment on June 14, sending shockwaves in the film industry and elsewhere.

The family said that the actor’s untimely demise has created an irreparable void in their lives.

“We can’t bring ourselves to accept that we wouldn’t get to hear his easy laughs anymore. That we wouldn’t see his sparkling eyes again. That we wouldn’t hear his endless rants about science again. His loss has created a permanent, glaring void in the family that will never be filled.”

Thanking his admirers for being a constant support as they try and recover from the loss, the family added that Rajput, “truly loved and cherished every single one of his fans.”

The actor, who made the storybook transition from Patna boy to television and then the starry lights of the Hindi film industry, was the youngest of five siblings and is survived by his father and four sisters. His mother had passed away in 2002 when he was a young teen.

To honour his memory and legacy, the family has decided to set up Sushant Singh Rajput Foundation (SSRF) that will support young talents in cinema, science and sports.

His childhood home in Rajiv Nagar, Patna, will be turned into a memorial, where all his personal memorabilia and belongings, that include thousands of books, his Meade 14’’ LX-600 telescope, flight-simulator, will be on display for his fans and admirers.

The actor’s family, who used to fondly call him Gulshan, will also maintain his social media accounts as legacy accounts to keep his memories alive.

Rajput started his acting career with television after dropping out from Delhi Technological University in the early 2000s. He was one of the few talents to have made a successful transition to movies.

The actor made his Bollywood debut in 2013 with Kai Po Che!. In past seven years, he had featured in a number of hits including blockbusters Neeraj Pandey’s MS Dhoni: The Untold Story and Chhichhore by Nitesh Tiwari.

Tiwari’s 2019 hit was Rajput’s last theatrical release.

On Thursday, it was announced that Dil Bechara, which is the actor’s last movie he shot for, will premiere on Disney + Hotstar on July 24.

New Delhi, Jun 26: Actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death has exposed the deep faultlines in the Hindi film industry with issues such as bullying, nepotism and discrimination emerging from tinsel town’s rarely discussed dark corners into the spotlight of introspection and debate.

The days since the death of the 34-year-old actor, whose body was found in his Mumbai apartment on June 14, have split the glamour industry down the middle – between ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’, 'us' vs 'them', and those born to fame and those who sweated for it.

That Rajput, who came from a middle class home in Patna and made his mark in mainstream Hindi cinema in what could be the classic fairytale, ended his life led to soul searching about power structures in Bollywood and also angry accusations at the biggies who call the shots.

'Outsider' Manoj Bajpayee said the structural shift that everyone in the industry wants to see will begin once the powerful abolish the "insider-outsider" divide.

"Nepotism has been in the debate for a few years now. It'll change only if each and every individual who is positioned well, who is established and powerful starts making efforts to make it healthy and democratic for all the talented people who are coming in," Bajpayee said.

“We will have to work very hard to turn this industry into a fraternity where each and everyone is welcomed," he said. Dibakar Banerjee, who directed Rajput in Detective Byomkesh Bakshy!, added that outsiders need to put in twice the amount of work as compared to star children to convince the industry, the public and the box office of their talent.

"The biggest unfairness in all this is that it takes double the talent, energy and hard work for an outsider to convince the audience and the industry that he or she is as safe a box office bet as a mediocre, unmotivated and entitled establishment elite," he told news agency.

Rajput was considered that rare actor, after Shah Rukh Khan perhaps, to have transitioned from television to Bollywood stardom and his death opened the proverbial can of worms.

Detective Byomkesh Bakshy! was produced by Yash Raj Films, which also backed Rajput’s Shuddh Desi Romance. As rumours swirled about unfair contract details, the powerful production house and other industry bigwigs and star children such as Karan Johar, Alia Bhatt and Sonam Kapoor faced ire from not just the public but even some of their colleagues.

The untimely death of the young actor had clearly not just touched a chord but triggered a rallying cry for change.

An out of context, old clip from Johar's chat show Koffee with Karan in which Bhatt is seen joking about Rajput and Kapoor confesses not knowing him fuelled the anger.

Hashtags like #BoycottKhans, #boycottnepotism and #JusticeForSushantSinghRajput started trending online a day after the actor's death with many calling for a boycott for the films made by Johar and featuring star children.

An online petition on Change.org asking fans to boycott Johar, YRF and Salman Khan has gathered almost 38 lakh signatures so far.

Reflecting the split in filmdom, Johar unfollowed everyone on Twitter except eight people, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Shah Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan.

Hate comments also made actor Sonakshi Sinha, daughter of veteran actor-politician Shatrughan Sinha, deactivate her Twitter account last week.

Kapoor, too, disabled the comments section on her Instagram page and that of her father, veteran actor Anil Kapoor.

The public's angst found resonance in Bollywood with many in the fraternity saying the industry needs to introspect on how it treats outsiders.

Actors Gulshan Devaiah and Sushmita Sen, directors Hansal Mehta and Onir and singers Sonu Nigam and Kumar Sanu were amongst the many people who spoke out on the deeply disturbing issues that Rajput’s death had thrown up.

Mehta made a distinction between nepotism and bullying. 

He said his son Jai Mehta was an assistant director in his own film Shahid and also in Anurag Kashyap's Gang of Wasseypur series. He stepped inside the door because of his father but got ahead because he is talented.

“So when people take off on nepotism they do not really address the elephant in the room. They belittle the real battle -- the battle is between the powerful and the rising, between old and new, between rigidity and change, between secure and insecure,” Mehta said.

The director also criticised those bullying people in the guise of criticism.

“People in power (inherited/earned) have no business bullying those perceived to be less powerful or dependent on them,” he said, adding that the debate had been narrowed down to target certain people not for reform or the larger good.

According to Sen, nepotism is a truth as old as the industry.

“I think competition is a great thing but it should be a fair one for everyone… We have lived with it for many years. If it needs to change then all of us need to take responsibility, no one person,” she told PTI.

Onir said calling out nepotism does not mean denying talent just because someone belongs to the industry.

“It is about empowering all those deserving and talented denied opportunity by blatant discrimination. It’s about marginalising talent and creating a non-inclusive space,” he said.

Devaiah, known for his roles in Shaitan and A Death in the Gunj, said there is a lot of "toxicity" in showbiz because of the power structures but actors need to safeguard themselves from getting into a position where they can "lose control".

The debate was just not about actors but also the music industry.

“I have a request for music companies. Today, Sushant Singh Rajput has died. An actor has died. Tomorrow you might such news about a singer, a composer or a lyricist. The state of affairs in the music industry... there is a bigger mafia in the music industry than the film industry…,” singer Sonu Nigam said in a heartfelt video after Rajput’s death.

His colleague Kumar Sanu also uploaded a video on Facebook this week, saying he can sense a "revolution".

"Since his demise, I can see a different revolution emerging. Nepotism exists everywhere. It's a little more in our industry. You (the audience) make us who we are… Filmmakers or the top people (in the industry) cannot decide. It is in your hand to make us," he said.

As the debate intensified, Aligarh scriptwriter Apurva Asrani said some ‘woke’ friends were trying to crush the movement the actor’s death had sparked.

“Claiming to want dignity for him, they want others to suffer indignity in silence,” he tweeted, sharing a thread in which other such as Shekhar Kapur Ranvir Shorey and Abhay Deol also discussed nepotism and the camp culture in Bollywood.