Considering the plethora of celluloid-celebs that contest/campaign, only few go back with victories/good memories election year after election year. The people have made wild swings between euphoric support to the proverbial foot in the A**. Take for example Shekhar Suman who lost this time or Sunil Dutt who won emphatically enough for the people to transfer their allegiance to his daughter just as trustingly.
On the other hand, the story of a glamorous actress of the 70s being hounded by the public during a promotional rally for her father is well known. Apparently the people blocked highways for kms around the venue to catch a glimse of her but eventually her late father lost even his deposit. Hence the people saw ‘the kaano ki baali, gallon ki laali and Bengal ki sari’ and went back to choose the guy they thought would work best for them!
So stars and star value obviously does not guarantee or even bolster the chances of a victory, their own or anothers. But every election national and regional parties try to woo film and t.v. stars for what?
Ideological bankruptcy? Is anyone still flogging this long dead cat? So what replaces this void….development and movie stars? Ad guru Suhel Seth says, "Today, every hero wants to be a neta and every villain in politics wants to be a hero. The Sabarmati Ashram has been replaced by Film City as the politician's temple of worship. The tragedy is that Ayodhya and development have sadly got less media mileage than Dhanno and Basanti! It shows the political parties in poor light, almost as if they were ideologically bankrupt!"
Eye Candy? Well for one film stars can do what politicians are exceedingly failing at (despite the daroo, damdi and danda on offer), they bring in crowds. One film star guarantees a large opening, after that it’s the politicians who have to make or break the situation. Celina Jaitley, Madhuri Dixit, Brangelina, Denzel Washington, Halle Berry all endorsed one candidate or the other.
A touch of stardust? A little sprinkling of this dust may sometimes equal box office bonanza. Salman Khan not only pulled in the crowds but also proved lucky for 5 of the 7 candidates he campaigned for, so there must be some strength in the film star=victory conviction. Matinee queen, multi-millionaire Oprah Winfrey (who has made a career out of endorsing) put her rather substantial might behind the then one of the two democrat aspirants, Barrack Obama. It did not hurt that she has quite the pull with the ladies and African Americans that definitely converted into very large financial contributions to the Obama nomination campaign and very probably to votes towards his election.
Media savvy? Years of being harried and hounded by the media gives them the savvy to shadow box with layered, irksome and down right pesky questions and people. This however may not be consistent with all as seen in the foot in mouth disease that constantly afflicts our most famous ex-bahurani, Smriti Irani as also with Dharmendra who made the gaffe of his political career by being quoted as ‘I don’t know about the BJP ideology is but if made a dictator of this country, I’ll clean up this mess’, it took him sometime to clean that mess up!
On the other hand, the story of a glamorous actress of the 70s being hounded by the public during a promotional rally for her father is well known. Apparently the people blocked highways for kms around the venue to catch a glimse of her but eventually her late father lost even his deposit. Hence the people saw ‘the kaano ki baali, gallon ki laali and Bengal ki sari’ and went back to choose the guy they thought would work best for them!
So stars and star value obviously does not guarantee or even bolster the chances of a victory, their own or anothers. But every election national and regional parties try to woo film and t.v. stars for what?
Ideological bankruptcy? Is anyone still flogging this long dead cat? So what replaces this void….development and movie stars? Ad guru Suhel Seth says, "Today, every hero wants to be a neta and every villain in politics wants to be a hero. The Sabarmati Ashram has been replaced by Film City as the politician's temple of worship. The tragedy is that Ayodhya and development have sadly got less media mileage than Dhanno and Basanti! It shows the political parties in poor light, almost as if they were ideologically bankrupt!"
Eye Candy? Well for one film stars can do what politicians are exceedingly failing at (despite the daroo, damdi and danda on offer), they bring in crowds. One film star guarantees a large opening, after that it’s the politicians who have to make or break the situation. Celina Jaitley, Madhuri Dixit, Brangelina, Denzel Washington, Halle Berry all endorsed one candidate or the other.
A touch of stardust? A little sprinkling of this dust may sometimes equal box office bonanza. Salman Khan not only pulled in the crowds but also proved lucky for 5 of the 7 candidates he campaigned for, so there must be some strength in the film star=victory conviction. Matinee queen, multi-millionaire Oprah Winfrey (who has made a career out of endorsing) put her rather substantial might behind the then one of the two democrat aspirants, Barrack Obama. It did not hurt that she has quite the pull with the ladies and African Americans that definitely converted into very large financial contributions to the Obama nomination campaign and very probably to votes towards his election.
Media savvy? Years of being harried and hounded by the media gives them the savvy to shadow box with layered, irksome and down right pesky questions and people. This however may not be consistent with all as seen in the foot in mouth disease that constantly afflicts our most famous ex-bahurani, Smriti Irani as also with Dharmendra who made the gaffe of his political career by being quoted as ‘I don’t know about the BJP ideology is but if made a dictator of this country, I’ll clean up this mess’, it took him sometime to clean that mess up!
