Kareena Kapoor to make her OTT debut from Darjeeling

Kareena kapoor file pic

Writes : Vivek Chhetri

Kareena Kapoor is set to make her over-the-top (OTT) debut from Darjeeling and many believe Bollywood’s latest foray into the hill station is the result of prevailing stability and peace in the region.

“Kareena Kapoor will be starring in a film directed by Sujoy Ghosh and she is expected to reach Darjeeling next week. Some of the places where shootings will take place are Mt Hermon School, Ghoom railway station, a monastery near Ghoom and also near Lava in Kalimpong,” said a source who is in the know of things.

The untitled movie is an adaptation of a novel, The Devotion of Suspect X, written by one of Japan’s most popular writers, Keigo Higashino.

According to director Ghosh’s tweet, the other lead characters in the movie are Jaideep Ahlawat of the Gangs of Wasseypur fame and Vijay Varma who is known for his role in the film Gully Boy.

Following the shooting in the Darjeeling hills, the next round of filming will be held in Mumbai in June, said a source.

Darjeeling was a regular feature in Bollywood many years ago. While Rajesh Khanna-Sharmila Tagore starrer Aradhana put the place in the spotlight, more than 200 films have been shot in the hills.

Sanjay Biswas, a writer in Darjeeling, said: “The list of even Bollywood films shot in Darjeeling is long. Over 200 films in Hindi, Bengali, Nepali and even Tamil and Telugu films have been shot here.”

Some well-known films to be shot in Darjeeling include Vinod Khanna-Shabana Azmi starrer Lahoo Ke Do Rang and Raj Kapoor’s Barsaat. Dev Anand visited the town many times to shoot for Mahal, Joshila and Jab Pyar Kisise Hota Hai.

Amitabh Bachchan was here with Rekha for Do Anjaane and with Rakhi for Barsaat Ki Ek Raat. “Anurodh, which had Rajesh Khanna, was also shot in Darjeeling. Sunil Dutt, too, had visited Darjeeling for Humraaz,” said Biswas.

Shah Rukh Khan shot Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman and Main Hoon Na. “Main Hoon Na was shot in Darjeeling in 2003 and the next major Bollywood shooting was for Anurag Basu’s Barfi! in 2011,” said a movie buff from Darjeeling.

Between 2007 and 2011, the hills were in turmoil over Gorkhaland. There was another round of agitation in 2013 and Bollywood stayed away from the region then. However, when things settled, director Basu came to Darjeeling in 2016 to shoot for Jagga Jasoos which had Ranbir Kapoor in the lead.

Sujoy Ghosh, too, was in Kalimpong to shoot for Kahaani 2 which had Vidya Balan in the lead in 2016.

The hills went into agitation mode again in 2017. “As soon as there was stability in 2018, Rajinikanth came to Kurseong to shoot for his Tamil film Petta,” said the movie buff.

Paras Chhetri, who works as a line director in Darjeeling for Bollywood films, admitted that lack of stability and peace in the region hit the industry hard.

“In the past two-and-a-half months, the pandemic hit us hard. Earlier, the strike and agitation did play spoilsport. We can now expect two to three major web series to be shot in Darjeeling soon,” said Chhetri stressing that those could be seen as spoils of some stability and peace in the hills.

Most web series are aired through OTT, which essentially is a media service offered directly to viewers via the internet bypassing cable broadcast and satellite television platforms.

[Source : Telegraph]

Diesel price hits a ton, buses bear brunt

There are around 5,500 private buses on local and long-distance routes across north Bengal, but hardly 2,500 buses run on roads

In Pic : Private buses parked at the Tenzing Norgay Central Bus Terminus in Siliguri. File picture

Writes : Avijit Sinha

Almost half of the private bus owners in north Bengal have stopped running their vehicles in the region and to Assam and Bihar because of galloping diesel prices. 

The price of diesel — increasing rapidly in the last few days — touched Rs 100 per litre at a number of locations of Bengal on Tuesday, including Darjeeling and Cooch Behar of north Bengal. 

According to Pranab Mani, the secretary of the North Bengal Passenger Transport Owners’ Coordination Committee, many bus owners grounded their vehicles as their earnings can’t match their fuel cost. 

There are around 5,500 private buses on local and long-distance routes across north Bengal, but hardly 2,500 buses run on roads, he said.

“In 2018, the bus fare was hiked for the last time by the state government when the price of a litre of diesel was Rs 68. Now, it is Rs 100 in many places. It is obvious that many owners are in acute financial crisis,” Mani said. 

In the last week alone, 500 buses went off roads in north Bengal as diesel prices have increased virtually every day. 

Bus owners said that in 2014, when diesel was Rs 64 per litre, the fare of private buses was fixed at 60 paise per kilometre for local buses and 65 paise per kilometre for long-distance buses. In 2018, when diesel price increased to Rs 68 per litre, the state government revised the fares by 10 paise per kilometre to be 70 paise and 75 paise for local and long-distance buses, respectively. 

“Now diesel is around Rs 100 per litre and we are charging the same old fares. It is not possible for us to sustain the loss,” said a bus owner based in Cooch Behar.

Over the past one week, there has been a dip in the number of private buses that connect Siliguri to different locations. Around 48 private buses used to run between Cooch Behar and Siliguri but now only 30 do. 

Similarly, 15 private buses would run along the Siliguri-Alipurduar route but now only six to seven do.

“We fail to understand why the state government is not increasing the bus fares when price of every other item is on the rise. The state itself has to bear the loss as it is paying subsidies to the North Bengal State Transport Corporation and other state-run transport companies every month. An immediate revision of fares can help the sector to revive or else the situation will worsen,” another bus owner said.

In north Bengal, around 20,000 people are associated with the private passenger transport sector.

A senior official of the state transport department said they were aware of the situation. “We understand their problem but the decision to revise fares has to be made at the top level of the government. All we can do is to make recommendations,” he said.

Source : The Telegraph