India Latest Victim Of “Everyday Low Prices”

(Money.CNN.Com)

Wal-Mart’s ruthless expansion into the global marketplace will continue, as the world’s largest retail conglomerate now plans to set up shop in India.

Bharti Enterprises, India’s leading cell phone company, has said it will be investing $2.5 billion to establish a “nationwide chain of supermarkets and retail shops” in partnership with Wal-Mart.

India, described as “the next big frontier in the battle for shoppers’ wallets,” was recently ranked as the world’s most attractive destination by the A.T. Kearney Retail Development Index.

“India’s rapidly growing middle class has more money to spend than any previous generation - but no place to spend it,” says Charles Fishman of the Gaurdian online. “Wal-Mart’s acres of low-cost merchandise from around the world, gathered under a single roof, will be like a carnival for a slice of Indian consumers.”

(Right. That’s one way of looking at it.)

Wal-mart, a $250 billion company, is often harshly criticized for its questionable labor and commerce practices.

More:
Goodbye family stores in India’s brave new retail?
Bharti moves ahead on retail plan
Wal-Mart goes abroad for growth

Desi/Arab Film Festivus Maximus

Vimukthi Jayasundara’s The Forsaken Land

The 2007 New York Arab and South Asian Film Festival begins this weekend.

The “NYASAFF” will include award-winning documentaries, shorts, and full feature films.

Organizers say the festival–which runs from February 23rd through March 4th–makes sense, given “the historical and cultural affinities between these geographic regions, as well as the contemporary political landscape.”

More:
Full Festival Schedule

Saving India’s Girls

Orphanage.Org

Last Sunday police in Bhopal arrested a doctor and janitor after discovering 400 bones (from fetuses and newborns) buried behind a hospital. According to the Associated Press, the bones represent the remains of unwanted baby girls.

Selective abortion of female fetuses has led to a gender imbalance in India, where many districts report 800 girls are born for every 1,000 boys. International non-profit groups estimate that 10 million female fetuses have been killed over the past 20 years.

The government is now determined to take action through what it is calling the “cradle scheme”–essentially a plan to raise unwanted children in a series of yet-to-be-built orphanages.

“What we are saying to the people is have your children, don’t kill them. And if you don’t want a girl child, leave her to us,” says Renuka Chowdhury, the country’s minister of state for women and children.

“We will bring up the children. But don’t kill them because there really is a crisis situation. We will have cradles strategically placed all over the place so that people who don’t want their babies can leave them there.”

Duds For Modest Surfer Girls

Sama Wareh (AP/Chris Carlson)

In a real-life moment not right out of Baywatch, a lifeguard on a California beach once asked Sama Wareh, 23, “Dude, are you like a Muslim surfer girl or something?”

The article “High-tech fabrics keep Muslim women in the swim” doesn’t offer what reactions or questions Wareh gets these days after switching from her “jogging pants, skirt and long-sleeved shirt” combination to an all-body suit designed for athletic activity by Splashgear. Whether the suits actually help in fitting in at the beach or pool, or whether the wearers simply find them an improvement over wearing street clothes in the water, the news is that this niche market for all-body suits is expanding and that the women of all ages interviewed found the suits useful for activities like scuba, snorkeling and swimming. The gear offers a solution for those who want to do these things in a coed environment like a public beach while maintaining their sense of modesty.

More:
Splashgear founder and microbiologist Shereen Sabet’s story
Sama Wareh, artist

Previously:
Burqini Babes Make Waves

Tharoor On Colbert

Former UN Under-Secretary General Shashi Tharoor rolls through The Colbert Report. Hilarity ensues.

Iron Maiden In India

WikiMedia.Org

Metal band Iron Maiden is weeks away from visiting India where they will perform at the Bangalore Palace.

The group, best known for songs like “The Number of the Beast” and “Run to the Hills,” will hit the Palace on March 17, becoming the first “major” heavy metal/rock band to perform in India.

“To say we’re all really looking forward to going to Bangalore is something of an understatement. It’s very special to us to be able to play to new fans in countries we’ve never been to before,” band-frontman Bruce Dickinson told reporters. “We hear the Indian fans are very loud and into their metal.”

Iron Maiden will be touring in promotion of the group’s new album Matter of Life and Death.

In Short

Interview Magazine

*Saif Ali Khan was hospitalized last night.

The star of Omkara (Bollywood’s interpretation of Shakespeare’s Othello) was rushed to Mumbai’s Lilavati Hospital after complaining of chest pains.

Khan–whose mother Sharmila Tagore joined Ralph Fiennes earlier this week at an HIV/AIDS Awareness event—is 36.

*Famed photographer Ellen von Unwerth shot Brad Pitt on location in India. The results can be seen in this month’s issue of Interview Magazine.

*And Time Magazine has weighed in on the ongoing clash between Big B and King Khan.

Not So Fair, Not So Lovely

Photo: TheSugarCubes.Net

Links to this Fair and Lovely commercial have been furiously circulating through the blogosphere (Nerve, Feministing, Poverty News Via Salon).

In synopsis:

“One TV commercial aired in India (often referred to as the Air Hostess advertisement) “showed a young, dark-skinned girl’s father lamenting he had no son to provide for him, as his daughter’s salary was not high enough – the suggestion being that she could not get a better job or get married because of her dark skin. The girl then uses the cream [Fair & Lovely], becomes fairer, and gets a better-paid job as an air hostess – and makes her father happy”.

Fair and Lovely is a product put out by Unilever—parent company to Dove (which we all know is responsible for the hugely successful “campaign for real beauty“). Oh irony of ironies.

More:
In critique of Fair and Lovely
Fair and Lovely India
Selling Race

Haute Couture Meets Hijab, East Meets West

Khan’s Spring 2007 Collection (NYMagazine.Com)

Rising star Naeem Khan recently created a stir with his Spring, 2007 collection of flirty, vibrant cocktail dresses. Last week, Khan and other designers joined forces at New York Fashion Week to raise awareness and funds for Darfur.

Participants in “Designers for Darfur” included Luca Luca, BCBG Max Azria, and Rabia Yalcin, a conservative Muslim designer interested in marrying high fashion with Islamic sensibilities.“In private, clothing should reflect a woman’s sensuality,” says the Istanbul-based Yalcin. In public, she wants to help “show the beauty of the flower while covering the flower.”

All profits generated through the fundraiser go directly to the Save Darfur Coalition.

Khan and Yalcin join the growing cadre of eastern designers, showcasing their work in New York (remember Sabyasachi Mukherjee’s collection from Olympus Fashion Week earlier this year?).

Namesake In Chicago

Apna Ghar hosts a special screening of The Namesake in Chicago this Thursday, February 22, with donations to benefit the nonprofit organization. Mira Nair will take questions after the screening. Taking its name from a Hindi-Urdu phrase meaning “Our Home,” Apna Ghar is a domestic violence shelter serving primarily Asian women and children in the Midwest.

The film’s official North American release is on March 9. Fox Searchlight offers the chance to RSVP for free screenings of the film in selected cities.

Reviews:
Film Journal International
Time Out London
Variety
Salon