Eyecatchers

India Today, April 12, 1999
April 12, 1999

Holy Politicos!

We've heard of sycophancy, but this is something else. Meet Ponnapati Eswara Reddy, village sarpanch and Congress activist, also architect of the Trigandhi temple in Andhra's Guntur district. Trigandhi, three Gandhis, get it? The sanctum sanctorum houses an idol of Bharatmata with busts of Mahatma Gandhi, Indira and Rajiv at her feet. What's the mother-son duo doing with the Mahatma? Reddy doesn't bat an eyelid. The trio, he says, "have made more sacrificies than everyone else for national unity and integrity". Soniaji would like that.

Soap Opera
Govinda From Elizabeth to Ganga soap, from Cate Blanchett to Govinda ... an unusual career graph for a director. But when Parmeshwar Godrej asks, can Shekhar Kapur say no? No. The entrepreneur and high-society queen has not only got Kapur to make the ad for her, she's roped in Govinda and his three-year-old son Yash as her models. "Govinda's image," gushes Godrej, "is that of a devout family man, one who prays regularly and whom people can trust." Trust a guy like that to use good soap, huh?

Twinkle Khanna. Hot Shots
How do you boost a sagging Bollywood career? Ask Twinkle Khanna. In Umesh Mehra's International Khiladi, Khanna's necklines match her diving career graph. As a skimpily clad journalist, she does some hot scenes with Rajat Bedi , even a wet song sequence in a swimsuit. Mehra fleshes out the point: "There's a lot of meat in the role ... She probably realised that with this role she can prove what she's capable of." You mean this is it?

Peel Appeal
The apple inspired Newton, another fruit does it for this boy. Tirupathi's G. Prashant Kumar makes batteries from banana peels, even gets gadgets to run on them. In May, the 14-year-old will give a demo at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, Philadelphia. But ask him if it's ready for commercial production and he says, "There's a lot to be done." This kid ain't going bananas over his brains.