Filmmaker Rohit Shetty says he has discussed a few ideas with Akshay Kumar but the duo has not locked what exactly they will do next.
There were reports that Rohit has signed Akshay for his next, which will go on floors post the filmmaker’s “Simmba”.
When asked about the same, Rohit told an agency, “I’ve always been open about what I am doing. We have bounced one or two ideas. I would love to work with him and definitely we will be coming together.
“But at present we have just tossed an idea and we just had a few meetings on what can be done and what we should do. Everybody is saying our combination will be good.”
The director is currently awaiting the release of his next, cop-action- drama “Simmba”. The film features Ranveer Singh in the titular role.
Also starring Sara Ali Khan, “Simmba” is scheduled to release on December 28.
The director says, though he is aware he has a loyal film audience, he is happy the way “Simmba” has shaped up.
American rapper Cardi B is planning to spend Christmas with rapper Offset, but she isn’t ready to get back with him yet.
Cardi, who shares a daughter named Kulture Kiari Cephus with Offset, feels co-parenting is very important for their daughter and has praised his parenting. The ‘I Like It’ rapper will be spending some quality time in the Dominican Republic with her family.
An insider told a online portal, “Although they are not together right now, they will be spending the holidays together as a family.”
“Cardi B wants Offset to be a part of Kulture’s life and wants him to spend Christmas with his daughter. It’s Kulture’s first Christmas and it means a lot to Cardi to have the family together,” another source told the portal.
“She isn’t ready to take him back. Cardi is trying to keep focused and keep her head clear until she figures out what she wants to do,” the source added.
On December 4, the ‘Bodak Yellow’ rapper announced her split with Offset after one year of marriage through an Instagram video.
The ‘Migos’ rapper has been expressing his regret and sorrow about the end of their relationship and has gone to great lengths to win his lady love back.
On Saturday, Offset surprised Cardi at her concert in Los Angeles and gifted her a massive cake and floral bouquet which read “Take Me Back Cardi.”
He also pleaded in front of the crowd, “I just wanna tell you I’m sorry, bro, in person, in front of the world. I love you. Whatever I gotta do to show you that, I’m there.”
However, Cardi had the flowers and cake removed from the stage and continued with her concert.
There were rumours about Offset’s loyalty and infidelity which is what led to their split. The drama between the two made headlines when an alleged video of Offset and a woman named Summer Bunni surfaced online.
Ranveer Singh says being best friends with one’s spouse is “key to sustaining a romantic relationship”.
Ranveer tied the knot with his girlfriend of six years, actor Deepika Padukone in an intimate twin wedding ceremony in Italy last month.
“Being best friends with each other is truly the dynamic. We are deeply in love with each other but above all we are best friends. We are each other’s support system, companions. We have a lot of fun together.
“Being each other’s best friend is truly paramount, where you can share silences, laughter and light moments. To have somebody who makes the passing of the lifetime a pleasant experience everyday is very rare and precious,” the actor told PTI in an interview.
The couple started dating on the sets of Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s “Ram Leela”. The duo then went on to feature in two more of Bhansali’s films “Bajirao Mastani” and “Padmaavat.”
“I feel like the two greatest things I’ve done in my life is, one, become an actor and two, get myself the most amazing life partner one can hope for,” he adds.
Ranveer credits Deepika for curating every aspect of their “fairytale” wedding.
“I had this fairytale wedding and I keep telling my wife that it’s the stuff of dreams. I could not have even dreamed of such a wedding. It’s beyond my imagination. I could never have the vision for it. She meticulously curated and designed every aspect of it.
“It was everything as it should have been – the most joyous month of our lives, there were tears of happiness throughout. It will be a fond memory in our hearts forever,” he says.
The actor says someone “very senior” in the film industry told the couple after the wedding that as youth icons their tying the knot has “reinstated everyone’s faith in the institution of marriage”.
“In the day and age we live in, the concept of marriage is questioned sometimes. This person told us how this has made a socio-cultural impact. To make a commitment is a positive sign. I feel lucky and blessed. As cliche as it sounds, she’s literally the best thing to have happened to me,” he says.
Ranveer was speaking on the sidelines of a promotional event of his next, “Simmba”. The Rohit Shetty cop-action-drama is scheduled to release on December 28.
