The initial phase was tough for Bhanurekha being not well versed with Hindi and adolescent when she really started. The story of her transformation from Bhanurekha to Rekha -The Diva is a legend itself.

How she sustained the high tides of Bollywood and could maintain her status? What makes her so special and so different?

Rekha was the first modern female actor of Bollywood who denied moulding her according to the male dominant films. On the contrary she came up with a bolder, sexier, more fashionable and smarter attitude, redefining women in Bollywood and its worthy enough to be mentioned, she did it all alone!

Winner of numerous national awards Rekha worked in movies which rocked the theatres solely because of her. Umrao Jan, Khoon Bhari Maang,  Khubsurat, Khiladiyon ka Khiladi fetched her acclaim from critics and audience. Yet apart from her brilliant acting and magnificent persona, her controversial personal life satiated media’s desire to chase her more.

The controversy started with her alleged off screen relation with iconic Amitabh Bachchan and her rivalry with Jaya Bachchan. She remained black listed from Bachchan family. Her straight forwarded attitude and bold answers made her even more desirable as told by experts.

She stunned the world by hugging Jaya at the launch of Rajadhyksha`s Marathi coffee table book `Chehre`. Despite of this friendly initiative Jaya remained cold to her and ignored her presence.

Apart from Mr. Bachchan, the news of her romance with much younger Akshay Kumar spread the waves of shock in B-town. The controversies followed her when her Husband – Mukesh Aggarwal, an industrialist committed suicide using a Dupatta that belonged to her. Though his suicide note didn’t blame anyone, Rekha was obviously questioned.

In the later period when she chose to do an erotic drama ‘KamaSutra’ by Mira Nair, she was in limelight again. She was about to lose The Diva status by doing movies like ‘bach ke rehna re baba’ and ‘Kudiyon ka hai zamana’ but she emerged out again and we still know her for what she is.

The secret of Rekha rests in her charismatic attitude, her revolutionary thinking, her extraordinary acting, her ability to struggle and her calibre to last!

Hats off to The Diva of Bollywood –Rekha!

Divya Bharti who is one of the few actors, who started their career at an early age, appeared on the tinsel screen in a telegu movie in 1990. Her resemblance with super star Sridevi, helped her getting noticed in Bollywood. She was a rising star who got to taste the sweet nectar of success in a very short span. Well known for movies like Vishawtma, Shola aur Shabnam, Deewana, Dil Aashna hai and many more, her career had an abrupt end because of her mysterious demise on april-5-1993 at the youthful age of 19.

Divya was alleged to commit suicide by jumping from the window of her apartment at fifth floor. Her designer friend Neeta Lulla and Neeta’s husband Shyam Lulla were present at the moment. It was found out that Divya had drunk before jumping from the window. She sat on the edge and might even have slipped.

Though her fearless nature to play with dangers was confirmed by the producers of her earlier films, this case which appears like an accident or suicide is still said to be a potential conspiracy or even a murder!

Complications had been increasing alarmingly between Divya and her mother because of Divya’s relationship with Sajid Naadiawala (Islamic by religion). Her mother never appreciated her relation with Sajid but Divya married Sajid against her mother’s will and changed her name to Sara.

While it was already a stressful situation for Divya, the news of Sajid’s connection with underworld tensed her even more. She was thunder stuck when she was dropped from Govinda’s Radha ka Sangam and replaced by Juhi Chawla. The all three fact – that are complications with her mother, Sajid’s connection with underworld and losing an important film cane be accounted as one of the reasons for her suicide (If it was).

Surprisingly, Sajid was not allowed to attend Divya’s cremation which expresses the grudge of Divya’s family over Sajid.

The two possibilities – that is suicide and accident are equally convincing, but the possibility of murder suffers with a feeble probability for there are no strong evidences.

The report says that she had three pegs of rum before she sat on the edge of window, where she could have lost balance and had accidently fallen. Also her stormed personal life because of Sajid and her mother makes the suicide case strong as well.

The investigation was finally closed after five years in 1998, but she is still remembered commemorated for her short yet remarkable acting career.

This could have been the logic submitted by any ordinary man or woman on the entire globe, but if we are talking about the most eligible bachelors of big screen, it can be simply concluded to crap.

Owing to couples like Abhishek-Ash and Genelia- Ritesh, wedding bells are ringing and here we have a list of Bollywood-biggies who have reached the threshold when the world is expecting them to tie-the-knot.

