Everybody146;s seeing double

I thought it was safe to conclude that the use of a 8216;8216;body double8217;8217; could be taken to mean 8216;8216;any act that the ...

I thought it was safe to conclude that the use of a 8216;8216;body double8217;8217; could be taken to mean 8216;8216;any act that the original uses a duplicate to perform8217;8217;. Manisha Koirala8217;s body double, who created a storm over a movie, would probably fit this description.

But Manisha confused me further. She said she knew that a body double was to be used for the objectionable scenes but whether to use the double or not depended on 8230;.

8216;8216;How well she performed,8217;8217; I interrupted.

8216;8216;Yes and no,8217;8217; she replied. 8216;8216;If she performed very convincingly I would got the parts deleted. And if she did a shoddy job it would be a body blow to my image an as an actress8230;.8217;8217;

Expectedly, this only added to my confusion. What made it worse was that others wanted body doubles too.

For instance, Vajpayee rang me up asking for details. He said, would a body double perform such acts that are considered painful by the original? 8216;8216;I don8217;t know what scene Manisha found painful, but I suppose it is possible,8217;8217; I told him, always ready to do business.

8216;8216;Then sign me up,8217;8217; he thundered, 8216;8216;I want my body double to attend all these stupid cabinet meetings, resolve knotty issues like disinvestment, get this VHP off my chest, handle my mail8230;8217;8217;

8216;8216;But isn8217;t L K Advani doing all of this?8217;8217;

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8216;8216;That is precisely the problem. If Manisha could have a look-alike for the scene she didn8217;t want to do, why can8217;t I have someone who looks like me to handle all the mess so that I could live more comfortably as prime minister for the next two years?8217;8217; Good point, I thought.

Salman Khan was next.

8216;8216;You can8217;t imagine how tiring it is to drink till three in the morning, beat up Ash every two weeks, run over pedestrians, shoot blackbucks, rough up photographers. If this were a movie, I could have hired a stunt man. But since this isn8217;t, can8217;t I have a body double?

There were others in the queue. Madhu Sharma, wife of R K Sharma, asked if she could have a body double: one to be on a permanent hunger strike outside Pramod Mahajan8217;s house and the other to address daily press briefings.

A bitter Pramod Mahajan told me that given the recent allegations in the media against him, he genuinely requires a body double. While Sonia Gandhi was keen that a slightly improved swadeshi version of herself could campaign for the party.

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But Manisha8217;s original body double said that the business wasn8217;t for the fainthearted. 8216;8216;The first qualification is that you have to identify whose body you have to double. For instance, if you are Vajpayee8217;s body double, you should have jalebis in your diet, but if you8217;re Jayalalithaa8217;s, mere jalebis won8217;t do.8221;

I got a phone call from an angry Sachin in Colombo rubbishing all body doubles. He said, 8216;8216;This Sehwag chap is getting out of hand. Not only does he look like me and is playing like me but he is also scoring runs.8217;8217;

That8217;s good,8217;8217; I said.

8216;8216;Not for me. Now Ganguly says since I am not scoring, why don8217;t I become the twelfth man and cheer every Sehwag six from the dressing room balcony? Sehwag can then score more runs as he watches his mentor, idol and body double8230;8217;8217;