Did SRK Plagiarize J.K. Rowling’s Speech?
LINK
EXCERPT: “A young blogger, Agratha Dinakaran, has got the social media space buzzing by pointing out how a recent speech by Shah Rukh Khan at the National Management Convention organised by the All India Management Association (AIMA) in Delhi reminded her of something — J.K. Rowling’s commencement speech at Harvard in 2008, ‘The Fringe Benefits of Failure and the Importance of Imagination’. In fact, as she blogged, some of the words were a ” little too similar to that of Ms. Rowling. No, scratch that. They were exactly the words of Ms. Rowling.””
SATYAMSHOT 
October 6, 2013 at 7:57 AM
I’m shocked and pained.
In an industry which upholds the highest standards of morality and impeccable behaviour this stands out like a sore thumb.
The various people involved in the industry carry the torch forward with such conscientiousness, led by the shining example of Gajhani where the people won name fame, (not forgetting money) by the sheer force of originality.
Hang him, I say.
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October 6, 2013 at 8:15 AM
Don’t get what the fuss is about. You can’t expect originality or any substance from a man who has thrived all his life on extracting all the possible juice of the “tried and tested”.
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October 6, 2013 at 8:30 AM
Well.. its not like it hasnt doesnt been before in other places maybe just not as blatant..shouldve mentioned or given credit where credit is due…
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October 6, 2013 at 8:36 AM
And just incase you’re wondering..
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/shah-rukh-khans-aima-ypo-million-other-speeches/
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October 6, 2013 at 9:10 AM
Thanx -some good points there maggie & oldgold
And interesting blogpost by shailaja.
Having said that srk needed to be more careful–he may not have even written the text –maybe some assistant or speech writer..
But if it’s someone like jk rowlings speech, it’s naive to think it will not be detected or misinterpreted as ‘copied’
Anyhow in today’s day n age, there are numerous anti plagiarism software –prevents also self plagiarism or even ‘unintentional plagiarism’
Liked ‘ithenticate’ software (if anyone interested)
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October 6, 2013 at 9:17 AM
These are expected from SRK. Calling himself number 1, telling Gavaskar to shut up and telling out in the media that no one should dare to compare his acting with thats of srk’s if these are not evident enough ques for arrogance I dunno what is. One more thing that I can predict the SRK fans wud react with is that Rowling might have borrowed srk’s words back in 2008 when she was talking in Harvard convocation. Dont be surprised to when u hear that.
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October 6, 2013 at 10:57 AM
LOL!
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/shah-rukh-khans-aima-ypo-million-other-speeches/
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October 6, 2013 at 11:02 AM
Lol,as pathetic as plagiarising is, even more sorry sight is fans trying to defend it! Feel sorry for them!
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October 6, 2013 at 11:06 AM
yeah never seen a group of fans as ready to defend the indefensible as this one!
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October 6, 2013 at 5:06 PM
She needs to take a course in digital rights. I think even the Yale speech has bunch of same things without credits.
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October 6, 2013 at 11:35 AM
Duplicity is evident when fans first hail it as a great speech and when it is obvious that it is plagiarised, they claim it was recycled speech anyway!
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October 6, 2013 at 12:49 PM
In India, this is how we were taught, ie, ratta maro or paper mein ulti karo. The perfect regurgitation always got an A. So when we arrived here as students, it took a bit of getting used to the system in the West. When we crammed our texts and wrote them down verbatim in our exams, we would be told by the Prof that this constitutes plagiarism. Great politicians (eg Joe Biden!) have waded into controversies due to plagiarism of speech. Its taken very seriously.
But its not unsurprising to see SRK fans defend him vociferously. In their world, nothing he does is ever wrong. Some fan of his says “..time and again as people of India, we take more pride in downsizing people rather than applauding their success story. ” So lets just denigrate the entire Indian populace to defend the shenanigans of one man. Joe Biden was himself a success story, but the American public did not take his plagiarism kindly, and had him booted out of a presidential race. Instead of denigrating Indians, why not raise our own standards of ethics, so that we can have the balls to actually criticize a successful person who dabbles in such ethical lapses.