Starting with the brilliant director and writer Karan Johar, who recently got a marriage proposal from a Delhi based businessman for his daughter, is being regularly questioned by close friends. Kjo, who gathers more attention than required due to his confused preferences, is having a high time.

On the contrary, he set the froth aside when a thirty one year old lady jumped in the scene. New-York based Vandana Melwani who is daughter of a family friend has increased the buzz!

Moving on, next in list we have Preity Zinta, a senior and settled actor in Bollywood believes that everything happens on its own time and she is concentrating on her career now. The actor finds it a stressful topic and liked to purse her lips but still her relations with Ness Wadia have been the talk of town.  Sources say she won’t announce or spill beans until and unless the marriage is finalized.

Moving on next we have the controversial relation of Aditya and Rani Mukharjee. Rani’s father Ram Mukharjee announced that his darling daughter will marry in 2012. But this sounds much like the impending doom of 2012 which we know is not going to arrive anyhow! Her relation with Aditya has stressed up because Aditya’s ex-wife Payal is demanding a huge alimony and he needs to wait for divorce. Obviously Rani is pissed off and now thinks that it’s futile to wait for Aditya anymore.

And last but certainly not the least; we have lady who rocked Bollywood at latest by producing the blockbuster ‘The Dirty Picture’. Yes we are talking about the head of Balaji Telefilms, Ekta Kapoor.

Her family has been set on mission lead by her brother, to find a perfect groom for the lady who tasted success at initial phase of life. Everyone in her family is concerned to find a groom to match the level of Ekta, though she is herself careless of all this chaos.

She has not made any comment regarding the marriage and supposedly the excuse of career would suit her best to avoid it as in now!

So, in a nutshell, all the eligible bachelors now stand on a dead end. Either they need to take a flight or they need to jump hoping someone to catch them!

We still have the hopes of hearing some wedding bells this year though. All the best!

Though this prophecy sounds extraordinarily heavenly, but the million dollars question – that is, will they ever co-star each other?

The affair and the followed rumours which can still out run any other fresh business in Bollywood, is the biggest obstacle in the vision.

It all started on the sets of ‘Do Anjane’ when the news of their love fragranced in air. And it ended on ‘Silsila’ – a movie starring Amitabh, Rekha and Jaya. Ironically, it was based on a love triangle itself, making it a hot cake then as well. But the journey from ‘Do Anjane’ to ‘Silsila’ and from ‘Silsila’ to now witnessed the high tides of controversies and rumours, followed by statements which flashed on television for days.

Things got heated up when Rekha was spotted with ‘Sindoor’(Symbol of Marriage on Hindu customs) contrary to the fact that her husband is no more. It was imposed by media that she wore ‘Sindoor’ for Amitabh and the controversies chased her like always.

Gloomy, alone yet splendid Rekha can be seen in award functions looking at her best even these days, though she has been dormant and has not appeared on silver screen for long.

On the other hand, Amitabh has been vigorously active on silver screen giving some of the finest performances of his career. While the star of the millennium was asked if he would work again with Rekha on TV9 Mumbai channel, he nodded in yes saying if there is a good opportunity he won’t hesitate. Though there have been no statements on Rekha’s side (Why in the world she would refuse by the way?)

Although Amitabh would not hesitate but his wife certainly can. Things never have been smooth between the Jaya and Rekha. It is said that Jaya invited her on dinner and cleared that she won’t leave Amitabh no matter what. Jaya has always been found keeping mum on the issue avoiding any sort of extra publicity.

Rekha too made a statement on the show of Simi Garewal- That is there was no personal association with Amitabh but she does love him. Does it make sense really?

Welcome to television in India. The most rotten form of mass media. Social responsibility of a medium as powerful as TV was being molested by the Star Pluses and the Sonys, the Ekta Kapoors and the Ronit Roys when suddenly one fine Sunday morning, the stars shine down and the same Star Plus that stabbed the minds of many a million Indians by starting the trend of the never ending Saas-Bahu soap sagas airs Satyamev Jayate, created by Aamir Khan. What was in it for the broadcasters was definitely the money associated with airing ‘Aamir Khan’ every Sunday morning, but was in it for us is what deserves an applause. By far, Aamir’s Satyamev Jayate is one of the very very few sensible things on tube that takes away or may just eases a little burden of being called an Idiot Box from the 40 inch shoulders of my LCD screen. Aamir Khan truly understands the meaning of social responsibility and and finally here we have a show that talks about the social evils of our society and brings us forward the first hand experiences of its victims. Simultaneously aired on all Star TV channels, for the first time, Aamir makes sure to catch the attention of every couch potato zapping the remote.

