Thread: Bollywood is seeking a global audience

Bollywood Movies Go Mobile With GSM Association, Roamware & Hungama

It's official - Bollywood is going mobile in a big way. Roamware and Hungama Mobile have joined forces with the GSM Association (GSMA) to announce the launch of a 'Mobile Bollywood Initiative' to create short movies tailored for mobile devices, taking the world's largest film industry onto mobile devices all over the globe.

In conjunction with the GSMA, Hungama Mobile and Roamware have teamed up with leading Bollywood filmmaker, Sanjay Gupta, to premiere three Bollywood short movies for the mobile medium. These films will be premiered at the GSMA's 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, which runs from the 12th to 15th of February 2007. The Congress, the largest annual mobile event, is expected to attract over 60,000 attendees from across the global mobile value chain. Bollywood today is the world's largest movie industry, producing more than 1,000 movies a year with an audience of more than 2 billion viewers across 127 countries.

The Mobile Bollywood Initiative builds on the announcement earlier this month that Roamware has become an exclusive sponsor of the Sundance Film Festival: Global Short Film Project, a joint initiative of the GSM Association and the Sundance Institute.

"We are very excited by Roamware and Hungama Mobiles' commitment to bring the spectacle of Bollywood to mobile phones - the fourth screen - at the world's most important mobile industry gathering," said Craig Ehrlich, Chairman of the GSM Association. "The Sundance and Bollywood communities represent some of the most creative, vibrant and diverse talent in the movie world, and we are delighted to be able to showcase these extraordinary films in Barcelona. In doing so, we hope to catalyse a truly compelling mobile entertainment experience for mobile users globally."

"Hungama Mobile has pioneered the delivery of Bollywood entertainment content to the world and has been instrumental in promoting Bollywood in the wireless world. From providing music, imagery, video and games we are now preparing to introduce full features and this project with Sanjay Gupta is a step in the same direction. Hungama Mobile has worldwide exclusive rights to over 70% of Bollywood content on the mobile and digital platforms and this content comes from the world's fastest growing mobile market - India and the most vibrant film industry. We believe it offers tremendous promise as a content category for carriers in over 125 countries." said Neeraj Roy, Managing Director & CEO of Hungama Mobile.

"We are honoured to be part of the Sundance Institute and the GSMA's pioneering vision of the distribution of movies via the mobile phone. Bollywood is a huge force in the global film market, and we look forward to helping the mobile industry realise the potential of this partnership," said Bobby Srinivasan, CEO of Roamware.

"Bollywood is a massive presence in the world movie industry, and South Asia represents the fastest growing mobile market in the world. I am thrilled to have the opportunity to be involved in a project that has a promise and the potential to create a whole new distribution model for Bollywood cinematic entertainment," said Sanjay Gupta, who is well known for directing several super-hit movies including Kaante and Musafir. "Our project 'Dus Kahaniyah' has been made keeping the mobile and digital medium in mind and the fact that today the market for short films has been given a huge impetus as the quality of video experience on mobile has improved significantly."

Bollywood is one of the fastest growing entertainment industry segments and has an appeal not only for the 140 million mobile phone users in India but for markets across all continents. Indian cinema is now dubbed in over 35 languages and accounts for as much as 18% of theatrical business in markets such as UK. Indian films have made it into the top 10 charts in markets such as USA, UK, Germany, Australia, Singapore and South Africa.

Bollywood’s a superhit

CEBU CITY: Bollywood made a surprise entry into the India-Asean summit meeting. Some Asean members, notably Malaysia, proposed that Bollywood could strike partnerships with Asean counterparts for production of films.

Commerce minister Kamal Nath was informed that Bollywood films are becoming popular in the region and there is a business opportunity to be explored. Mr Nath also said India and Asean will soon begin talks on an open sky policy.

The Prime Minister also spoke of new areas of co-operation with Asean in his address. He highlighted the need to enhance science and technological co-operation between India and Asean. He said steps must be taken to operationalise the proposed technology development fund as early as possible.

