Stalked again

Guess who is bothering film director Madhur Bhandarkar these days? No, it’s not starlet Preeti Jain who publicly accused him of exploiting her with the promise of casting her in his films. Rather, some mysterious people have apparently been lurking around the sets of Corporate, the film he is currently directing, asking for details of the plot. Predictably, Bhandarkar is paranoid: it’s the film script that they are after, he feels. The suspicion is that somebody in the film industry wants to pre-empt his film by producing a similar movie. Small wonder, then, that the director is keeping his film sets off limits for the media and other film industrywallahs. After winning the national award for Page 3, such phobias are understandable. Corporate, by the way, stars Bipasha Basu.

News on FM

If all goes well, FM radio listeners will tune in to some good news in the next few months. Private FM radio stations will soon be allowed to broadcast news and current affairs programmes. These were banned during the first phase of radio privatisation six years ago. A industry source says that the Cabinet is favourably inclined towards permitting news and the permissions should come in about three months. To be sure, the radio broadcasters body, the Association of Radio Operators of India (AROI), has been actively lobbying with the government to open up news for private operators. It’s being supported by the London-based International Association of Broadcasting (IAB) in its efforts. In fact, IAB wrote to the I&B ministry that news on private radio is allowed all over the world.