Aamir treats the subject of social abuses and atrocities with utmost seriousness, gives them the required incubation period for the viewer to fathom its depth and makes the victims comfortable by sharing their pains. Satyamev Jayate is not a TV show, it’s a movement in itself. With Female Foeticide as it’s subject in its first episode and Child Sex Abuse as the subject in the second episode that aired today, Aamir uses the most widely used mass medium, a TV set which has its reaches right from he slums of Dharavi to the rain forests in Cherapoonji and a language that everyone understands, everyone speaks. Call him the Oprah Winfrey of India or the Matt Damon but Aamir uses his star status in the best way he possibly could have. He does not compare your intellectuals with a ‘paanchvi paas’ student, nor does he endorse a game of shadows in a house commanded by a terrifying voice, Aamir personifies what Peter Parker’s uncle told him, “With great power, comes great responsibility.” It is a show for the masses, much better than watching a star grunt his way out of a video-game, much better than watching primer league games on TV. Satyamev Jayate has a reach that made my pro-gamer friends in H Hostel watch it, that made the TV in my hostel switch for the first time from anything except sports to Star Plus, that made #femalefoeticide, #childsexabuse and #AamirKhan trend on Twitter but most importantly, it made India think. It made India skip a heartbeat. It touched a paining nerve, a nerve that should be touched, wriggled and ostracized from the body.

Let’s all draw our sword from our scabbards and continue the fight that Aamir Khan is starting. For once, let’s all hail the guy who is not only the reigning superstar of Bollywood who tries to achieve perfection in the films he makes, but also dares to debut as a director with Taare Zameen Par and now on TV with Satyamev Jayate! And I would not disagree with Somik Sen (@bangdu on Twitter) when he says “Aamir Khan has single-handedly affected the business of all-you-can-eat-and-drink Sunday brunches.”

Kudos to you Aamir!

Saif and Kareena totally supported each other during ups and downs during the past 4 years. Be it Kareena’s great grandfather Shammi Kapoor’s death, or Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi’s funeral procession, Saif and Kareena, never backed off from supporting each other unconditionally.

The couple also got a chance to portray as reel life partners again with “Agent Vinod”, during the making of which plans were made of finally tying the knot after the movie’s release. But, whether these commitments were made to be fulfilled or not still remain a question as no formal announcements have been made regarding the Nawab’s wedding till yet. All what we have achieved till now, is Bebo’s sister Karisma’s slight hint of a possible engagement, on which, now even she decides to keep mum about..

Now with the movie being a box office flop, the couple seem to be growing apart. Saif’s absence on recent events, and Bebo arriving with sister Karisma instead, is leading suspicions in minds across the audience that has the couple decided to finally move on separate ways? If so, then why?

 Arjun

But his career as an actor couldn’t take a leap which he probably anticipated. His hard work and decent acting on screen was never really noticed and he couldn’t gather much appreciation, neither from critics nor from viewers.  But never did he lost his hope and then came the movies like Dil ka Rishta, Asambhav and Vaada which blew the whistle to sped up his career.

He later appeared in a Temptation concert 2004 with biggest stars of Bollywood like Shahrukh Khan, Rani Mukharjee, Preity Zinta and many more. His relations with SRK improved only when he got the role of Jasjit in Farhan Akhtar’s Don, and they became friends during the entire journey from Temptation to Don.

We are well aware how much Shahrukh care for his friends and family and Arjun’s entry in SRK’s gang was probably the most blissful event of his entire life time.

Eventually Shahrukh recommended Arjun to his dear friend Farah Khan, choreographer cum Director who featured Arjun as villain in Om- Shanti- Om starring SRK and then debutante, Deepika Padukone. He bagged Apsara award for best actor in negative roll.

This proved to be the mile stone of his career and since then he never turned back. Later for Rock On by Farhan again, he received the honour of national award for best actor in supporting role and was admired both by critics and viewers this time!

Arjun was flooded with critical acclaim after his work in Rituparno Ghosh’s English film The Last lear, which was premeiered at Toronto International Film Festival.