With film promotions in full swing, the actor says, unlike Deepika, he is not someone who is adept at striking a work-life balance.
“This is the kind of workload that I am not used to. It requires discipline and time management, both of which are not my strong points. But my wife is helping me now. She’s very good at handling massive workload and still maintaining a work-life balance. I have some support now,” he says.
“The Flash” star Grant Gustin has married has fiancee LA Thoma.
Gustin, 28, and Thoma, 30, exchanged wedding vows last Saturday, reported E! online.
The wedding reportedly took place at Valentine DTLA, a 9,000-square-foot venue erected in the 1920s.
According to the publication, “Supergirl” stars Melissa Benoist and Chris Wood, Hamilton’s Daveed Diggs and Taylor Trensch, along with Broadway actors Adam Kaplan, Jared Loftin, Ben Ross and Leela Rothenberg attended the ceremony.
The couple is yet to comment on their nuptials, but Gustin’s manager Robert Stein shared a photo of himself with the newlyweds on Instagram.
“What heartfelt joy is was to watch Grant and LA, surrounded by their family and friends, come together for a loving union.
“Wishing them both a Lifetime of Love and Happiness. They are so blessed to have one another to spend the rest of their lives together,” he captioned the post.
Gustin and Thoma, a physical therapist, announced their engagement in April 2017. They dated a little over a year before getting engaged.
Assam government has approved farm loan waiver to the tune of Rs 600 crore which will benefit around eight lakh farmers of the state, its spokesman said on Tuesday.
As per the scheme, the government will write off 25 per cent loan of farmers up to a maximum of Rs 25,000 of all farm debts, Assam Government spokesperson and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Chandra Mohan Patowary said.
The waiver will be for all the loans taken through Kisan Credit Card (KCC) and from PSU banks, he said.
The government has also sanctioned an interest relief scheme which will enable around 19 lakh farmers to take loans at zero interest from the next financial year, he said.
The decisions were taken at a cabinet meeting was held on Monday night.
“The debt relief scheme for farmers will waive 25 per cent of all loans taken till now. The benefit will be up to a maximum of Rs 25,000. This scheme will immediately benefit around eight lakh farmers,” he said.
The cabinet decided to enhance the state Freedom Fighters’ pension from Rs 20,000 to Rs 21,000.
The meeting also approved the formation of a Micro and Small Enterprises Facilitation Council to help the growth of MSME sector in the state, the minister said.
The government also sanctioned Rs 32.72 crore loan from National Cooperative Development Corporation for revival of a jute mill at Nagaon, he added.
A severe feud between two factions of the management over revenue sharing might have led to the food poisoning incident at Maramma temple in Sulivadi village of Chamarajanagar district, police said on Tuesday as the toll increased to 15 with the death of another woman.
Health department said Dundamma (51) died Tuesday, while over 100 people were still in different hospitals. As many as 21 persons are still on ventilator in intensive care units.
The government on Monday had confirmed that insecticide was found in the ‘prasad’ served at the temple.
Without divulging much detail, Chamarajanagar district superintendent of police Dharmender Kumar Meena told agencies, “We have made positive progress. Further investigation is on.”
Requesting anonymity, top police sources said that there appeared to be a severe feud between two factions of the temple management over revenue sharing.
The Kichchugutti Maramma temple that attracts lakhs of believers gets donation in crores. Sharing the donation appeared to be at the centre of the feud, the sources added.
The government told the Legislative Assembly on Monday that about 150 people were said to have been served with vegetable rice at the ground-breaking ceremony for the temple tower on Friday and within half an hour those ate fell ill.
A case of culpable homicide not amounting to murder has been registered against seven persons of the temple management under Section 304 of the Indian Penal Code, police said.
K M Asokan, father of Hadiya, the young woman from Kerala who converted to Islam and married a Muslim man against her family’s wishes, on Tuesday said he has ended his association with the Left and joined the BJP.
Local BJP leaders said Asokan officially became a member of the BJP at a ‘Sabarimala protection conference’, organised by the party at Vaikom on Sunday.
Asokan and 50 others in TV Puram village received membership from party state general secretary B Gopalakrishnan at the function, they said.
Asokan said that he and members of his family have been supporters of the Communist Party of India (CPI) and Left Democratic Front for several decades but decided to end the association with the Left due to the “bitter experience” they had with them during his legal battle in the Hadiya case.
