March 2015

Former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee conferred with Bharat Ratna

News

Mar 272015

Vajpayee is lauded as a statesman and has been often described as the moderate face of BJP. Photo:PTIFormer Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and founder member of Bharatiya Janta Party will be conferred Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian award today.

President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be among a host of VVIPs who are likely to be present at the Krishna Memon marg residence of Vajpayee in Lutyens’ Delhi where he will be honoured.

The announcement for the prestigious award for Vajpayee, the first Prime Minister from outside the Congress party to serve a full five-year term, came on December 24, a day before he turned 90.

Vajpayee, who was Prime Minister from 1998 to 2004, and has faded from public life due to age-related illness, is lauded as a statesman and has been often described as the moderate face of BJP.

He has been credited with taking bold initiatives, notable among them being the historic bus journey to Lahore in 1999 when he signed the landmark Lahore Declaration with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif with both sides pledging to push for peace and security.

Vajpayee’s detractors called him the “mask” of RSS but still always had good words for him.

The recommendation for Bharat Ratna is made by the Prime Minister himself to the President.

Since its inception, 43 people including former Prime Ministers Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bhadur Shastri, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi besides singing legend Lata Mangeshkar and the batting mastreo have received the prestigious award.

For more news from India Today, follow us on Twitter @indiatoday and on Facebook at facebook.com/IndiaTodayFor news and videos in Hindi, go to AajTak.in. ????????? ?????? ?? ?????? ?? ??? ????.?? ?? ???.

Vishal Bhardwaj’s next with Hrithik Roshan not a remake of ‘The Departed’

Celebrities

Mar 172015

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Mumbai: Vishal Bhardwaj says he and Hrithik Roshan have been planning to work together for a long time but things did not work out in the past.

There is a strong buzz that the director and Hrithik are collaborating on a project to be produced by Sajid Nadiadwala. When asked about such a possibility, Bhardwaj said it may or may not happen.

“Hrithik and I have been trying to work for a long time. After every film he completes and I complete, we meet and decide that we will do a film together. I hope it works out this time but not sure,” Bhardwaj told PTI.

The director, however, clarified that their future project will not be a remake of “The Departed” contrary to reports. “It won’t be ‘Departed’. I am not going to make a remake of it. I was thinking about it a long time back, probably six or seven years back,” he said.

Arvind Kejriwal stung by ex-AAP MLA, Anjali Damania quits on Twitter

News

Mar 112015

Anjali Damania and Arnind KejriwalAs the Aam Aadmi Party battles internal dissent, an old audio tape purportedly showing the party’s national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal discussing his plans to break the Congress and buy its MLAs last year during the President’s Rule in Delhi surfaced on Wednesday. The AAP dismissed the audio, saying it was an attempt to defame the party.

The audio tape, released by AAP leader and former MLA Rajesh Garg, allegedly shows Kejriwal in conversation with him and planning the horse-trading of six Congress MLAs into the AAP. “Congress won’t support us. We have been trying for the last one and a half months,” Kejriwal is apparently heard saying in the tape.

The explosive conversation between Kejriwal and Garg

In the tape, whose authenticity could not ascertained, Kejriwal is allegedly heard telling former legislator Rajesh Garg to split the Congress as it was not ready to again support the AAP to form the government in Delhi. Garg told reporters that the conversation between him and Kejriwal took place sometime in July-August, 2014. Kejriwal had resigned on February 14, 2014 after 49 days in power over the failure to pass an anti-graft bill in the Delhi assembly.

The AAP chief was also reportedly heard telling Garg that Manish Sisodia, now Delhi’s deputy chief minister, was in touch with the Congress on the issue of forming the government. AAP leader Preeti Sharma Menon told reporters that such tapes are not new and were also released earlier to defame the party.

Anjali Damania quits AAP

The sting had its immediate fallout with senior AAP leader Anjali Damania quitting the party on Twitter. “I quit, I have not come into AAP for this nonsense. I believed him, I backed Arvind for principles not horse-trading,” she tweeted.