Again, maybe SRK just plainly forgot, so we cud give him the benefit of doubt. But instead, we see a sustained hate campaign against the blogger who broke the news. Im sure she fears for her life, such is the vilification being delivered on to her by SRK fanclubs on FB/Twitter.
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October 6, 2013 at 12:52 PM
Btw, this calls for adding SRK’s name to this wikipedia list:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_plagiarism_incidents
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October 6, 2013 at 2:52 PM
>the blogger who broke the news.
You make that sound so sweet and innocent.
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October 6, 2013 at 1:52 PM
Some very good comments by everyone.
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October 6, 2013 at 1:55 PM
And a great moment for cathartic comments.
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October 6, 2013 at 7:45 PM
“And a great moment for cathartic comments.”
Haha Oldgold –well said 🙂
Ps Satyam : in my other comment on modifying the title-since allegation not yet proven—
It’s ‘sued’ not ‘used’..
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October 6, 2013 at 1:58 PM
Where were all you guys when Aamir was busy plagiarizing Memento? SRK, being a very busy person must have forgotten to acknowledge Rowling, but he did that in an earlier speech. No big deal!
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October 6, 2013 at 2:22 PM
That is such an easy one! Where were you when SRK did Darr (Cape Fear) or OSO (Karz/Naseeb, etc) or RaOne (From the entire encyclopedia of Hwood Superhero movies!). But I will not hold it against SRK, cause it is oxymoronic to expect originality from Bwood scriptwriters. No one can claim originality in this cesspool, Aamir included.
However, the incident here was clearly out of bwood. The superstar was in an academic forum, supposedly being an Inspiration coach, distributing valuable advise.
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October 6, 2013 at 2:54 PM
>However, the incident here was clearly out of bwood.
And suddenly Jekyl has to become Hyde.
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October 6, 2013 at 2:58 PM
Oh, I can smell the Jekyl’s from a distance. Its his fandom which is hellbent on anointing him a Hyde! Once a plagiarist, always a plagiarist!
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October 6, 2013 at 3:02 PM
inverse Jekyl and Hyde there..lol.., ie.. all the Hydes of Bwood but just one trying to be Jekyl!
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October 6, 2013 at 2:56 PM
Personally, this would not have been a big deal had SRKFandom admitted it, and perhaps gotten a reasonable response from the man himself. But, what riles me up is the way SRKfandom went hammer and tongs against this blogger, accusing her of seeking cheap publicity and of being small-minded in reporting this! Actually, more than the actions of SRK, its the actions of his fandom that totally rile up everybody.
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October 6, 2013 at 3:34 PM
Yes, very bad, this….. riling up.
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October 6, 2013 at 6:10 PM
Yup Oldgold–‘riling up’ isn’t good
Suggest u try Oktoberfest 🙂
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October 6, 2013 at 4:06 PM
I think its funny enough to read the comments here.. SRK directly referenced JK Rowling in his speech but people tend to miss that part and creating this unnecessary controversy.
Satyam, please post this. Thanks.
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/shah-rukh-khans-aima-ypo-million-other-speeches/
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October 6, 2013 at 5:50 PM
Shailja – Do you have any instance of YPO speech in public space apart from your GoogleDoc account?
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October 6, 2013 at 6:18 PM
what a reply…thanks…
Obviously SRK haters are not going to read this…
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October 6, 2013 at 7:02 PM
actually that response reads like a fairly desperate defense of the indefensible. Not that the ‘SRK lover’ would notice. It’s hard to conceive of the objectionable act or even crime SRK could indulge in that you (and others like you) would find objectionable!
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October 6, 2013 at 6:09 PM
@ shailja– thanx for that info/ updates— u have a nice blog cheers
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October 6, 2013 at 7:18 PM
@ Satyam & munna
Suggest that in the fairness of things, shalijas ‘addendum’ should also be put as a separate post–given that the ‘allegation’ was prominently put up.
I haven’t yet read the details /debates wither ways but shailja is NOT speaking on behalf of SRKs offices and she has responded on her OWN accord just like any of us can /do.
