With so much said and written about the readiness of the Games venues or lack of it, now it is the turn of the Games Opening Ceremony. The organizers on Tuesday announced that Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan won’t be performing at the Opening Ceremony of the Commonwealth Games on October 3^rd at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. The sports event is scheduled to take place during 3-14 October.

“Shah Rukh is definitely not performing at the opening ceremony. However, I don’t know if he is planning to attend the event or if he has received any invite from the organizing committee. But he is not performing,” Viraf Sarkari, director of Wizcraft International Entertainment cleared the air regarding the issue over phone, reports NDTV.

Wizcraft, the event management company is behind the cultural show being put up as part of the opening ceremony. The show will be a potpourri of Indian dances and songs, revealed Sarkari.

The earlier reports had hinted at the participation of King Khan at the opening ceremony and also that he would be performing there. Sarkari said that Bollywood will take a back seat, while India’s cultural heritage will occupy the central stage on the D-day.

Meanwhile, Sarkari said that the Oscar-winning composer AR Rahman will be performing a few songs for the opening ceremony, in addition to the revised version of the CWG anthem.

The CWG anthem composed by Rahman had invited much flak for being lackluster. This has led to much debate why some of his songs are chartbusters, while some others are duds. Singer Sukhwinder has come out with an explanation for this phenomenon. He says, “Whenever Rahman won a major award, there was a teamwork that supported his endeavor. There was poetic excellence and singers’ contribution, which added life to his music. Usse Gulzar Saab ki yaad kyun nahin aayi? After all, Jai Ho was his poetic contribution!”

This has many takers, as the lyrics “Yaaro India bula liya…khelo jeeyo e-yo” is nothing but laughable.

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Sachin Tendulkar in Vighnaharta Shree Siddhivinayak Promo

Indian cricket  icon, Sachin Tendulkar is planning to enter a new arena when he will make his Bollywood debut in the Hindi film, Ferrari Ki Sawari, produced by Vidhu Vinod Chopra. It is believed that his Ferrari will also feature in the film.

The world got the first inkling of the development when Sachin tweeted a few months back, “Vinod Chopra has a script called Ferrari Ki Sawari. Just heard it. Sounds awesome.” Later, he tweeted as regards a picture of him and Chopra posted in the social networking site, “Hanging with Vinod Chopra and Atul Kasbekar… 3 more Idiots?”

According to media reports, Sachin’s co-stars will be Boman Irani and Sharman Joshi. While the script will be written by Chopra and Mapuskar, Raj Kumar Hirani will write the dialogues. Producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra is not yet disclosing details about the film or the cricket legend’s role in it.

In the film, Sachin will be playing a character very close to his own. The film tells the story of a boy, who after being inspired by a famous cricketer’s Ferrari, endeavors to play the game at the cricket’s Mecca, Lord’s cricket ground. Drawing parallels with real characters, Sachin is the only Indian cricketer to own a Ferrari.

Sachin is obviously not the first cricketer to be bitten by the acting bug. From Sunil Gavaskar and Sandeep Patil to Ajay Jadeja and Vinod Kambli, all have tried their hand at acting without receiving any encouragement from Lady Luck.

Sachin had played himself in a documentary titled Vighnaharta Shri Siddhivinayak about Mumbai’s Siddhivinayak temple two years back. In the film, he spoke about his experiences during the temple visit.

With no real frontiers left to conquer in the cricket field, no wonder Sachin is changing tracks now.

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Gideon Sam, President, SASCOC

South Africa’s Olympic Committee president Gideon Sam has come out in full support of the troubled Games, scheduled to begin on October 3 in New Delhi. He went to extent of saying that he will clean toilets to ensure that CWG 2010 is a success.

At the farewell dinner in Boksburg on Saturday, organized in honor of the departing South African team for CWG, Mr. Sam, president, South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc) said, “Our athletes will have no excuses if they do not perform at the Games. If they are unhappy with their rooms because they have not been swept, they must take off their jackets and sweep them themselves. We will not complain. South Africans do not do that.”

“And when I get there on Friday, if a toilet is not clean, I will clean it myself,” he continued. While India drew flak from participating nations regarding lousy accommodation, faulty construction and security concerns, Mr. Sam said that it was imperative for South Africa to get behind the host country.