Mumbai-based Damania, a close aide of Kejriwal, was in New Delhi as the party prepared to act against Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan and his father Shanti Bhushan after an overwhelming number of AAP MLAs signed a letter asking for their ouster from the party’s National Executive. The two leaders were thrown out of the party’s Political Affairs Committee last week.

Kejriwal is currently in Bangalore for a 10-day naturopathy treatment at a city clinic. Sources said the Kejriwal camp was preparing the ground for launching an all out attack on the Bhushans and Yogendra Yadav ahead of the AAP National Council meeting later this month.

Lara Dutta joins ‘Fitoor’ cast

Celebrities

Mar 112015

By IANS |Posted 1 hour

Actress and former beauty queen Lara Dutta has joined the cast of Abhishek Kapoor’s “Fitoor”, and she’s glad her daughter has given her a thumbs up for her look in the movie.

Lara Dutta

“New day, new movie!! Happy to join the cast and crew of Fitoor for Day 1! Daughter has passed her verdict on my outfit so I’m good to go,” tweeted Lara, a mother to three-year-old daughter Saira with husband Mahesh Bhupathi.

In ‘Fitoor’, which also stars Katrina Kaif, Rekha and Aditya Roy Kapur, Lara is reportedly playing the part of an art curator.

Bollywood reacts to ban on BBC’s documentary India’s Daughter

Celebrities

Mar 062015

Bollywood Buzz | March 6, 2015 at 12:06 pm

aditi-rao-hydari Genelia D’Souza, Aditi Rao Hydari, Vir Das, Boman Irani and other celebs from the Bollywood film fraternity reacted strongly against the orders to restrain the broadcast of a documentary based on December 16, 2012 gang-rape, including an interview with a convict.

Here’s how B-Town reacted over the ban:

Genelia D’Souza: Pls watch “India’s daughter”…We need to understand and eradicate the evil within us n around us

Aditi Rao Hydari: I stand by #IndiasDaughter a film by the @BBC-insightful,shocking,frustrating,sad, we need a SOCIETAL OVERHAUL

Vir Das: I don’t know what’s in this documentary. But It seems like a country is fighting harder against embarrassment rather than for it’s women.

Boman Irani: Documentaries are stories of truth! We should be embarrassed of the truth rather than the fact that the documentary got made#IndiasDaughter

Anurag Basu: Jst saw “India’s Daughter”It shd be compulsory viewing not Banned!! We have this Ostrich Mentality Banning #IndiasDaughter is like putting your head in the sand so no one can see me

Sanjay Gupta: Beef BANNED, Documentary BANNED, Films BANNED, 5% Quota for Muslims CANCELLED. Where the f##k are we headed? BURE DIN HI ACHCHE THHE.

Anubhav Sinha: Just finished watching ‘India’s Daughter’. Why should they ban it? WHY? I wonder if they have seen it.

Kabir Bedi: Govt’s decision to BAN #IndiasDaughter – a BBC documentary by an award-winning director – damages India’s image the most.

Milap Zaveri: NOTHING should ever be banned. Don’t wanna watch, read, hear, then simply DONT!

Goldie Behl: Why ban #IndiasDaughter it’s our shocking reality ban this mentality of men.

Shirish Kunder: Now wait for a FIR on all those who shared the banned documentary and also those who watched it. #IndiasDaughter

The documentary ‘India’s Daughter’ by British filmmaker Leslee Udwin has kicked up a storm over the interview of one of the six men who raped the 23-year-old trainee physiotherapist on December 16, 2012 in moving bus in Delhi. She later died in a Singapore hospital where she had been airlifted for specialised treatment. The controversial documentary was uploaded on video sharing website YouTube by an individual. The home ministry on Wednesday said orders were obtained from court to restrain the broadcast of the documentary.