Highest paid Bollywood India film stars

By Vipin Agnihotri

The India Street always loves to give some interesting information to their readers. Take a look at the highest paid Indian film stars. You will be surprised to know that Shahrukh Khan is not the highest paid Indian film actor. There is a tie between south superstar Rajnikanth and versatile Akshay Kumar.

STAR	LATEST ASKING PRICE
Rajnikanth	Rs 20 crore
Akshay Kumar	Rs 20 crore
Hrithik Roshan	Rs 15 crore
Salman Khan	Rs 15 crore
Aamir Khan	Rs 12-15 crore
Shah Rukh Khan	Rs 10 crore
Sanjay Dutt	Rs 10 crore
Ajay Devgan	7-8 crore
Saif Ali Khan	Rs 7 crore
Priyanka Chopra	Rs 6.7 crore
Rani Mukherjee	Rs 6 crore
Amitabh Bachchan	Rs 4 crore
Abhishek Bachchan	Rs 4 crore
John Abraham	Rs 12 crore
Kareena Kapoor	Rs 3.5 crore

Cricket- Bollywood link up in pictures

By Vipin Agnihotri

We Indians only love two things: Cricket and Bollywood. While cricket is like a religion to us, Bollywood gives us peace of mind from the hectic work schedule. There are number of instances when there is a link up between cricket and Bollywood. Latest one being between Indian captain MS Dhoni and newcomer Deepika Padukone. The India Street decided to give you these link ups in picture, as picture speak thousand words. Take a look.

MS Dhoni and Deepika Padukone-

Yuvraj Singh and Kim Sharma-

Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Sharmila Tagore

Ravi Shastri and Amrita Singh-

Reena Roy and Mohsin Khan

Azhar and Sangeeta Bijlani-

Sourav Ganguly and Nagma-

Zaheer Khan and Isha Sharvani-

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Sony Pictures and Warner Brothers Looking to Conquer Bollywood

By Vipin Agnihotri

It has come into the notice of The India Street that Bollywood is seeing some serious foreign interest. As a matter of fact, Hollywood biggies such as Sony Pictures and Warner Brothers are now interested in getting into the production of Bollywood movies.

The latest film ‘Saawariya’ is produced by SPE Films India, the Indian arm of Sony Pictures Entertainment. It is worth mentioning in this regard that this is the first time that one of Hollywood’s big 6 studios is co-producing a Hindi film. In my opinion, thus far Hollywood studios have had only a peripheral presence in India, sticking to the traditional business of distributing in the country.

In terms of statistic, Hollywood’s share of the Indian film entertainment pie is a mere three to four per cent. According to sources, the big money lies in producing and distributing local films and that is the path that some of the Hollywood biggies are now taking.

Generally speaking, Saawariya is a step towards the integration of two of the world’s largest film production communities and gives a tremendous opportunity for the enormous talent in India to interact with a Hollywood studio.

If experts are to be believed, Hollywood first started testing the waters in the regional language market with dubbed versions of its English hits. For example, Jurassic Park in 1994 and Titanic in 1998 contributed around 25 to 40 per cent of their gross collections in India, signifying the progress of the market. These were followed by Spiderman, Godzilla and Casino Royale, all of which reported multi-million dollar collections.

The obvious attraction for Hollywood biggies is the size of the Indian market. The revenues of Bollywood, which were at Rs 5,990 crore in 2004 is all set to touch Rs 9,680 crore this year. If you add this up with television, home video rentals and film related merchandizing things couldn’t get any better.

Taking this into account, there is hardly a surprise that Sony, Viacom- Paramount, Time-Warner, Walt Disney and Fox are sitting up and taking notice. Only Universal Studios has not yet announced any India plans.

In my opinion, Hollywood’s interest in Bollywood will help Indian filmmakers in gaining greater knowledge and understanding of the systems followed in Hollywood. Apart from Bollywood, Hollywood studios are also seeing a potential in Indian television.

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Top 10 Bollywood Actresses by Online Popularity

Given the popularity of our recent article entitled REVIEW: Top Celebrity Branded Real Estate Projects in India where we explored the top celebrity endorsed projects; we decided to explore the online popularity of actresses for business purposes. While the list only takes into account a celebrity’s OFFICIAL website or fan site, we feel it’s a fairly good indicator of the Bollywood celebrities’ popularity. The list is an indicator of the star power of the actresses and how much star power she can give to a corporation wishing to use them as a celebrity ambassador.

Top 10 Bollywood Actresses by Online Popularity

#	Date: 07/2007	People*	Month Δ	Year Δ
1	aishwaryaworld.com	3,080	-59.9%	-87.4%
2	rani-mukerji.com	2,251	6.5%	153.2%
3	sushmita-sen.com	1,920	366.0%	381.2%
4	bipashabasunet.com	1,396	199.6%	N/A
5	mallikasherawatwow.com	1,147	-76.9%	N/A
6	preityzinta.com	1,011	-16.2%	-85.7%
7	Amisha-patel.net	1056	12.8%	-18.3%
8	kareena-kapoor.info	995	15.8%	-58.3%
9	rakhi-sawant.com	583	N/A	N/A
10	amrita-rao.com	251	-88.5%	-75.4%
*	The number of Unique people visiting a site.