After this nectar of success, he appeared in a comic movie Houseful by Sajid Khan, more or less in SRK’s gang being the brother of Farah Khan. After compromising and getting content of all these supporting roles he finally made a breakthrough and got a lead role in ‘We are Family’ yet again by Karan Johar,  SRK’s one of the closest friend. Though the movie didn’t spread a great magic on the magical screen, being casted opposite to superstars like Kajol and Kareena still meant a lot.

We bid Arjun Rampal great luck and also appreciate Shah Rukh for being so supportive to his friends!

Amir Khan, I am sure is pleased as punch.  After all his TV program Satyamev Jayate, seems to have got everyone’s attention. Good, bad or even being downright abusive, everybody seems to have an opinion. That’s great, because any day it is better than no one talking about it.  Judging by the varying reactions I have read online, people have either hated it, or loved it.

Personally, I loved the introduction in Amir khan’s voice wherein he tries to convey the motivation behind this program.  While, I am sure it was scripted to the last detail, Khan’s voice does seem to convey the sense of despair, the wanting-to-reach-out-to –the-public -at large and wanting people to shake themselves of their stupor and at least take notice of the ugliness that is underlying in the society.

The program seemed to have all the right triggers; emotions tend to run high while watching it. Amir khan shedding tears when the victims were sharing their personal details of female-foeticide, I thought was a bit of over-dramatization (but then one needs some dramabazi to get attention).

Female –foeticide is very prevalent in the country; the declining sex-ratio figures are proof of that.  I am not sure about the others who watched the program, but I was not aware of the cruelty and the complete de-humanizing, which pregnant women go through, when they are perhaps the most vulnerable stage of life, emotionally and physically.

I was appalled to know, that a grandmother could kick her grandchild down the stairs, all because she happened to be a girl-child: this from a grandmother who happened to have retired as a vice-principal.  I thought such things only happened in movies, or maybe in the Ekta Kapoor serials, never in reality. So, yes, through moist eyes, I did sit-up and notice. I realized, that like me, so many of us led cocooned lives, and had not encountered such harrowing cruelty. Imagine, being bitten off by your partner for not producing a male-child? Frankly, I never had.  Had you? Never could think that such a thing was possible, ever, except in vampire series of novels.

The naysayers say Amir Khan comes across as insincere, they also seem to have an issue with his supposedly high remuneration (rumored to be 3 crores, per episode) and some have even labeled it as social-pornography.

There is no denying Amir Khan is a STAR, who would listen to you or me, were we to host a program like this? Would it garner so much attention? Not at all.   Will the program change attitudes? Will people stop indulging in female-foeticide? That would be too simplistic to think so; life unfortunately is not so simple.

Female-fotecide is just many of the issues; the subsequent episodes apparently will talk about the different societal pain-points.The important thing is, the program Satyamev Jayate at-least brings real-people share their life-stores; any day more meaningful than just giving out figures of crime.

 Amir Khan unlike a lot of his counterparts is not using his star status to go and spend our monies on a fruit drink or a fairness cream. He is asking us to be AWARE, to look-around and if possible also become a part of the social change. It is easy to become an arm-chair critic, and try and find faults with any effort, but it takes a whole lot of conviction, research and passion to be talking about and bringing to the fore the ugliness of society.

 Don’t want spend your Sunday mornings on morbid issues? You would rather listen to music or play ball? Perfectly fine, just give the devil his due, is what I say. 

1. Tell us about your venture

We also offer premium services – becoming a featured member, video chatting, sending gifts to your loved ones, online advertising and web applications.

In future, we are thinking of expanding our services to creating professional pages for individuals and dateIITians mobile (for accessing the website on mobile based devices, etc.). There may be some more features like -

• Video Chatting
• Premium Profiles
• Points Based System
• Sending Gifts to loved ones
• Entertainment / Games Applications
• Mobile Based Applications for Social Media / Dating
• Beauty Contest Live
• Beauty Contest On ground
• Locality Meetings

 6. Tell us something  about yourself?

 Layak Singh, a B.Tech. graduate in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Kharagpur, is the man who makes it happen. He is the head of Operations, Public Relations, Talent Search and Product Design of our startup. His philosophy is defined by investing in forward-thinking solutions with an eye toward technology and first-to-market advantages. Understanding that being first to market is a huge advantage, he directed energy toward achievements that positioned him ahead of competitors in emerging markets. He has an immense experience in supporting various individuals and organizations in tasks related to project management and creative problem solving! He has expertise in business development, networking and digital marketing as well as in operations management. He is the leader who keeps the team running with futuristic goals.