The Prime Minister said there was immense scope to pool “our knowledge and create more wealth” through innovation. The technology fund should support the development of strategic alliances between Indian and Asean researchers and lead to “collaborative R&D”. The Prime Minister said officials on both sides have been mandated to decide the details of the structure and financing of the fund.

Kids say hooray for Bollywood
Michael Davis
January 15, 2007

BOLLYWOOD came to Melbourne's Immigration Museum yesterday as children were encouraged to become film stars for the day by dressing up in costumes and learning some new dance moves.
Children were also given the opportunity to act out a scene and face the camera for the first time as film characters as part of the museum's Kids Fest: Experience Bollywood.

As well, the Jhanak Dance Company performed and conducted workshops in Bollywood dance - a combination of hip-hop, salsa, rhythm and blues and classical Indian dance movements from all parts of the country.

"It all comes together to form unique dance that is common only to Bollywood," one of Jhanak's four partners, Shyama Singharasa, said yesterday.

"Our sessions were a great success. All the children seemed to be jumping and moving at the right time and the good part about it was that some of the adults joined in too."

Kids Fest celebrates themes from the museum's special exhibition, Bollywood Dreams, by New York's Jonathan Torgovnik, which focuses on the world's largest film industry. It includes original photographs by Torgovnik and behind-the-scenes documentary footage.

Bollywood Dreams explores the power of the cinema in India as entertainment and a social phenomenon.

"Bollywood produces three new movies every day and is far bigger than Hollywood," Ms Singharasa said. Her dance company has been operating successfully in Australia for almost two years.

Bollywood Dreams will run every day until January 28 as part of the museum's school holidays program aimed at making different cultural groups accessible to children and families.

Bollywood comes to screen near you

Canada: 'A Melting Pot': Tonight's premiere in Toronto a first for an Indian film
Rakshande Italia, National Post, with files from Melissa Leong
Published: Thursday, January 11, 2007

When the stars of a made-in- India blockbuster walk down the red carpet outside a downtown Toronto theatre tonight for the world premiere of a Bollywood film, the star-studded event is the first time such a gala debut of a mainstream Indian movie has been held internationally, evidence of Canada's growing clout in this burgeoning and increasingly lucrative niche market.

In a climate where the biggest Bollywood films can now draw more audiences than Hollywood movies in some Canadian theatres, and where even some of the country's biggest movie chains have begun screening Indian films, tonight's star turn by Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan, whose movie Guru premieres at the Elgin &Winter Garden Theatre, is to be expected.

Over the past five years, AMC and Cineplex Theatres have begun screening Bollywood movies at locations across Canada, including Surrey, B.C., Calgary, Alta., and a number of communities in Ontario.

When one of Cineplex's Surrey theatres ran a Hindi movie as an experiment about three years ago, the film out grossed the Hollywood movies playing at the cinema.

"We knew we were on to something," said Pat Marshall, vice-president of communications and investor relations, at Cineplex Entertainment.

"Canada is such a melting pot that we [saw] that there was an opportunity to provide films that enhance what we already provide."

The Canadian distributor of Guru, a rags-to-riches tale about the late Indian business tycoon Dhirubhai Ambani, says the city was chosen for tonight's world premiere because it is deemed to have a highly receptive audience primed for Indian films.

"In two years' time, the market for these films will be as big as U.K.'s," predicted Roger Nair, the distributor. "It's huge there because it's not just Indians going to see them."

Canada certainly boasts a captive market for such films. Statistics Canada projects that immigration trends will make South Asians the country's dominant visible ethnic group by 2017, with a projected 1.8 million South Asian population. According to the 2001 census, 917,000 individuals identified themselves as South Asians.

The recent Bollywood movie, Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna (Don't Ever Say Goodbye) ran for more than eight weeks in theatres across Canada this summer -- grossing $650,000 in Toronto alone.

Nav Bhatia, the Mississauga businessman who marketed Don starring Hindi film superstar Shahrukh Khan, says the movie netted $400,000 in the first 10 days of its November launch. He estimates that the Canadian Bollywood industry is roughly $40-million.