“As developing nations we must stand together. We cannot allow developed countries to go out there and take the last seat in the hall. We had the same problems with these countries who complained before the FIFA World Cup, and I won’t even mention them because we know who they are. As South Africans, we have always supported our friends, and internationally, India and Brazil are our best friends,” he spelt out without mincing words.

“We will be prepared when we get there, we will work side by side with our friends, and we will come back with medals,” he exuded confidence. Mr. Sam also said that his country has devised plans to ensure the security and health of its athletes on top of that provided by the Games OC.

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Shabana Azmi with Javed Akhtar

Bollywood actor and social activist Shabana Azmi turned 60 last week. Guess what her lyricist-screenwriter husband Javed Akhtar got for her? A cake designed like an urban slum!

Whether the slum cake was meant as a representation of her work in slums or Javedsaab meant it as a harmless joke, things soon went awry with comments like ‘poverty porn’, ‘insensitive’ and ‘politically incorrect’ coming from various quarters. The Bollywood elite were condemned for the way they view Mumbai slums and for their double standards on crying foul when Danny Boyle created history with his version of slumdog.

The much debated birthday cake had a perfect slum scene with tiny huts and a clothesline running along it. The slum effect was completed with open drains, sewage and muck all around. The cake carried a big tag that read ‘Shabana Nagar, Gali no. 60’, indicating her 60^th birthday.

Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan was the first person to disclose the unusual cake decoration. He tweeted from the birthday party, “Javed Saheb’s gift to Shabana – a cake designed like a slum!! Touché!”

Social activists and media, including foreign media, pounced on the issue, criticizing the choice of icing. The British newspaper The Guardian condemned the incident, saying the cake was a ‘tasteless representation of poverty porn’. The Magsaysay award winner Jockin Arputham, who has worked for the betterment of slum-dwellers for four decades said, “I can’t believe that she was part of something like this. It is rather unpopular and against her simplicity.”

The article in The Guardian set off an online debate on the issue. Most responders criticized Akhtar for his ‘insensitivity’ and said the cake’s design was ‘tasteless’.

With the criticism mounting, Akhtar was forced to explain. He said, “It was a surprise I planned for her. She is so serious and driven about her work all the time, at times we who are close to her feel like pulling her leg. It was a joke and should be treated as nothing else. It does not in anyway mean she does not take the people she works any less seriously. She did not even know about it and now she is all confused with these reactions.”

“There is no joke that cannot be interpreted as ‘politically incorrect’,” he added. “The cake was not a joke on the slums. It was a harmless joke on her.”

Whether the slum cake is funny or not depends on the angle it is viewed.

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Mary Kom

MC Mary Kom, the five-time world champion beat L Sarita Devi at the Asian Games trials held on September 22 at Talkatora, New Delhi to qualify for the event to be held in Guangzhou, China this year. However, Sarita Devi refuses to accept her non-inclusion in the squad saying she had already been selected after the trials held in Bhopal last month. She is demanding sports minister’s intervention in the issue, resignation of Indian Boxing Federation General Secretary and a fresh round of trials in the presence of media within a week.

Sarita Devi

“The sports minister must intervene into the matter immediately and solve the issue. Until and unless these demands are being fulfilled I will not play for India and I shall also return the Arjuna Award that was awarded to me in 2009,” Sarita Devi says in her ultimatum. “The IBF general secretary must apologize for indulging in favoritism in the selection process which is against the ethics of sportsmanship. He must resign on moral and disciplinary ground,” she added.

Sarita Devi is a former world champion and the reigning Asian Champion in the 51kg category, while Mary Kom has been competing in the 48kg category till date.

“The selection trial for the Indian women boxing team to take part in the Asian Games was held at Bhopal for two days on 20 & 21 August. The selection committee had announced the selected names, in which I was included in the 51kg category with two other women players in the 60 and 75 kg categories,” Sarita explained. “But unfortunately Indian Boxing Federation tried to keep it confidential and delayed an announcement. Surprisingly the Federation decided to hold the trial again without giving any specific reason,” she said.

IBF General Secretary Muralidharan Raja categorically dismissed the allegations, saying that Sarita was beaten in both trials. He said, “There was no politics involved. The trial at Bhopal was inconclusive and for the sake of fairness we did another trial at Talkatora after Barbados world championships. All the selection panel was there at Talkatora and they felt Mary was much better. Sarita could barely hold herself against Mary.”

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