 Lavalife.com

 eHarmony.com

 Facebook

 Badoo.com

 Zoosk.com

 Fropper.com

 Google+

11. What would you like to say to budding entrepreneurs

NaturalMantra.com is India’s Largest exclusively Natural, Organic & Eco Friendly
products. We only bring the best, safe and non toxic products to our customers.

2. Where are you based?

NaturalMantra is based in Kandivali Mumbai

3. When was the venture started?

NaturalMantra was in planning stages for a good 9 months but the website went live in
Dec 2011

4. What triggered you to start this venture?

Our family is a regular user of Natural & Organic products back in our time in the
Bay Area. When we moved back to India in April 2011, we found a lack of choice and
selection of products that were safe and non toxic. Inspite of being in Mumbai it was
hard for us to find and access these products in a convenient manner. So we figured
why not build a place online where these products are accessible to anyone all over
India. Thus began our journey for NaturalMantra

5. Tell us about your products/services.

NaturalMantra.com is an online retailer. We gather products from fantastic brands
from India and abroad. The criteria is simple – No harmful chemicals, no preservatives
(food) , non toxic and above all very high quality. We also insist that our beauty products
must be cruelty free (not tested on animals). It is actually difficult to curate products
but we pride ourselves in doing the right thing for the customer and we can see them
appreciate the great lengths we goto to find the amazing products.

6. Tell us something more about you?

I am an eCommerce junkie at heart. Was with eBay for over 4 years in various roles of
Product Management, Search, Analytics & SEO. More recently was heading Business

Product for Futurebazaar.com (a Future Group eCommerce initiative). Our team
includes folks from Sales, Marketing and Operations in big organizations from India.

7. What is the market size you are trying to capture?

The Natural & Organic market is huge and continues to grow at a rapid pace. Its over $
56 Billion worldwide with the Indian market estimated closet to around $ 100 Million
USD. It’s the tip of the iceberg where we think that the market is actually bigger and will
grow for many years to come.

8. Any more Expansion plans that you have.

NaturalMantra.com will continue to expand its product and service offerings at a rapid
pace. Shipping internationally is next on our list. Many more interesting things on our
plate but will be revealed as soon as they are live.

9. What are Sector specific challenges that you face.

The Natural & Organic segment has some very unique challenges specifically lack of
customer awareness and guidelines around what is “natural”. The organic certifications
are well defined but not many people understand how to look for it or what it means.
That is why education plays a huge role in helping people figure out what products
are right for them. Also there is general lack of awareness of brands in this space.
NaturalMantra.com however continues to break new ground in overcoming these
challenges and making steady progress towards its goals.

10. Competitors? How are you different?

There are quite a few sites bigger than us who happen to have Organic or Natural
categories along with their regular offerings (Goodlife, UrbanTouch etc). However there
is no one of significance who is focused on this segment from a lifestyle perspective.
There are sites that are copying our ideas but we take it as a compliment and are
focused on being the best.

11. What would you like to say to budding entrepreneurs

I would describe myself as an armchair entrepreneur for the longest time. Lots of great
ideas but never went out and acted upon them. There was never “the right time”. I
guess the same is true for most people. Eventually I figured out that there is a never the
right time to start your business. There are always commitments and challenges in your
life. So my simple advice is if you believe in your idea and are committed to it for the
long term, go for it. Act on your idea and execute on it. You never know what will come
out if it. Don’t be afraid of failure. And one more thing: Don’t listen to others who say
this wont work and don’t get discouraged. If your idea is good and you can execute well
on it, it will succeed.

12: What does your venture do as their CSR?

Our simple Mantra is to provide entrepreneurs a platform to sell their sustainable and
eco friendly products. We use resources carefully and think that the best way to give
back to society is to empower the entrepreneurs to build a successful business selling
ethical products to the Indian consumer.

13. How do you connect with the people?

We love speaking to our customers and don’t hide behind nameless emails
Our
number is listed prominently on the website. We also participate in offline events and
exhibitions to introduce ourselves to newer audiences. We also use Social media very
effectively to converse with our customers and fans.