"Multiplexes know we have grown, and they can't ignore us anymore," said Mr. Bhatia.

Other companies are also recognizing the demand: Canadian telecommunications giant Telus is sponsoring the film Guru and will be offering its customers exclusive movie content through their mobile phones.

The Toronto International Film Festival featured a record number of Hindi films this year. And Toronto filmmaker Deepa Mehta's Water -- a Hindi movie -- is Canada's official entry in the foreign film category for the 2007 Oscars.

Bollywood movies are being made with an eye on the overseas markets -- appealing to the large expatriate communities with equal parts nostalgia and glamour.

Foreign locales, glamorous, skinny models in mini-skirts, the use of more English and slick photography are meant to attract the second-generation Indians known as NRIs, or non-resident Indians.

That is, people like Aseem Jafer. The Canadian-born IBM employee was 28 when he saw his first Bollywood movie, visiting India to marry wife Sakeena Sultana in a traditional arranged Muslim marriage.

"Now, I've almost forgotten Hollywood -- it's Bollywood for me, even my cousins here are amazed,'' Mr. Jafer said, outside an AMC theatre in Oakville, recently where he had come to see Lage Raho Munnabhai, an award-winning comedy about a man meeting the ghost of Mahatma Gandhi.

His family hits the local theatres for Bollywood features three times a month; his son is growing up humming Indian songs.

"When you go to a Bollywood film, people show up in families, where traditional movie-goers are groups of two," said Ms. Marshall, the Cineplex vice-president.

Golden Theatres, which plays Bollywood movies at two of its cinemas in Toronto's suburbs, does even more to elicit that nostalgia for families.

"Just like back home, we create the Indian ambience with samosas and chai served during the interval," said Farzan Dehmoubed, vice-president, and a partner of Golden Theatres, which has been around for more than 15 years.

The interval, which usually runs 15 minutes, allows the public to go out for refreshments and is a necessary break in a Hindi movie, which can stretch more than three hours. It also signals a turning point or climax within the movie.

Rupal and Ashit Kapadia, who immigrated to Toronto from Mumbai six years ago, looked forward to Hollywood movies back home. Now that they're in North America, they miss the "nach-gana- (song and dance) that is bite-sized pieces of our lives in India."

"We cherish Bollywood, although they glorify reality and dress them up like a warm, dark chocolate cake,'' said Ms Kapadia, a senior analyst at a Toronto bank.

"Globalization has made the mainstream aware of our movies," added her husband, noting the growing numbers of non-Indians in the audience -- "even if it means reading English subtitles."

As the popularity of Bollywood increases in the mainstream media, it is posing new challenges for some of the smaller- screen theatres that have remained its devoted fans for years.

Shafik Rajani, president and owner of Raja Cinemas, which has shown Indian movies in B.C. for 12 years, said its big crowds have shrunk in recent years.

He once had six cinemas, but now has only two in Vancouver.

"We used to have line-ups and sold-out shows for months but unfortunately recently, it's gone downhill," he said.

"It's been slowing down recently because it's going mainstream."

"In the U.K., they don't show it in private theatres anymore. They only show it on the big screens. I think that's coming [here]."

Still, Mr. Rajani is not deterred: "We'll continue until the time ends, until we can do it no more because we love it."

"All of the [movies] are like the Titanic. They're all love stories. People love that kind of stuff."

India’s Hindi Movie Industry, Bollywood, Booms in 2006
December 31, 2006

India’s prolific Hindi movie industry, popularly known as Bollywood, recovered from a long slump in 2006. Not only did the industry produce a series of big hits, but market avenues such as Internet and television also began contributing more money to the trade. Anjana Pasricha has a report from New Delhi.

The movies that grossed big earnings in 2006 ranged from breezy comedies like Lage Raho Munnabhai to a film called Krishh, which created Bollywood’s own version of Superman, and a slick, action-packed movie titled Dhoom 2.

These hits buoyed an industry whose films had been flopping with alarming regularity in recent years. Most films barely recovered production costs, only a handful brought in a profit.

