One thing I agree on though – the girl would have had a larger portion to act out if it were made in Bollywood. F Pinto barely has 5 minuted on screen.

Oh I see now – thanks, I didn’t think of this in th Indian context. I am mostly unfamiliar with American electoral politics, more used to European ones which play out slightly differently.

“Anyone should be able to use the song. ‘Jai Ho’ should not belong to any one; it belongs to the country.

I actually didn’t even recognize that it was the theme song of Slumdog and this quote made me think this was yet another ancient patriotic hymn, like Vande Mataram or Gana Mana, that I had simply not heard of. I believe that Bankim Chandra Chattopadhay’s and Rabindranath Tagore’s estates have both lost copyright by now. But no, it’s the credit song for Slumdog written by A. R. Rahman with original lyrics by Gulzar. I could be wrong, but it seems like India’s copyright law is enough like our system that Rahman–or whoever his publisher is–has the right to license public and lucrative performance of the Jai Ho composition as he sees fit. It seems odd for the BJP to lean towards GNU fanaticism. . .

India doesn’t have a dole.

It was a word-play on the phrase “pro-poor” Conrad.

Instead of saying they are pro poor people he’s saying they are pro the state of being poor. Hence, pro-poverty. If your electoral fortunes are dependent on keeping poor people on the dole and dependent on you, one cannot expect you to be too zealous about changing their fortunes. Kind of like why Republicans talk a big game about abortion, guns, and gay marriage but always stop short of doing what the principled (lunatic) fringe voted them in for. Once they get it done whose going to support them?

This is not an uncommon view, even amongst many voters in rural north India. It is, unfortunately, almost completely wrong. I am not sure what a “pro-poverty” party is meant to be, most parties at least nominally should be anti-poverty. The Congress, however, is not a pro-poor party at all; it delivers some sops and minimal redistribution to assuage discontent amongst the have-nots but that is about all. You simply need to look at how Congress ruled states spend money under Central development schemes like the NREGA or the Bharat Nirman scheme. If anything BJP ruled states have doner better on the former. OF course, the BJP is even less of a ‘pro-poor’ party than the Congress; since it doesn’t even do the minimalist redistribution that the Congress does while phsing through neo-liberal policies.

I love Bollywood. It is a genre onto itself and I happen to love dance sequences, as long as there aren’t too many (I think 3 per film would be enough) and as long as the movie is not too long.

Bollywood films have a tendency to go on sometimes beyond even 3 hours.

But then, they are made for cinema goers in India and provide “intermissions” mid-way for bathroom/popcorn break, and I think they are made that way as to be a “complete evening out experience”.

If they could cut down to 3 dance sequences per film and cut down to 2 hour films, I would love Bollywood even more.