Opinion The Bollywood Diplomacy Files

Nobody wants to rock the happy boat so efforts are being made even off screen to keep the love going.

Even as we witness the Indo- Pak diplomacy dance with the visit of their new Foreign Minister,Hina Rabbani Khar – she of the big Birkin bag,Cavalli aviators and flawless skin—Bollywood is upping its own diplomacy maneuvers.

Sanjay Dutt conducted his version of dinner diplomacy with Shah Rukh Khan recently. When he threw a birthday bash for wife Maanyata,close friend Salman Khan made an appearance with his ‘Character Dheela’ co-star Zarine Khan. Salman’s arch emeny,SRK was missing at the party though Dutt camp insists that he was very much on the guest list.

Apparently SRK was busy wrapping up his ‘Ra. One’ shoot so could not make an appearance. Well,things at the party turned a bit wild when Salman apparently got into a verbal spat with producer Bunty Walia. Rumours are rife that Salman and Sanjay also got into a war of words.

It is being said that Salman was a bit miffed that Dutt,whom he regards as an elder brother refused to act in his home production ‘Bodyguard.’ Incidentally,Sanju has also done a cameo in  ‘Ra.One’,a gesture SRK reciprocated by gifting him a fancy bike.

In the past,Salman and Sanju have acted in ‘Saajan’ and ‘Chal Mere Bhai’. Sanju feels there’s not much of an age difference between them for him to play the ‘Dabangg’ star’s father convincingly. The two stars decided to thrash out this matter at Maanyata’s party. However everything was hunky dory the next day as the two actors shot a promo for ‘Bigg Boss’.

Sanju will host this season of ‘Bigg Boss’ with last season’s host Salman giving him company for the first two episodes. While all this drama was happening with Salman,Sanju decided to go for his dinner diplomacy with SRK. A day later,he called in SRK and wife Gauri for an intimate dinner at his house. The media was also at hand and pictures of Sanju hugging SRK made it to all the tabloids. And that’s how Sanju maintained his status quo with both the warring Khans. 

Amitabh Bachchan meanwhile had to indulge in a bit of twitter diplomacy. It all began when Mr. B tweeted his appreciation for Zoya Akhtar’s ‘Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara’. While praising the male bonding film,he mentioned Farhan Akhtar and Abhay Deol’s performance. That was enough for Hrithik Roshan’s fans who unleashed vitriol against Big B for his supposed deliberate snub of the ‘Krrish’ actor.

Nobody bothered to read Bachchan Sr’s blog where he praised Hrithik. Even Javed Akhtar poked Mr. Bachchan for missing out on Hrithik. Eventually Mr Bachchan had to give a clarification on twitter that he had personally texted Hrithik about his performance and as proof,he printed Hrithik’s response to him. Seeing his senior’s gesture,even Hrithik asked his fans to calm down and he printed Mr. Bachchan’s full-of-praise text.  

Phew.

These Bollywood denizens make Hina Rabbani Khar’s diplomatic duty seem like child’s play,don’t they?