Film industry analysts say producers reversed the trend by moving away from clichéd love stories and predictable family dramas to experiment with new themes. An explosion of new multi-screen cinemas built across India also prompted audiences to return to theaters.

Bollywood trade analyst Taran Adarsh calls the results impressive.

“The quality of cinema has improved, by quality I mean story as well as story-telling technique, audiences are coming back, cinema conditions are improving with multiplexes coming in, people are going back to theaters in a very big way,” noted Adarsh. “All kinds of cinema was attempted, you cannot really say one particular genre clicked. Overall it was a great year.”

It is not just audiences at home that are boosting Bollywood’s revenue. The industry also collects huge earnings from movie-crazy Indian expatriates around the world, who are eager to rent or buy video versions of Hindi hits. In fact, some films that failed to make a profit in India were great successes overseas.

The film studios are based in Mumbai, also known as Bombay, which led to its comparison with the U.S. film industry based in Hollywood, California.

According to rough estimates, Bollywood is a one and a half billion dollar industry, and an estimated four billion people watch its films worldwide every year.

However, there are no accurate figures on how much money the industry makes, because financing for the Hindi movie trade has never been transparent.

Most of the funding comes from private film distributors and a few large studios, and some even from Mumbai’s thriving underworld.

But the movie industry is in wide agreement that its fortunes have turned around this year.

Trade analysts say it is not just box office revenues that are responsible. They say traditional movie-making economics are undergoing a change as the Indian film studios also begin to rake in revenue from new media such as Internet rights and satellite television channels.

And in a country besotted with anything related to Bollywood, revenue also flows in from ring tones that use movie songs, film clips that run on mobile phones and video games based on films.

Taran Adarsh says Bollywood is likely to earn even more from such sources in the coming years.

“Bollywood is making additional money from non-theatrical rights. People are exploring newer territories, newer avenues, and that is a very healthy trend for producers to rake in additional money,” added Adarsh.

The changing fortunes of the Hindi movie industry have prompted banks, big conglomerates and media businesses to line up to invest in show business, which was once considered too risky for serious investors.

Brand Bollywood

S S W
Posted online: Friday, February 23, 2007 at 0000 hours IST

From being just a tactical one-off activity, companies are clearly making branded entertainment an integral part of their marketing strategy.

Bollywood has finally discovered branding. In 2006, according to industry estimates, brand cameos earned around Rs 80 crore, and as a result, even small and medium-budget movies as well as animated films are hoping to cash in on this new and lucrative revenue stream. Indeed, media analysts and industry watchers expect that figure to climb to Rs 200 crore this year, and reach Rs 800 crore in 2010 Last year, Farhan Akhtar’s Don promoted Tag Heuer watches, Motorola, Garnier, Citibank and, of course, Oakley sunglasses as well as Louis Philippe outfits. Dhoom:2 promoted Coke, Pennzoil, Pepe, Sony, Disney channel, Sugar Free, Mc-Donald’s, Speed, Suzuki Zeus and Lage Raho Munnabhai featured Worldspace, IOCL, Go Air, MSN, Good Day, Kurkure, Bright Outdoor and Reliance Communications. Krrish, on the other hand, prominently featured Singapore Tourism Board, Sony, John Players, Bournvita, Tide, Hero Honda, Boro Plus, Lifebuoy, HP Power, Acron Rangeela, Hansaplast and Lays chips, followed by merchandising of Krrish masks, lunch boxes, water bottles.

In fact, the way Krrish was marketed even made it a case study at the Indian Institute of Management, Indore. Producer Ritesh Sidhwani of Excel Entertainment claims that once the script is fine-tuned, production houses choose brands that will fit into the film without hurting its content. Says he: “Our new film, Honeymoon Travels Pvt Ltd, is also going to be smartly marketed and branded and we waited until we got the right mix before releasing the film.”