Or else the original ‘allegation’ itself should be removed 🙂
Obviously these are just suggestions
Having said that, I think too much is being created here against poor srk. Yes he is guilty of being careless and even naive
And like most university professors who get their research papers written from their PhD students (bit quote their own name in the credits prominently), many prominent speakers who are active on the circuit
Yes srk should have checked from basic plagiarism soft wares before actually delivering it. But apparently srk seems to have even quoted the source!
Any which ways, let’s get back to the context
Yeah srk is perhaps guilty of carelessness and ‘lifting off material’ (which in this phrase appears worse than it is in this context)
It’s not about a good for nothing person trying to climb onto a real celebrity and basking in the reflected glory!!
Jk Rowling is definitely a big deal and her Harry potter books are trendsetting best sellers in that target segment
But so is srk and more…
Somehow there’s also a certain ‘subservience’ at play here to the west. I know this perhaps sounds like a lame defense of SRKs obvious carelessness which he should have well avoided
But SRK is not what he is due either to this ‘speech’, ‘ invitation, or the few sentences he has borrowed from Rowling !! ( whether srks as acknowledged it also matters and I’m not privy!)
Ps : I do wanna suggest some anti plagiarism software to srk (readily available online-try google!) to check for self plagiarism and even ‘unintentional plagiarism’ 🙂
Ps2: But c’mon folks–think we are making a big deal of importance to rowlings text here .
Let’s not get onto poor SRKs back every time he does something
And must say-he is nowadays doing stuff which not many Indians claim to be invited to do -give him a break plz
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October 6, 2013 at 7:21 PM
Qalandar put up the post. His call. But once a thread has been started every addendum doesn’t have to generate a separate post. The point is that a plagiarism charge came about. that’s the ‘news’ here. Now I put up a blog post where SRK was criticized for this but also the explanations people were offering were equally criticized (scroll up to see this link). Then someone else put up a blog post defending SRK. Both are part of the thread in the very same way.
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October 6, 2013 at 7:35 PM
read this :
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/did-shah-rukh-khan-plagiarise-jk-rowlings-speech/426674-8-66.html
There are more instances of plagiarism apart from Rowling’s.
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October 6, 2013 at 8:50 PM
Lol, this just ices the cake. So now we have the following uncredited folks in just one speech by SRK:
Timothy Noah, JK Rowling, Bill Cosby, Soichiro Honda, Thomas Huxley, John Wooden and Eddie Rickenbacker. Would be interesting to know what the ‘recyclist’ response will be.
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October 7, 2013 at 9:52 AM
Why so much hatred for sark, why aren’t other people’s speeches dissected like this? When we have such a generic topic, there will be a million speeches similar to his? Did any of these people talk about darr and baazigar like sark did or is that plagiarized as well? Please have some respect for the greatest actor of our generation.
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October 7, 2013 at 10:48 AM
I do have respect for the greatest actor of our generation but I never knew his name was SRK..
Of course greatest actors could still be shameless plagiarizers.. that’s another matter..
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October 7, 2013 at 2:22 PM
“Did any of these people talk about darr and baazigar like sark did or is that plagiarized as well?”
looks like everything has to be feeded
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parwana_%281971_film%29
Parwana (Devanagari: परवाना, Nastaliq: پروانا, translation: “moth”) is a 1971 Bollywood psychological thriller film directed by Jyoti Swaroop. It stars Amitabh Bachchan, Navin Nischol, Yogeeta Bali and Om Prakash. In this film, Amitabh Bachchan plays the role of an obsessed lover, which could be regarded as a model on which several other such roles were based, notably the one enacted by Shah Rukh Khan much later in Darr and Anjaam. Several other actors in various movies have portrayed similar roles.
Contents
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October 6, 2013 at 7:35 PM
Good point. And creditably qalander has kept it open in the title…
Perhaps the title can be modified to reflect that this ‘allegation’ is unproven yet and is debatable…
Ps1: for people like me who only read bits (or only title!) lol
Ps2: to avoid getting used, incase an angry srk retorts and files a ‘defamation case’ oops
Nope srk I’m not giving u ideas 🙂
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October 6, 2013 at 7:47 PM
unproven? !! The defense is that, in AIMA Rowling is not credited because it is recycled. recycled means he is using previously used and slightly modified. In one instance (YPO Delhi) her name is credited (Apart from googleDoc account of Shailja or someone in SRK’s PR, I don’t see the transcript).
