Eyecatchers

India Today, February 1, 1999
Feb 1, 1999

Teen Queen

At 13, you'd think she'd have her nose buried in books and bad habits. Not Joshna Chinnappa. The Class VII kid from Chennai is India's budding squash star. Last month she had a smashing victory at the Scottish Junior Squash Championships in Edinburgh. This month she beat Britain's Under-13 No. 1 to reach the semifinals of the British Junior Open Squash Championship. Next stop: Kuala Lumpur for the Asian Junior Championships for girls. "Squash is a part of my routine," says the teen queen lightly. Winning just kinda happens.

Dropping Anchor
Win the Miss India-Canada contest, join Indian TV ... it's a predictable path now. Following in the exalted footsteps of veejays Ruby Bhatia, Kamal Sidhu and Rishma Malik, 23-year-old Geeta Bali will be anchoring a new improved version of Siyaram's Star Miss India Contest coming soon on Star Plus. "All of them came here and did so well, so I decided to give it a shot," says the pretty pardesi. It's not a long shot either.

Grind Your Teeth
Whose smile is it anyway? Ruby Bhatia's, of course. The former V veejay is flashing her pearly whites for two rival brands of toothpaste these days: hll's Close-Up and Colgate-Palmolive (CP). "I did the HLL ad in 1996 and was told that it had been scrapped," says the damsel on the defensive, "and I did the Colgate ad recently, forgetting about the Close-Up ad." Now CP is frothing and fuming: "This is a typical HLL ploy. Spy on us and do these things because they lack creativity." Grind your teeth guys, the damage is done.

The Babe Who Grew Up
Little babies grow up, you know. Even the cutest ones. Aftab Sivdasani -- whom the world saw soon after his mom first did, as the Farex baby -- is director Ram Gopal Varma's latest find. The kid, now 22, is Urmila Matondkar's co-star in Ramu's Mast. In the in-between years, he's been a child actor (Chalbaaz, Shahenshah, Mr India) and modelled in over 100 ads. "When I received a message from Ramuji I was maha thrilled," recalls the adult Aftab. Ramuji, by the way, was looking for "a dream boy, yet a boy next door". Found him. Now tell the girls which door.

Royal Coincidence
This has got to be the king of coincidences:

Ex-diplomat Shahryar Khan, manager of the Pakistan cricket team, happens to be the cousin of Mansur Ali Khan, one-time nawab of Pataudi and Indian captain.
Indian coach Anshuman Gaekwad, from the Baroda royal clan, is the nephew of Fatehsinhrao Gaekwad, India's manager on the '78 Pakistan tour.
And Ajay Jadeja is a Kathiawar royal with Ranji-Duleep ties.

Now watch the battle of the blue bloods.