Jayalalithaa urges Kerala to abide by Supreme Court order

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa Thursday requested her Kerala counterpart Oommen Chandy to ensure that his government abides by the apex court order allowing the water storage level at Mullaperiyar Dam to be raised to 142 feet.

Replying to Chandy’s letter dated Dec 1, 2011, the text of which was released here to the media, Jayalalithaa said: “May I take this opportunity to request you to kindly ensure that the Government of Kerala abides by the order of the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, which has taken into consideration all the safety aspects of the dam and allow the water level to be raised to 142 feet?”

While agreeing with Chandy’s views that Tamil Nadu and Kerala have mutual interests and co-operation on various fronts and they should be fostered, she said: “I would like to take this opportunity to bring to your notice unwarranted provocations from across the border and also our anxieties on the fear psychosis generated in Kerala.”

She said the apex court after considering the report of the expert committee formed by the central government ordered “raising of level of storage in the Mullai Periyar Dam to 142 feet”.

Jayalalithaa said the Kerala government amended the Kerala Irrigation and Water Conservation Act 2003 in 2006 there by nullifying the apex court order.

She said the Empowered Committee under the chairmanship of the former chief justice of India A.S. Anand is looking into dam safety.

“The Government of Tamil Nadu had carried out a series of measures from 1980 to 1994 on the recommendations of the Chairman, Central Water Commission, to strengthen the dam and after all these measures have been carried out, the retrofitted Mullai Periyar Dam is as good as new. The Supreme Court of India had also factored this in while pronouncing its judgment in 2006, allowing Tamil Nadu initially to store water up to 142 feet,” the letter notes.

She said a series of studies/tests such a scanning the upstream face of the dam, testing of cable anchors, non-destructive tests have been conducted and some are in progress.

In response to Chandy’s reference in his letter to the 22 tremors in the last four months, Jayalalithaa said: “As per the Indian Meteorological Department data, there have been only four mild tremors in the last four months, that too far away from the vicinity of the Mullai Periyar Dam site, which did not have any effect on the seepage in the dam.”

“The seepage of the dam is well within the permissible limits as per the Indian Standards Code. The possibility of tremors of even medium magnitude does not exist in the Mullai Periyar Dam site. The possibility of the Mullai Periyar Dam breaching due to flood waters and collapsing is not logical since all eventualities have been factored in during the strengthening of the dam,” the letter notes.

Jayalalithaa stressed that informed decision making at the the government level should be based on reason rather than extraneous factors and one should guard against unfounded fears overtaking reason and ground realities.

Mullaperiyar dam facts by PWD

MullaiPeriyar Dam History & Technical Details by PWD Engineers

THE DIRTY PICTURE REVIEW

THE DIRTY PICTURE REVIEW

by J Hurtado, December 3, 2011 2:00 AM

DRAMA, MUSICAL, SOUTH ASIA

If there is any justice in this world, The Dirty Picture will do for Vidya Balan what Raging Bull did for Robert DeNiro. Balan owns this film so completely that it seems to collapse under it's own facade whenever she's off screen, which thankfully isn't much. The Dirty Picture is one of the best mainstream Hindi films of 2011, and Balan's performance supplants Priyanka Chopra's turn in 7 Khoon Maaf as the breakout dramatic performance of the year.  When The Dirty Picture is on its game, the film lights up an audience like few I've seen, however, it descends intermittently into soap opera melodramatics and that keeps it from being a truly great film, leaving it in the realm of the merely very good.

The story of a country girl breaking the chains that bind her to her rural upbringing and looking for success on the big screen is not a new one.  It's been told in Hollywood many times, however, this story played out for real in the south Indian film industries in the 1980's with the real life Silk Smitha. Silk's tragic tale is illustrated capably by director Milan Luthria, who struggles with an uneven script from Rajat Arora. The rise of this big screen siren is nearly as meteoric as her sudden fall from grace. The dichotomy could probably have been handled better, but the film chooses to address it in the most common of ways.

The first half of the film shows Silk's running away from home and beginning her career as the sexiest and raunchiest of item girls. The pre-intermission arc provides lots of laughs and generates lots of goodwill toward the commoner Silk as she crawls through the muck to land on top of the heap.  Helping, and sometimes hurting, her ascent is Naseeruddin Shah as Surya, an aging south Indian film hero from the one place left on Earth where the idea of an anti-hero hasn't yet caught on.  Yet, for all of his forthrightness on screen, he's kind of a creep in real life.  However, his relationship, on and off screen, with Silk provides for some of the finest on-screen moments for the both of them. Shah is a brilliant actor, and even though he's here to lampoon a certain style of acting and filmmaking in general, he never tips his hand.

Vidya Balan's transformation from the country girl Reshma to Silk the sex bomb is definitely worthy of note.  In the first half of the film, she proves that she's willing to do anything to become a star, much to the chagrin of a director with international ambitions played by Emraan Hashmi. As Silk rises, Hashmi's Abraham plots her downfall, and in the second half of the film, we see his plans begin to gel. The film takes a very dark turn as Silk turns to the drink and allows her ego to get the best of her. While her out of control pride leads to one of the best songs in the film in the form of a dance off with the new flavor of the week at a party, it's all downhill from there.

I could spend more time talking about Shah, Hashmi, and Tusshar Kapoor, the third man in Silk's life, but that's all just a smoke screen for this film's real raison d'etre. Vidya Balan is astounding in this film, and Milan Luthria, even though he can't quite seem to get a handle of his own film's dialogue at times, knows exactly what he's doing when Balan's on screen. She oozes sex in a way that Indian actresses don't.  Indian films are all about the tease and implication, but Vidya Balan, and the real life Silk Smitha, were all about seduction and raw, raunchy sexuality in a way that audiences of both sexes lapped up.

Silk Smitha didn't look like a typical Indian film star, either, she had some meat on her bones, and Vidya Balan gained about 25 lbs for the role, all of which are on display throughout the course of the film. One thing that I didn't notice at the time, but became more obvious as the film wore on was that the weight was always there, but for the first half of the film, Vidya was shot in such a way that it was extremely sensual and she looked bountiful and gorgeous.  However, as she began to crash, her posture took a nose dive, and what was sensual and curvy became lumpy. I've never seen any actress in an Indian film willfully look the way that Balan looks in The Dirty Picture, and it was all 100% intentional.  She uses her attitude, her dress, her affect, and even her posture to convey this complicated and conflicted character that required a lot more than most actresses would be willing to deliver.

Where the film stumbles is when it veers away from Vidya.  When the camera isn't on her, Luthria doesn't seem to quite know what to do.  Characters deliver long soliloquies to no one in particular, the scenarios move from homage to farce, and the actors seem to lose focus.  On several occasions, actors deliver lines of philosophical mumbo jumbo to the camera for no reason at all.  In fact, Vidya's only questionable moment in the film comes in the scene immediately before intermission when she accepts an award and goes on a rant to the audience that is not necessarily out of character, but very out of step with her performance as a whole.

The Dirty Picture succeeds because of Vidya Balan in the finest acting performance of the year out of India. She is able to overcome the clumsy writing to make her character sympathetic and the film incredibly engaging. The melodrama drags down the second half, but Balan's charisma keeps the audience from drifting in a way that requires a true and powerful talent.  This film offers big laughs, fantastic spectacle, big emotions, and a powerhouse performance from a brave and exciting actress. The Dirty Picture is a winner, and with the help of a good editor, could probably even make the art house rounds if it wanted to. However, I'll take Bollywood with all of its faults and excesses any day, and this is quality Bollywood.