I was watching House of Cards (US) – They properly credit house of Cards (UK) and the book. They could have said it is based on UK series which was based on book. They could have skipped giving credit to book.
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October 6, 2013 at 8:15 PM
perhaps we needn’t get into such legalistic intricacies since what actually happened is hardly a mystery! Of course the next step for some of SRK’s defenders might be to blame copyright laws that prevent the democratic exercise of plagiarism!
check this out:
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October 6, 2013 at 7:57 PM
Well pointed munna
That’s the correct protocol as in the west
But apart from etiquette, it’s also a necessity since copyright and plagiarism laws are strictly followed
Try using a pirated Microsoft office etc lol
And so on…
But clearly srk is indian not westerner (yet!)
And nor is his support staff
Yeah it should be an eye opener to him and he should be more careful in the future
As for exact details and minutiae etc, must admit haven’t gone into that myself yet—have too much of my own pending stuff to tackle (or get tacked by someone !) 🙂
Ps: will await shailjas details /googledoc etc but think she has also clarified enuf already
Poor girl is not even working for srk and just responded as a netizen/fan –let’s not get onto her neck now
(Not that she needs my defense) but let’s not attack the poor girl
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October 6, 2013 at 8:04 PM
** Poor girl is not even working for srk and just responded as a netizen/fan –let’s not get onto her neck now **
Take this –
In the last few years; moving to pottery and painting from running a technology company in 2007 , from directing my first feature film Walkaway in 2009 to being stationed in india for 6 months to manage the digital and merchandising for the movie Ra.One, from developing toys, action figures to cartoons, comic books and websites
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/hello-world/
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October 6, 2013 at 8:09 PM
Hmm interesting info
Anyhow uve got a fine blog, shailja –may visit it more…
And plz don’t mind these comments form folks here
They are all well meaning decent folks (esp Satyam!)
Ps: now what to do with all my pending work !!!
Looking for some plagiar….oops
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October 6, 2013 at 8:40 PM
“Poor girl is not even working for srk and just responded as a netizen/fan –let’s not get onto her neck now”
That suggests you haven’t read her defense. She is “Chief Digital Strategist” of Red Chillies (You can find her on Twitter and LinkedIn). I posted couple of critical comments on her blog and they haven’t shown up and your comment is there 🙂
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October 6, 2013 at 8:01 PM
Anyhow folks–this stuff gives us some more ‘masala’ to enjoy 🙂
Oops time to do some ‘work’ now….
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October 6, 2013 at 9:22 PM
I will not defend SRK here but..
@ we see a sustained hate campaign against the blogger who broke the news. Im sure she fears for her life, such is the vilification being delivered on to her by SRK fanclubs on FB/Twitter.
Ya just like Fake IPL Player got fears for his life. SRK fan will asli kill shailja.
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October 6, 2013 at 9:28 PM
Shailja is SRK’s Chief Digital Strategist.
One who broke the story is Agratha Dinakaran.
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October 6, 2013 at 11:34 PM
Oh Darling yeh hai India!
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October 7, 2013 at 1:15 AM
lol Zamana Deewana hai yaar, SRK ka Dil Toh Pagal Hai, speech Dil Se diya aur One 2 ka 4 hogaya. Deewana ka Anjaam kya hoga? Ram Jaane!
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October 7, 2013 at 8:07 AM
The comments are getting increasingly *dishonest* here.
Are people really that concerned over a line/sentence or do have another agenda here.
Trying to defend themselves by saying films is a – *different matter* This is as dishonest as it can get.
Secondly all this getting uptight and upright in a western aura is axtremely dishonest too. India and Indians have yet to follow the path of copyright earnestly. Look at all that upheavel over 3idiots.
Americans really get *Rajen’s pet phrase to be sustituted here*.
I can imagine JK ROwling hardly worried about it.
But it gives the dishonest people to epress what honesty is all about.