In 2006, the most successful Bollywood branding was probably that of Rang De Basanti with its limited edition RDB Coca-Cola bottle, and cameos of Airtel, LG, Berger and Provogue in the film. The cola company had a special campaign for Dhoom:2 where Hrithik Roshan encouraged youngsters to take a swig and “go dhoom”. Mentos was branded smartly in Chup Chupke and Jaan-emann. Brands like Audi, Kotak Insurance, Eros Jewellery and Taj Mahal Tea made their branding debut in Ravi Chopra’s Baabul. “Revenue from brand associations totalled Rs 4 crore, so most of our promotion costs were taken care of and BR Films had to put up very little money,” reveals BR Films business head Sanjay Bhutiani. Kotak and Baabul have released a joint TV campaign that is currently on air: ‘Spirit of Baabul is celebrated with Kotak Life Insurance’. “Similar to the Tide-Baghbaan TVC, we have released the Kotak-Baabul campaign,” says Bhutiani. The high profile in-film ad in Baabul featured the Audi A6. Chivas Regal, Eros Jewellery and Audi together contributed Rs 40 lakh in cash and kind for the music release and fashion show of Baabul.

According to Siddharth Roy Kapoor, Senior Vice-President, UTV, while branding does not contribute significantly to revenues yet, it has enormous potential. “After 2006’s success story, more FMCG brands and durables have woken up to the power of movies as a means to push their products. Companies are increasingly opting for joint promotions. In our forthcoming film, Metro, Lenovo is going to be prominently branded; in Hat Trick, FedEx will be a joint promotion,” says Kapoor.

For UTV’s Goal, Reebok worked closely with the film’s costume designer to create outfits for the cast. Reebok India already sponsors top soccer clubs in India like East Bengal, Mohun Bagan, and Mohammedan Sporting and the theme of Goal revolves round soccer. “Hence, the fit for us was very natural and strategic,” explains Sajid Shamim, director-marketing, Reebok India. Besides helping to promote the movie with a media campaign,

Reebok would also highlight its association with the movie. Sources said the footwear company would spend Rs 2-Rs 3 crore on these marketing activities. UTV will also use Reebok’s retail outlets to advertise the movie. “Unlike most associations today where a brand is a force fit or an afterthought; this is a strategic and seamless association between the brand and the film,” says Vinit Karnik, Senior Director-entertainment, Broad-Mind. Even animated films are jumping on the ‘brandwagon’.

After Hanuman 2, Adlabs Films Ltd and kid’s apparel giant Gini & Jony are producing an animated feature film based on the characters Gini and Jony, mascots of the label. Says Prakash Lakhani, MD of Gini & Jony: “We believe that an animation film based on our characters will take our brand to the next level, and we have found an ideal partner in Adlabs.” Spends have increased from a meagre 1% in 2005 to as much as 3.5% in the 2006-07. Media buying for branded entertainment is now a specialised activity.

Moreover, companies are even seeking to associate with films featuring their brand ambassadors. Compaq, Tag Heuer and Airtel all added their branding to brand ambassador SRK’s Don in the form of co-promotions. “Creating branded content has a greater impact than making a commercial,” says Navin Shah, CEO of P9 Integrated, the media-brand arm of Percept, predicting, “By 2010, branding and product placements will contribute to a huge amount of revenue.” For brand managers, an association with Bollywood gives them a clutter breaking opportunity to look beyond the 30-second television commercial.

Indians in U.S. find new sideline: Bollywood moguls
By DIYA GULLAPALLI - The Wall Street Journal
Article Last Updated: 02/21/2007 03:28:52 PM PST

MUMBAI, India - For years, Renuka Pullat led the life of a wealthy mother in a suburb of San Francisco. She shuttled her two sons to tennis and soccer games, and volunteered for the American India Foundation.

Now, at 38 years old, she has an unusual new occupation: She is one of a wave of Indians in America pouring money into Bollywood movies here in India's film capital. One of her newest projects is about a vengeful wife who kills her cheating husband, featuring song-and-dance scenes. Her first movie, inspired by "A Fish Called Wanda," made it to theaters in 2005. It barely broke even.

In Bollywood, the name commonly associated with Hindi movies made in the former Bombay, even a lavish production that runs three hours can be made for a few million dollars. Some cost a lot less than that.

