The Voice
of the Free Indian
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Bollywood Star's Act Makes Her
a Hero, and Possible Target
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Bollywood Star's Act Makes Her a Hero, and Possible Target
By John Lancaster
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, January 23, 2003; Page A16
BOMBAY -- With her dimpled smile and wholesome good looks, Preity
Zinta has danced and lip-synced her way into the top ranks of
Bollywood stardom. But nothing prepared the 28-year-old daughter
of an Indian army officer for the critical acclaim that greeted
her latest performance, on the witness stand in a Bombay courtroom.
"Bravo Preity," exclaimed the headline on an editorial
in the Indian Express. "Bollywood's Only Real Hero,"
agreed the Hindustan Times.
The outpouring of praise was prompted by Zinta's willingness
to do what no other Bollywood star has until now had the nerve
to do: offer evidence about the pervasive influence of organized
crime in the increasingly profitable and global Indian film industry.
In a closed court session this month, the details of which were
promptly leaked to the press, Preity testified that she had been
the target of an extortion threat two years ago by a man claiming
to represent Chota Shakeel, a Pakistan-based gangster. Her testimony
came in the high-profile trial of Bharat Shah, a leading Bombay
diamond merchant and film financier, on charges involving links
to the underworld.
Before Zinta's appearance, the prosecution had called a dozen
other film personalities to testify, but all had turned uncooperative
on the stand, recanting earlier statements or suddenly going fuzzy
on key details -- evidence, police say, of the underworld's power
to intimidate even the most macho and highly paid stars.
So what prompted India's "Preity Hero," as one headline
writer dubbed her, to break the code of silence on the nexus between
Bollywood and the mob?
In her first interview since testifying, Zinta owned up to a
mixture of motives, from an altruistic desire to "do the
right thing" to more pragmatic considerations, such as wanting
to "get out of the court" quickly and fearing the legal
consequences of contradicting her taped statement to police.
Asked whether she felt her testimony had put her safety at risk,
she replied, "for sure," lashing out angrily at law
enforcement officials who she believes leaked the details of the
supposedly secret court proceeding.
"It was a huge risk I was taking in there, and I expected
to be protected," she said, sitting in her office in a Bombay
suburb near several of the major studios. "I felt extremely
betrayed."
Zinta said she had no wish to launch a personal crusade against
underworld influence in Bollywood -- "I wouldn't want it
to be made into a big deal, because it's just going to create
lots of problems for me in the future" -- and defended fellow
stars who have been accused of cultivating chummy relationships
with mob bosses based in Karachi, Pakistan, and Dubai, in the
United Arab Emirates.
"If you meet someone and he comes and says hello, you can't
just tell him to take a walk -- you say hello back," she
said in her precise, convent-school English. "You think,
maybe if I say hello I can leave. Do you know what I'm trying
to say? It's a Catch-22 situation. It's not as black and white
as we put it. It's not just, 'If you keep away from them you're
good, and if you mix with them you're bad.' "
Zinta's ambivalence, to say nothing of her fears, reflects what
police officials contend is a high degree of collusion -- some
of it voluntary -- between mob figures and some of the biggest
names in Bollywood.
As in the Hollywood of an earlier time, crime bosses have long
cultivated social ties to the Indian film industry, basking in
the reflected glory of its glamorous stars. In the mid-1990s,
however, crime syndicates began looking for new sources of revenue
following the collapse of the Bombay real estate market, which
had provided them with money through extortion and other means,
according to police officials here.
Bollywood was an obvious target. Churning out roughly 900 feature
films a year, the industry's three-hour song-and-dance epics command
huge audiences both in India and around the world, especially
since the advent of new technologies such as satellite television
and DVDs. At the same time, Indian filmmakers have had difficulty
financing their projects by conventional means because India's
government-owned banks had refused to lend them money until 2000,
when the government changed its policy.
Crime syndicates were only too happy to step into the breach,
offering loans to producers at rates of up to 36 percent, police
say. "Anyone who has money could enter into Bollywood and
start a movie," said D. Sivanandhan, an Indian Eliot Ness
who investigated organized crime in the movie industry as a joint
police commissioner, a job he has since left. "There were
no qualifications, no entry fees. It was a wide-open field."