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October 7, 2013 at 8:43 AM
Hey OG,
I was a little surprised by the first reply you made on this post – do you really not think its pretty embarassing to copy somebody else’s speech and do so without referencing? You are usually really thoughtful about social issues so your response here threw me a little as there was no acknowledgement on your behalf of SRK having done anything wrong at all! I wasn’t sure why you brought up Ghajini and now 3 Idiots…if SRK has done something wrong why say ‘Aamir has done wrong things’. And the blogger who picked it up – why are they facing such anger and resentment? I didn’t understand that either.
Anyways, I just finished Shammi Kapoor-Nutan’s Basant – it was so much fun! now I’m gonna try Do Ustaad with Raj Kapoor-Madhubala.
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October 7, 2013 at 9:45 AM
>do you really not think its pretty embarassing to copy somebody else’s speech and do so without referencing?
I’m not aware that he copied the speech. A senetence or two I thought.
Anyway, what I think is not the issue with me. It’s that I’m not supporting this dishonesty here of making a big issue out of something but rubbishing and putting behind the fact that there are real copyright problems with several films who not only earned them fame but financially.
too.
Here they want to propogate that it is criminal to copy a sentence or two from someones speech, but a book’s essence in a film but denying it was OK.
This discrimination is galling, and brings out the dishonesty of intent clear and loud.
>I was a little surprised by the first reply you made on this post
Read it again. It might help to mellow your surprise 😉
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October 7, 2013 at 10:43 AM
yes but isn’t it easy to always make it about the messenger? In other words if SRK does something as opposed to calling him out on it you tend to say ‘hey look at how people who don’t like him are pouncing on him’! This after you’ve reduced the actual infraction to something akin to a kid snatching his sibling’s toy! Sentence or two? Perhaps it was just a word or two. Perhaps he just stole the word ‘and’ for Rowling!
So isn’t the opposition a convenient way to avoid saying things about your favorite star? I know many people here dislike Abhishek but if he did something of this sort the right response on my part wouldn’t be ‘hey you already hate Abhishek’! I would call him out on it, then I would turn to the ethical integrity of those calling him out. However trying to change the subject by saying it happened with 3I and this or that is once again about avoiding the obvious. Even if others are dishonest by selectively calling out people that does’t force us to be dishonest in the same way! I know people here who support garbage in cinema when SRK is involved with it and who then turn around and criticize the D3 advertising or whatever. But that doesn’t prevent me from criticizing the D3 stuff myself!
It really becomes about defending the indefensible using whatever tactic one can employ. And so when people were knocking the Don remake whether one agreed with the criticism or not the right response wasn’t to bring up Chinatown or whatever film had a loosely similar storyline because SRK’s film was explicitly a remake of the older Don that even used a number of lines and songs from the original. So again one can like politician keep changing the subject or do anything not to blame SRK, that’s entirely one’s prerogative but then surely one doesn’t have a right to question the honesty of others?
One doesn’t have to resort to legalistic debates in these matters with all manner of hair-splitting. It’s not as confusing a situation as the defenders of SRK pretend it is. I loved Aamir’s Ghajini. It was a remake of a Tamil film. The original film didn’t attribute anything to Memento. The remake also didn’t. Perhaps a lower bar here, certainly legally more defensible (they could I suppose pretend they were just remaking a Tamil film and had no awareness of the original whereas the Tamil film couldn’t make the same case) but either way it’s a problem. I’ve liked most of Aamir’s film if not all since Lagaan, I liked his Ghajini more than the Tamil original for certain contextual reasons but this doesn’t stop from accepting what’s obvious. That there is a copyright issue here. So it’s not rocket science where we need lawyers to pore over the speech and figure out what’s going on!
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October 7, 2013 at 10:48 AM
>‘hey look at how people who don’t like him are pouncing on him’!
That’s how it is satyam.
I can’t believe I’m wasting time on this subject.
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October 7, 2013 at 10:10 AM
Its hard to argue when people think that giving unattributed/uncredited quotable quotes (from 7 different sources nonetheless!) to current and future captains of industry is no great shakes. As SRK fans put it, he has a big mind that discusses ideas! The aura of intellect was foisted on him by his very own fans. Clearly he was invited as a motivational speaker to disseminate said intellect. And bask did he in the thunderous applause of the standing ovation given by a raptured educated audience. We’ve been told that by dint of their education, these folks already knew of the sources of the quotes, because every educated business grad is supposed to know each quotable quote with source reference!!
