ACTING THE PART: Swaraj (below) is pushing a retrospective on Raj Kapoor (far left)

Wine on the beach and Information and Broadcasting Minister (I&B) Sushma Swaraj? The other lead actors in that unlikely scene will be Bollywood's biggest producers, an event manager for a flashy India party, Rs 30 lakh from the Confederation of Indian Industry and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry and Rs 15 lakh from the National Film Development Corporation. All to promote Indian cinema at Cannes.

Post Lagaan, the I&B Ministry has decided the film industry needs a push. So there's a three-film retrospective on Raj Kapoor, a movie by a student of the Satyajit Ray Film and TV Institute and director Manu Rewal's 12-minute digital video. Yet, though much is being made of the Indian pavilion in Cannes being double the size a year ago (100 sq m) no one is sure exactly how much business Indian films will do. In 2001, the only filmmaker who sold was Satyajit Ray. This time, the ministry hopes that biggies Yash Chopra, Yash Johar and Subhash Ghai will make enough contacts to sell their films to non-NRI markets.

Before the Cannes festival, Amit Khanna, president of the All India Film Producers' Council, will take the same producers to Britain at the invitation of the Confederation of British Industry. A trip to China is next, with Swaraj in tow.

-Kaveree Bamzai

GOLDEN PUMPKIN

BADSHAH OF SELF-GOALS: Ganguly

The god of the off-side has succeeded in putting us-and more importantly the balance of his team-completely off in the West Indies. Indian captain Sourav Ganguly's "brave" decision to go in at No. 3 ahead of more adept candidates in the first Test was arrived at by curious reasoning: because he had made his debut at No. 3 and because he got bored of waiting to bat. As though batting for India was like waiting for a bus. As though India was his para (neighbourhood) club. The West Indian bowlers made sure he didn't get bored at the crease in Guyana, the Prince of Kolkata was in and out of there in a jiffy. The deposed No. 3 Rahul Dravid came in at No. 5, scored a gutsy hundred and bailed the Indians out of trouble.

Would captain Ganguly think of giving the ever-accommodating Dravid his due and his batting spot back? Not on your life. Ganguly has declared his intention to keep coming in at one-drop, prompting the acerbic Sunil Gavaskar to drop the acid and request him to rethink his decision. Rethink? Has he been thinking in the first place?

SIGNPOSTS

APPOINTED: Supreme Court judge B.N. Kirpal, chief justice of India, with effect from May 6.

DIED: Captain Ram Singh, 88, founder-member of the Indian National Army and composer of Kadam kadam badhaye ja, in Lucknow.

APPOINTED: Rakesh Mohan, economic adviser to the finance minister, as director, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, Delhi.

DIED: Heramba Kanta Barpujari, 89, eminent historian, in Guwahati.

AWARDED: The Officer of the Order of the Arts and Letters, to artist Paritosh Sen, by the Government of France.

DIED: Indrani Devi, 91, freedom fighter and widow of former deputy prime minister Jagjivan Ram, in Delhi.

MURDERED: Paritosh Pandey, crime reporter of Hindi daily Jansatta Express, in Lucknow.