B-town support for Jaya Bachchan

Jaya Bachchan's statement calling Happy New Year 'a nonsensical film' created quite an uproar. Subsequent reports suggested that Jaya's statement apparently didn't go down well with Shah Rukh Khan. There were also news reports indicating Abhishek and Aishwarya apparently rushing to Mannat to apologise to a riled up SRK and Big B sending an apology text message. It now looks like all the reportage of stars being angry at Mrs. Bachchan were nothing but false rumours. First Big B himself clarified that Jaya's statement was taken out of context through his blog and later the man who is supposed to have been angry, King Khan himself refuted such claims. Trashing a news report that said SRK is angry and didn't accept the Bachchans apology, the actor through one of his tweets wrote, “Have not read a more crappy, made up piece of journalism lately." Now coming out in support of Jaya is Anil Dharker, a veteran journalist and noted columnist who also happens to be the Festival Director of Tata Literature Live where the incident took place. Said Dharker, "Without meaning to sound pretentious, a literary festival provides a forum for the exchange of ideas. If it's a lively festival, as I believe Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest is, this exchange is laced with wit and humour. And this is precisely what happened when Jaya Bachchan was in conversation with Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi. Her remarks about Happy New Year being 'nonsensical', when taken out of context, sound like harsh criticism of the film, but when quoted in full show that she was talking of two kinds of cinema that exist in India—those based on literary works and those that are pure entertainment. She enjoyed both these kinds of films, she said (as all those who heard the discussion would attest). An example she gave of the latter was of Amar, Akbar, Anthony, a film she said she enjoyed immensely, as much as she did Happy New Year. In fact, she said, she complimented her son Abhishek for his role, because it's something she couldn't have done." Well, finally the dust has settled for good we say.