1. Aishwarya Rai

Our number one India celebrity is a big hit with online fans. Aishwarya Rai transcends mere numbers. If you were to actually tally her last dozen films, and not count her item-song in Bunty Aur Babli, then you'd see that none of her films have made a profit since 2002's Devdas.

2. Rani Mukerji

We have not seen Rani endorse a real estate related project as of yet, but she’d be an excellent choice given her online appeal. If there can be a point of unanimity during any banal Bollywood discussion about numbers and ranks -- in an industry that trades loyalties every Friday It's come to the point where everybody loves Rani.

3. Sushmita Sen

Another India celebrity not endorsing a real estate project, this graceful stunner in Mumbai takes the sari to new heights in Main Hoon Na, then disappears from the marquee.

4. Bipasha Basu

She was the winner of the Ford's Supermodel of the World Contest for 1996 and now works in mainstream Bollywood films. She has been listed as one of Asia's sexiest women, along with fellow stars Mallika Sherawat and Aishwarya Rai.

5. Mallika Sherawat

In these times of the cleavage-friendly music video, this statuesque woman isn't as special as she once was. However, she still ranks high on our online ranking.

Mallika's onscreen debut was in Lak Tunoo, a music video by Surjit Bindrakhia.[1] She attracted wide notice with her appearance in the 2003 movie Khwahish. By Indian standarts the movie was quite racy, however it was known for its naturalistic and realistic topic. In 2004, she starred in Murder, a film inspired by Hollywood's Unfaithful that again challenged Indian film standards.

6. Preity Zinta

(born 31 January 1975) is an award-winning popular Indian actress who appears in Bollywood movies. She is among the most successful actresses in the industry, and is regarded as one of the biggest names in India. Balancing commercial successes with critically acclaimed performances she has established herself as one of the most prominent leading actresses of Hindi cinema. Zinta is placed on the top in the list of the biggest actresses of this generation.

7. Amisha Patel

This girl knows business and an excellent choice for an endorsement. After pursuing her studies, she came back to India to join the Mumbai Stock Exchange, but that could not hold her interest for long and she decided to join Satyadev Dubey Theater. In 2004, Amisha shocked the industry by suing her father for mismanaging her accounts and since then the actress shares a strained relationships with her parents and her brother. Amisha is one of the most educated actresses in Bollywood and is known for reading books on the sets.

8. Kareena Kapoor

She might not have delivered on the Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham potential and turned up as Bollywood's bonafide Number One yet. However, after completing high school, Kareena headed straight to Harvard to attend the summer school but returned to India to pursue a career as an actress. Kareena’s debut movie was JP Dutta’s ‘Refugee’ opposite Abhishek Bachchan. Kareena was so magnetic on screen that she left a great impact on the audiences in her debut movie. 5.

9. Rakhi Sawant

Sawant was still in school when director Suneel Darshan offered her an Item Number opposite Govinda in Joru ka Gulam. Three years later, she auditioned four times before winning her breakthrough Item number Mohabbat hai Mirchi in Chura Liya Hai Tumne in 2003.

10. Amrita Rao

Rajkumar Santoshi approached Amrita after seeing her in a coffee ad. "In fact, Santoshi was one of the directors who had contacted me after watching the Perk ad. I had to turn down his film offer because I wanted to concentrate on my studies. When he approached me for The Legend Of Bhagat Singh, Rajkumar Santoshi made it clear to me that it was very brief role and would not require more than five days to complete it. I agreed immediately because I got to play Bhagat Singh's fiancé. Few know about her. The sacrifice she makes by living as his widow even though they never marry. The character does leave its impact in the film."

---

Other notables not on the list

• Priyanka Chopra (just launching a site)

She didn’t make the list because her official site has not been launched and thus we had no data.

• Kajol

We didn’t find an official site or fan club for her, but we know the star’s popularity is extremely high.

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Casting couch in corporate world of India

By Vipin Agnihotri

If you thought that the ‘casting couch’ syndrome was only limited to Bollywood in India, you are in for a real shock. It has come into the notice of The India Street that high profile corporate men and government officials of India are also looking out for opportunities to satiate their carnal desires within the office premises.

In my opinion, official power is the tool that they often use with impunity to subvert the modesty of their female colleagues. Take the case of Parul (name changed) a bright intellectual girl- entered the big bad corporate world at an age of 21 with a promise to prove her talent as a true blue professional. But she was not aware that the professional space dominated by men would demand her dignity and not the intellect to achieve her dreams.

In the case of Parul, his sexually frustrated boss expected her to perform for him more in the bedroom than in the boardroom. You may not believe at first but it’s true that majority of cases of sexual harassment in India go unreported.

Recently, an ex KPMG director filed a complaint against Vikram Uttam Singh, head of Financial Advisory Services & Senior Partner of KPMG India, for sexual abuse at workplace. Uttam Singh allegedly often made obscene gestures towards the woman director.

This particular case clearly signifies that male mindset of control & power over men’s body is still there. As a matter of fact, men still consider women as an object of entertainment. If experts are to be believed, the Indian government needs to implement laws with vigour.

Five years ago, another high profile case that ironically increased public awareness was the one involving the former Executive Assistant Rekha Maximovitch and the Infosys’ Director & Head of sales and marketing Phaneesh Murthy.

Business houses should have a grievance cell dealing with the issue of sexual harassment. What’s more, working women have to be made aware of their rights. Last but not the least, it is of paramount importance that companies in India incorporate well-defined policies against sexual indiscretion within the office space.

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