It's a byproduct of India's rush to open its economy. A few years ago, a regulatory change by the Indian government helped make it easier for foreigners to finance movies. It granted the film business a formal "industry" status, ushering in financing from local banks and other institutions. Such investments have made it more inviting for overseas investors, too.

Among recent productions: a movie about the Taj Mahal whose investors include Kanwal Rekhi, a former Novell Inc. executive. A Hindi-language movie inspired by "Rocky," the Sylvester Stallone boxing classic, was produced by Indian entrepreneurs from New Jersey who made their fortune selling products on TV infomercials.

One, an exercise machine called the "Ab King," was featured in the movie.

A former executive at software maker MicroStrategy Inc., Manish Acharya, recently directed a movie called "Loins of Punjab Presents." It's the story of a Bollywood-style singing contest, written in English and set in America. Most of the crew was professional, says Mr. Acharya. But "10 percent was incompetent _ and that was a nightmare." Mr. Acharya did some filming in Mumbai to save money.

It's tough to be a movie mogul in Bollywood, which is home to legions of ripoff artists, fly-by-night operators and underworld figures. In 2000, actor and director Rakesh Roshan was shot in what was widely believed to be retribution for not giving up overseas rights to a movie to an underworld figure. In a December interview, Mr. Roshan said he didn't know why he was targeted but suspected the Indian mafia.

The total number of films financed with foreign money is still small. A PricewaterhouseCoopers report counted at least a dozen films produced by "nonresident Indians," or NRIs (a term for the Indian diaspora), in 2004. Bollywood turns out more than 800 movies annually. The phenomenon was virtually nonexistent before, says Timmy Kandhari of PricewaterhouseCoopers Pvt. Ltd. in India.

Ms. Pullat knows just how tough it can be. In December she flew to Mumbai to push her projects along.

First she met with director Vikram Bhatt to discuss the script about the cheating husband and murderous wife. Ms. Pullat had rejected some of his suggestions and now Mr. Bhatt was lukewarm about her team's ideas. "Boring and predictable," he said at the meeting. "The battered-wife-fighting-back is the usual angle."

Later she met with another top director, David Dhawan, to discuss a different film. Back in 2005, Ms. Pullat paid Mr. Dhawan $200,000 to make a movie for her. Since then, Ms. Pullat, who has an M.B.A. degree, set up a business distributing Bollywood films to theaters and video stores in the U.S. and has been finding wealthy investors for her movies. Only now, two years later, were she and Mr. Dhawan getting around to picking a plot.

Mr. Dhawan arrived for the 3 p.m. meeting bleary-eyed and complaining about a raucous birthday party the night before at the home of a Bollywood superstar.

The good news: He liked the story idea presented by Ms. Pullat's team _ a comedy about two young, aspiring filmmakers trying to get a star to make a movie with them. "This is something that can be very interesting," he said.

One of the most ambitious foreign-funded projects under way right now is "Taj Mahal: The Heart of India." It's an Imax movie based on the story of the Taj Mahal itself, which was built by a heartbroken emperor, Shah Jahan, during the Mughal Empire (the era that also gave the world the term "mogul").

Mr. Rekhi, a former chief technology officer of Novell, and other Silicon Valley types have put $4 million into the film. Production on it began more than three years ago, but so far, only half the footage has been shot. Challenges have included scheduling the star, Aishwarya Rai, one of India's most bankable actresses.

"I tell investors it took Shah Jahan 22 years to make the Taj Mahal, so give me seven years to make a world-class Imax film," jokes Bharat Bala, the director.

Some films are starting to get out the door, like "Aryan: Unbreakable," the movie inspired by "Rocky." Aryan is the name of the movie's main character, and Poonam Khubani, whose husband is the New Jersey infomercial mogul, was a producer. In the movie, banners advertising the TeleBrands Ab King exercise device are draped around the ring where fight scenes take place.

Ms. Khubani also sings one of the songs on the soundtrack, titled "Ek Look, Ek Look" ("One Look, One Look").