“They (LDF) did nothing for us (in the case). Instead they worked against us. At least that could have been avoided,” Asokan, an ex-serviceman, told PTI over phone from T V Puram.
He said most of his family members have supported his decision to join the BJP. Asokan, however, said he was not interested in becoming a full-time party worker.
Asokan said that his daughter telephones him often.
The Supreme Court in March had restored the marriage of Hadiya with the Muslim man setting aside a nine-month-old order of the Kerala High Court.
In his complaint, Asokan had alleged that his daughter was a victim of ‘love jihad.’
The apex court had in August last year asked the NIA to probe the case of conversion and marriage of Hadiya, as the agency claimed a “pattern” was emerging in Kerala.
The matter came to the fore when Hadiya’s husband Shafin Jahan challenged a Kerala High Court order annulling his marriage and sending her to her parents’ custody.
On November 27 last year, the apex court had freed Hadiya from her parents’ custody and sent her to college to pursue her studies, even as she had pleaded that she should be allowed to go with her husband.
Addressing India’s distressed farmers directly from Parliament, Congress president Rahul Gandhi said on Tuesday he will not let Prime Minister Narendra Modi sleep until all farms loans have been waived.
In a stinging attack on what he described as crony capitalism, Gandhi said the government has turned a blind eye to the loans given to 15 top industrialists of the country, including Anil Ambani, but has made no effort to alleviate the woes of the farmers in the last four years.
“We promised to waive loans in 10 days. In two states, we did it in six hours,” Gandhi told reporters outside Parliament.
“We will not let Prime Minister Narendra Modi sleep until loans of all farmers are waived,” the Congress president said.
The Congress is running away from a discussion on the Rafale deal in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Vijay Goel said on Tuesday while asserting that the government is ready for a debate on any issue.
A dispute, be it on Rafale, the Cauvery river water, the RBI or the CBI, can only be resolved through discussion, Goel told reporters outside Parliament.
“The Congress is running away from a discussion on the Rafale issue in both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. The government is ready to have discussions on any issue in Parliament,” he said.
Referring to the recent Supreme Court order rejecting demands for a probe into the Rafale jet deal, the minister said it was clear that the Congress was spreading “misinformation” on the issue.
The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed the pleas challenging the deal between India and France for the procurement of 36 Rafale jets saying there was no occasion to “really doubt the decision making process”.
“I want to tell the Congress that the government is ready for a discussion on the issue of Rafale… But the Congress is not ready for a discussion and its members are instead raising unimportant issues in both the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha,” Goel said.
The Congress has repeatedly criticised the deal for the 36 Rafale jets, alleging that the government was procuring each aircraft at a cost of over Rs 1,670 crore as against Rs 526 crore finalised by the UPA government.
The government has, however, denied any irregularity in the deal.
India for the fourth time deferred the deadline to impose retaliatory customs duties on 29 US products, including almond, walnut and pulses, by another 45 days, the government has said.
According to a notification by the finance ministry, the implementation of the duty hike has been postponed until January 31, 2019.
The commerce ministry had asked its finance counterpart to extend the deadline further.
In June, India decided to impose retaliatory tariffs from August 4. But it was extended by 45 days till September 18 and then till November 2. In November, the decision to impose these duties was deferred till December 17.
As part of imposition of higher import duties, New Delhi has notified higher tariffs on several products. While import duty on walnut is to be hiked to 120 per cent from 30 per cent at present, duty on chickpeas, Bengal gram (chana) and masur dal will be raised to 70 per cent, from 30 per cent currently. Levy on lentils will be increased to 40 per cent, from 30 per cent.
The duty hike move by India was in retaliation to US President Donald Trump’s March 9 decision to impose heavy tariffs on imported steel and aluminium items.
India is pressing for exemption from high duty imposed by the US on certain steel and aluminium products, resumption of export benefits to certain domestic products under their generalised system of preferences (GSP), greater market access for its products from agriculture, automobile, automobile components and engineering sectors.
On the other hand, the US is demanding greater market access through cut in import duties for its agriculture goods, dairy products, medical devices, IT and communication items, the official added.
Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu will hold bilateral discussions on trade issues with US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross on February 14.
