Who better to give Amitabh Bachchan a fresh start in Daulatpur, Barabanki, than the face that has launched a thousand dreams?

Till a few months ago, Barabanki was a major blot on the image of the superstar, as he faced trial in a land deal case here. On Sunday, however, over 40,000 residents of Daulatpur and its surrounding villages thronged to welcome the Bachchan family, who were here to lay the foundation of Aishwarya Rai Kanya Degree College.

It may not have been a political, or third front event, but giving Amitabh, Jaya, Abhishek and Aishwarya company was most of the UNPA brigade: Samajwadi Party’s Mulayam Singh Yadav and Amar Singh, of course, apart from ex-Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu and former Jammu & Kashmir CM Farooq Abdullah, who is expected to join the front soon. Sunday also happened to be Amar Singh’s birthday.

Much was made of the fact that Bachchan chose to name the college, in a backward area of Uttar Pradesh, after “bahu” Aishwarya — Amar Singh called it Bachchan’s gift of love to the “bahu of UP” and a salute to “Nari Shakti”. They also were at pains to clarify, repeatedly, as to why it had not been named after Bachchan’s father and noted poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan.

First it was Aishwarya, who after wishing Amar Singh on his birthday, said she was hesitant at first at the decision. “I told everyone that it would have been good if the college was named after dada Harivansh Rai or dadi Teji Bachchan. But everyone told me that it is theirs and UP’s blessing to me and I should be happy,” she told the crowd.

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