As the Chief Digital Strategist states: “Famous quotes especially if they are recycled from earler speeches are sometimes not quoted” and “FOR GOODNESS SAKE, IT IS A HARVARD SPEECH BY JK ROWLING, THE EDUCATED PRETTY MUCH EVERYWHERE ALREADY KNOW OF IT! ”
Other bwood stars do not proclaim a unique gift of personality that can make them sought after for such events. There is no equivalent parity with other bwood personalities in this instance. That may indeed happen when Aamir/Sallu/HR/Bachchan etc start giving speeches full of such plagiarism. Maybe SRK fans ought to do forensics on the speeches of other bwood personalities to come up with sought after parity.
As for 3I, credit and payment were given. But the dispute arose on how/when the credit shud be given in the credit rolls.
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October 7, 2013 at 10:52 AM
>Its hard to argue when people think that giving unattributed/uncredited quotable quotes (from 7 different sources nonetheless!) to current and future captains of industry is no great shakes.
If you mean me then I’ve said nothing whether it is great shakes or not.
I’m ONLY talking about the dishonest intention of people here who would like to think – and show/propogate – what a great crime this was, and that it’s nOT the same as making films (which IMO is bigger because it involves financial gain and boost to profession).
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October 7, 2013 at 10:43 AM
Do Ustaad is pretty mediocre but check it out by all means..
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October 7, 2013 at 12:54 PM
Haha this is embarassing to say the least, and borderline criminal. SRK should fire his writers, and audit his speeches better.
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October 7, 2013 at 2:32 PM
Most likely srk would have got a speech writer or assistant(s) write up these speeches and he delivered it with panache.
Perhaps he himself didn’t know what has been plagiarised form where.
“This discrimination is galling, and brings out the dishonesty of intent clear and loud.”
I think Oldgold has a point there
Not condoning SRKs obvious carelessness and foolishness (besides unethical practices) but apparently the ‘standards’ on ‘lifting’ ‘copyrighting’ are pretty poor in India
So why single out only srk
Just taking the example of aamir (just bcos of comparability –obvious we can’t compare srk to Tushar kapoor or fardeen khan!!)
Look at his recent few appreciated films
3 idiots, taare zameen par, peepli live –is it just a coincidence that ALL of the scriptwriters/ or those whose brain child these projects were–cried foul? Yeah maybe someone had bad intent but ALL?
The only case where this ‘lifting’ saga wasn’t there was ‘talaash’–the outcome of which is known 🙂
This is NOT to say that if srk was caught pants down so let’s strip aamir as well…
Finally what if I say that
SRK is infact BIGGER than JK Rowling !!!!!
The latter being a writer used her skills and srk used her skills in his presentation
it’s not like a small time wannabe climbing onto Rowling to bask in the reflected glory !!
Srk is not what he is due to those few sentences
Ps: this doesn’t condone srk from obvious faults of careless and probable ethical concerns here
But will still rate these ‘ethical concerns’ minor compared to ‘making out’ with your poor subordinate ‘assistant’ on the sets of Lagaan while the poor ‘producer’ wife is running out errands on the set
AND
not only indulging in adultery but producing a ‘love child’ in far away lands (aka London) oblivious to family/friends
Or
Being caught with possession of a cache of arms which led to the killing of hundreds of people
Or running over sleeping people and then then threatening victims
So let’s get the context right
Everyone has demons –the severity differs 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 4:19 PM
JKR’s books have outsold anything thus far. The movies based on her books have earned more than what Bwood combined wudve made in entire last decade. JKR is worth over $1B. SRK maybe around $300m. All things considered, JKR is way way bigger than SRK.
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October 7, 2013 at 4:34 PM
I fully know the ‘worth’ of JKR & infact have attended one of her speeches (not this one though!)
Yeah Harry Potter is a very successful franchise and yeah in its target audience, it’s pull is astonishing but it’s one book!!
