Lips Don’t Lie,or Do They?

Bollywood know-alls have already ordered the bindis and bangles,rolled out the red carpet and worked everybody into a frenzy for Mexican singer Shakira’s arrival. Unfortunately,nobody can say for sure that the Hips Don’t Lie bombshell is really on her way to India! The grapevine is crackling about Shakira making a debut in Bollywood with the musician duo Salim-Sulaiman composing for her. She would be following in the footsteps of pop diva Kylie Minogue,who sang in the Akshay Kumar-Lara Dutta flop film Blue last year. We don’t have Shakira’s comment on this but Salim-Sulaiman certainly were surprised.

“We are still in talks with her management. Nothing has been finalised. We have just returned from our Africa tour and walked right into a media wave about us composing for Shakira,” says Sulaiman Merchant. Nobody wants to believe him,of course,so he adds emphatically,“A lot of people are saying a lot of things but she has not agreed to record as yet.”

What about the “fact” that the song is going to be a cabaret number with Latin influences? “We have no idea about the song as yet. We have not composed anything. Once (and if) Shakira agrees,there will be meetings on how things have to be done,” says Merchant in a tone of one who has repeated this statement several hundred times. We ask him about reports that the song will be shot on South African model Candice Boucher and the movie will feature IPL owner and entrepreneur Sachin Joshi. “I have no idea about all of this! We are just hoping for a positive response from Shakira’s management. It is only then that anything else would be decided,” he bursts out.