One of the most important mob financiers is alleged to be Shakeel,
whose name turns up repeatedly in the Shah case and who is thought
to be living in Karachi. Based on transcripts of telephone conversations
that were secretly recorded by police and leaked to the Indian
press last summer, Shakeel appears to be on good terms with a
number of India's top producers, directors and stars, with whom
he discusses financing arrangements and sometimes even creative
issues.
"Be careful during mixing when you cut scenes," he
tells one prominent director, who replies, "Yes sir. Yes
sir."
Shakeel also chats amiably with Sanjay Dutt, a top Bollywood
star who is facing criminal charges for alleged links to Pakistan-based
gangsters blamed for a series of bomb blasts that killed 257 people
here in 1993. When Dutt complains about another actor's habit
of showing up late on the set, according to the transcript, Shakeel
laughs and tells him not to worry: "He will be punctual in
our project."
Crime bosses have also regarded Bollywood personalities as ripe
targets for extortion, and those who don't cooperate can play
a heavy price. A top music executive was killed by mob hit men
in 1997. And in 2000, armed assailants shot and wounded Rakesh
Roshan, a director and the father of heartthrob actor Hrithik
Roshan. The director was allegedly targeted for refusing a gangster's
demand to line up Hrithik's services for a movie he was backing.
Such episodes have contributed to an atmosphere of fear among
Bollywood's glitterati, some of whom are under full-time police
protection. (Zinta said she was offered protection after her testimony
but declined for the sake of her privacy.)
For law enforcement officials, nothing so captures the corrosive
influence of organized crime in Bollywood as the case against
Shah, the diamond merchant-turned-movie mogul who owns a fleet
of BMWs and reportedly paid 300,000 rupees, about $6,250, for
an autographed pillowcase used by Michael Jackson during a stay
at Bombay's Oberoi Hotel. The court case turns on allegations
that Shah helped an associate of Shakeel's -- another Karachi-based
crime boss named Dawood Ibrahim -- in an extortion scheme. Shah,
who is currently free on bail, has denied any wrongdoing.
The case has also brought to light allegations of mob involvement
in the making of "Chori Chori, Chupke Chupke," in which
Zinta played a leading role. During the shooting of the film,
Zinta received a phone call from a man who claimed to be an associate
of Shakeel's, ordering her to pay 5 million rupees, about $104,000,
or "face consequences," according to details of her
testimony that were leaked.
Zinta declined to discuss the specifics of her testimony but
confirmed the essential thrust of the reports. In the transcript
of his phone conversation with Dutt, Shakeel denies threatening
Zinta, telling the actor, "I will never demand money from
the female species."
Zinta is in some respects an unlikely star. The daughter of an
Indian army colonel who has since died, she was raised on military
bases and attended a convent boarding school. She holds an English
degree from Delhi University and pursued advanced studies in criminal
psychology. One brother is a major in an armored unit currently
stationed near the hostile frontier dividing Indian and Pakistani
forces in Kashmir; another brother sells cars in Petaluma, Calif.
In person, Zinta projects a high degree of confidence, greeting
a visitor with a direct gaze and a hearty handshake. Demurely
pretty in a pink sweater and flowered skirt, she said she stumbled
into acting largely by accident, though she seems to have adapted
comfortably to the role. She lives in a luxury high-rise, tools
around town in a black Lexus sport-utility vehicle and vacations
in places such as Cannes and Sydney. The details of her romantic
life, including a recent breakup with a top model, are breathlessly
chronicled in the Indian press; she is currently dating a Danish
engineer named Lars.
While Zinta's testimony is at best peripheral to the Shah case,
police say she deserves credit for helping to shine a light on
the extent of mob influence in Bollywood -- an important step
in cleaning up the industry.
Perhaps because the job has yet to be completed, Zinta isn't
exactly welcoming the attention. "I had a lot of people telling
me I was very stupid," she said. "One thing everyone
told me is, 'Preity, one person can't change the system.' "
The most telling reaction may have come at a television awards
ceremony a few days after her court appearance. "I met this
guy who walked up to me and said, 'Congratulations, you're the
only crazy person in this industry.' "
© 2003 The Washington Post Company
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