Q 1. The latest to quote Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee's poetry is...
a. Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
b. Hollywood actor and Buddhist Richard Gere.
c. Maldivian President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

Q 2. Actor Preity Zinta is sick of...
a. Hearing people say she's "cute".
b. Being told she's in the running for the No. 1 slot.
c. Dieting.

Q 3. Eunuchs from across India and Nepal gathered at Patti, Amritsar, to...
a. Attend an all-India eunuchs' conference.
b. Hold a protest march.
c. Display communal amity.

Answers: 1(c). 2(a), 3(a)

Q&A: KARAN JOHAR
"This Year Has Been a Wake Up Call for the Industry"

After the opulent Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham, director Karan Johar is writing the script for his assistant Nikhil Advani's directorial debut, Kal Ho Na Ho, "a love story that speaks a new language".

Q. Did you have a fallout with Kareena Kapoor?
A. Kareena and I parted ways on Kal Ho Na Ho purely because of monetary reasons. She wanted a price that my film's budget could not afford. But we are still very good friends. I signed on Preity Zinta because she was the only other person I had in mind when I thought of this film.

Q. There has not been a single big hit this year. What is the significance of this for the industry?
A. This has been a terrible year. It is a wake up call for the industry to work on original scripts and for stars to revaluate their prices because today there are few stars who can promise a terrific weekend opening.

Q. This is your third film starting with the letter "K" ...
A. After I did Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, I was told by a tarot card reader that the letter was lucky for me. Now I can't get it off my mind and have become extremely superstitious about it.

-Nidhi Taparia Rathi

TELLYSCOPE
Zee Last Hope?

PATH TO SUCCESS: Zee will telecast Road

When all else fails, head for the movies. Having launched a succession of new shows that were not even a blip on the viewers' radars, Zee TV has now reached for mint-fresh movies, 16 of them to be precise, valued at about Rs 40 crore. From the recently released Humraaz to the yet-to-be-released Road, every Thursday from October 10 onwards, Zee will have a movie premiere. "It's not a big risk,'' says Partha Sinha, director, marketing. "And it's part of our overall paradigm shift that shows people are bored stiff on Sunday evenings. All our new daily soaps will begin a day earlier than on the other channels,'' he adds.

With all of the movies featuring younger actors, they hope to give Star TV's grande dames some competition. And no, it's not a bad year to look for help from the movies, says Sinha. "Look at Gadar. We screened it on August 14 on Zee and it was a phenomenal success. Even if Om Jai Jagdish didn't do well theatrically, people will still tune in to it.'' With the Indian Readership Survey 2002 putting Zee TV's reach at only 36 million compared to Star TV's 54 million, it needs all the help it can get.

-Kaveree Bamzai

MUSIC REVIEW

YEH BHI WOH BHI (Musicurry; Rs 55)

Don't be misled by the models on the jacket. The good bodies can sing too. A Band of Boys (abob)-comprising Karan Oberoi, Sudanshu Pandey, Chaitanya Bhosle, Sherrin Varghese and Siddharth Haldipur-claim to be India's first boy band. After 18 months of part-time training, they do sound tuneful in these numbers composed by Leslie Lewis, especially in Ishq, a slow number with piano interludes.

However, the songs have been technically engineered to such an extent that the singers' natural voices are drowned. The rain falling on the ground sounds artificial. The diction in some songs is laughable-pyar ke fool instead of phool. There's nothing poetic in Vinod G. Nair's lyrics. Let this one pass.

-S. Sahaya Ranjit