Making the movie, was an uphill battle, Ms. Khubani says. It was released in India in December, eight months later than planned. The main delay: a lawsuit that went to Delhi High Court challenging the claim that Ms. Khubani actually sang "Ek Look, Ek Look" on the soundtrack. A singer who auditioned for the spot alleged that she had done the voice-over. The song was re-recorded after a costly legal battle.

Aryan didn't break box-office records. A December review on the Web site for the Times of India, one of India's biggest newspapers, said the movie "almost puts you to sleep with its insipid goulash."

In late December in Mumbai, at one 5:20 p.m. screening of "Aryan" in a downtown theater a week after it opened, only a few people were in the audience, many talking on their cellphones. Then, during the intermission _ a standard feature in Indian theaters _ they bought a few vegetable samosa snacks and cappuccinos in the lobby, then left the building, skipping the rest of the movie.

"We're lucky it lasted three weeks" in theaters, said Hitesh Israni, Ms. Khubani's brother, who lives in India and helped coordinate the project.

Using Bollywood to Teach Drip Irrigation

Sarah Rich
February 21, 2007 11:58 AM

India's International Development Enterprises (IDEI) works to advance locally-appropriate, sustainable development by designing and marketing affordable products that can improve the lives of the rural poor and ease some of the burdens that keep them in dire poverty.

Their products are geared towards rural farmers, and primarily deal with water -- probably the most vital and burdensome resource to obtain and use efficiently. Their Affordable Drip Irrigation Technology Intervention program introduces a collection of ready-to-use, prepacked kits that can be selected according to the size and condition of the farmer's plot. Their product summary explains:

Though drip irrigation as a water-saving technology -- comprised of drip and sprinkler irrigation -- existed in India and elsewhere for over fifteen years, it was not appropriate and affordable for small and marginal farm families. Hence the key task of IDEI during the period from 1997 to 2000 was to adapt this technology to suit the needs of poor farm families and, more importantly, to make the technology affordable.

Conventional technologies have a high capital cost, and are high-tech in nature, making them complicated to install and maintain. Further, there is a severe lack of efficient market supply chains in rural areas to develop, manufacture, install and maintain micro irrigation systems appropriate to India's small and marginal farmers.

IDEI's products cost around $30 and employ simple components that are easy to use. To make it even easier, IDEI has been running a marketing program to help farmer's learn how to adopt this technology. Their instructional tool is a Bollywood-style film that educates viewers about the benefits of drip irrigation. IDEI workers bring the film from village to village and either project it from the back of a truck, as shown in this picture, or project it onto the side of a house.

The company has already sold more than 80,000 of these irrigation kits, and with their entertainment-style marketing and education campaign, they will probably sell many more.

Bollywood stars for TT festival
By RHONDOR DOWLAT Wednesday, February 21 2007

Trinidadian and Tobagonians this week will have an opportunity of a lifetime to be a part of the world’s biggest Indian Expo — its highlight is estatic performances for three nights by two of Bollywood’s biggest stars — Amitabh Bachhan Jr and Govinda Jr.

Speaking with Newsday event organiser Anand Kumar Kersarkar said that it was time for Bollywood to give back to its fans, hence the unbelievable entrance fee of only $10.

The first-ever event tagged as “The Festival of India 2007” will commence from February 23 to March 4 from 11 am to 9 pm at the Divali Nagar Site in Chaguanas, off the Uriah Butler Highway. It would consists of three types of festivals, which include: Shopping, Bollywood and Give Away Festival.

There would also be unique attractions such as Ayurvedic Herbal, Indian Massage Parlour, Feinshui, Astrology, Palmist, Accu-Pressure, Magicians from India, Bombay Indian Dancers, Bhangra music and Give aways — among them a brand new vehicle.

Bollywood stars Amitabh Bachhan Jr and Govinda Jr are expected to perform on a full stage accompanied by Bollywood Dancers on February 23 - 25. Other nights would feature top local performers and dancers.

“We want everyone in the country to come out and enjoy this festival because it is one of a kind and it is our gift to you. It would be a pleasant lifetime experience,” Kersarkar said.