with the moment, Esha Deol's publicists seem more jittery than Hema Malini's little girl. They've launched an aggressive marketing drive in Mumbai, with traffic-endangering hoardings at key intersections, to vault the "next dreamgirl" into the realm of superstardom. The billboards are of the doe-eyed Deol in her first film, Boney Kapoor's Koi Mere Dil Se Pooche. "I did not cast Esha because she is Hema's daughter," says Kapoor, "but because she has a mystical quality." That obviously has not stopped the publicists from screaming, "You loved her mother-now the little dreamgirl is coming your way", from the rooftops a full month before the film's release. Has it stopped Esha?

Have Body, Will Flaunt

There is a reason why she has been wearing some of the sauciest outfits on the fashion runways this season. Model Jessy Randhawa just happens to have one of the jauntiest walks and most flauntable bodies in the country. Hindi films are not for her ("they don't have good roles that would go with my height and short hair"). Nor does she have much patience with those unending shoots for print and TV ads. But, says this 20-something walking willow from Jaipur, "When I am on the ramp, I feel like a queen." So if it's an almost-glass-like top by Suneet Varma, or an Ashish Soni dress with tantalisingly long slits ... well Randhawa's got the body to carry it off. As for that glimpse of bosom she gave us at a Rohit Bal show this year ... "That was a mistake," she further reveals. "I was supposed to hold the jacket but it came open and then there was nothing I could do." But why? Was anyone complaining?

Candelabra!

Suman Ranganathan has a new pastime. The sultry model and actress who twiddled her thumbs in supporting roles is now putting them to better use. She's making candles. It all started when Ranganathan enrolled in a candle-making class to do up her Mumbai home and got hooked: "I am considering it as a vocation." Maybe she was inspired by Dimple Kapadia's candle business Faraway Tree. Or maybe, with no films, Ranganathan was just plain bored.

Politically Correct

He's not the Khanna in the news. Son Akshaye is. But he can still give his boy a run for his money. After six years in politics, Vinod Khanna is back in the arclights. In Vashu Bhagnani's Deewanapan, Khanna can be seen playing Diya Mirza's dad. But more than that, it's "a powerful character". "Nobody else could have played it better," says Bhagnani, "except perhaps Amitabh Bachchan. But Bachchan has been on TV. Khanna is absolutely fresh." At a press meet to announce the film in Mumbai last week, the two-time Lok Sabha member said he came back because he was "established" in politics. Next in line is an English film Leela with Dimple Kapadia. Akshaye will have some catching up to do.

—Himanshi Dhawan