Goodbye Parvati, farewell Krishna and om shanti om, Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki. They’ve been with us for eight years and whereas the serial may not be kahani har ghar ki, it was the story of one family, the Aggarwals, who made themselves at home in our homes. If only they’d left before they overstayed their welcome — by about three years? —they’d have been the perfect guests. Watching their joy and their jokes, their carefree attitude, last week, seemed they, too, were relieved to finally go.

Meanwhile, the inmates of Bigg Boss are huffing and puffing till they blow a smokescreen before our eyes. The men’s favorite companion dangles from their lips and when Abhishek Bachchan visited Big B, one of the first questions they asked him was: got a light, sorry, cigarette? Should they be allowed to smoke so wantonly — is television a public space, or not? And since we’re at BB, could someone explain why Rahul Mahajan, nominated every week for eviction (he’s really unpopular with other contestants), never gets the heave-ho, glued to the show like fellow contestant Payal is to him? Abhishek B said Rahul M would be the winning contestant — how does he know? — and seems the public wants to prove him right.

From one Big B to the other. Amitabh Bachchan had barely climbed into the ambulance and the entire news fraternity was accompanying him to Nanavati Hospital. Barely had he laid himself down on the hospital bed for tests and the news channels were breaking into the lab flashing the reports in our faces. By evening, he was said to be resting. Hope he wasn’t catching up with his own illness on TV news, or he would have been astonished at the haste with which they were telecasting what looked increasingly like premature obituaries. Yes, it was his 66th birthday but did Zee News and Aaj Tak have to broadcast his entire life history?

... contd.