Obviously due to the exchange rates and higher reach of the English language it translates into bigger figures
But if one looks at the populace touched by srk, (taking into account the language barrier & Indian currency rates etc)
Srk isn’t far behind
Ove may or may not like him but he is a phenomenon as well
Now it depends on which reference points one chooses–
But it’s not such clear cut
This is like saying that the multiple world record holder Sergei bubka was smaller than yuvraj Singh since the former just got medals and nil else in capitalist Russia whilst the latter is rolling in IPL parties (& cash) 🙂
And WHY should we automatically consider that srk is smaller than JKR –time to get rid of this ‘subservient’ mentality 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 4:49 PM
Your claim is highly debatable. There have been more than 400 million copies of Harry Potter sold, which does not include the books borrowed from libraries, friends etc. The movies have been seen by more people than those who just read the books. I wonder if there have been 400 million tickets sold for SRK movies combined.
And you really need to stop with this ‘subservient’ tag. We Indians are the highest earning ethnic group in the US. In my experience, due to our business ownerships, there are more subservient Americans to us, than the other way around. Can’t remember the last time I had an American boss!
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October 7, 2013 at 4:55 PM
Good man …
This ‘subservient’ tag is not for u but for a certain thought process
Ps : what’s your take on the ‘gravity’ controversy( read below) –which nobody bothered to make into a ‘controversy’ 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 4:33 PM
And I still cannot fathom this obsession of bringing the kleptocracy of bollywood into this discussion. We all already know that the standards of originality in bollywood are abysmally low. Hardly any production which does not have a borrowed ‘inspiration’ from other sources of cinema. And yes, it is a much more financially harmful plagiarism than the one engaged by SRK here. Nobody is giving a pass to bwood script plagiarism, because everyone in the industry is deeply involved in this crime, Aamir included.
However, I keep repeating: He just happened to apply the bwood standards of plagiarism to a forum outside of bwood. The audience was in no way connected to bwood, but were listening to a keynote speaker who happened to be from there. They all thought that this speaker will provide them with motivational aspects of the path to success. He sure did so by highlighting his own past struggles, however he also added the ‘masala’ of pilfered quotable quotes! If this had happened to be Ratan Tata or Mukesh Ambani, sure as hell, they would have to issue apologies. But since this is SRK, he does not have to apologize, cause he has this loyal fan brigade who will go to any extent to acquit the condemnable. Maybe Tatas/Ambanis and even politicians should try to learn a few tricks from these online fangroups, they all know how to paint a pig.
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October 7, 2013 at 2:38 PM
frankly this shouldn’t have gone into public as this damages reputation especially earlier for credit with singer abhijit bhattacharya for his home production main hoon na and om shanti om
(the same abhijeet once the voice of actor targetted heavily by bollywood brigade for his stand on across the border singer when talent is plenty in india)
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October 7, 2013 at 4:39 PM
And finally —
Just to further underline these ‘double standards’
Recently someone here (don’t remember who) out up a link wherein a Tamil writer is alleging that parts of the script of ‘gravity’ (not even a small film!!) has been lifted from his story which he had forwarded to a Hollywood company years ago…
Forget condoning or even questioning (it maybe a false allegation anyways) nobody even bothered
Why?
Bcos a big Hollywood name is involved?
Bcos biggies like clooney or Sandra bullock are involved?
Bcos there’s a ‘subservience’ ?
🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 5:00 PM
Had not heard of this. For sure the writer should get justice, and should approach the right avenues to attain his dues. We should be all forwarding this story on social media, lest a hwooder steal away a rare instance of our desi script originality.
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October 7, 2013 at 5:17 PM
LOL, you didn’t hear about it because that writer’s story is not even remotely connected to Gravity’s. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
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October 7, 2013 at 5:06 PM
That’s the spirit !!
First perhaps one may trace the response that original post elicited here (& by whom!) 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 5:11 PM
Yes and while they’re at it they should read the actual story summary from that writer (something you clearly and typically didn’t!) which resembles Gravity almost as much as Ace Ventura does.
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October 7, 2013 at 5:15 PM
All that is up for debate (just like this srk matter is !)
The Tamil guy is saying it resembles his script and has the sequence of events etc to substantiate it
Anyhow folks—
Have put up these posers here as well as on (Satyams sister) shailjas blog as well to raise ‘awareness’
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/shah-rukh-khans-aima-ypo-million-other-speeches/#comment-109
Enjoy folks and do respond what u think about the Tamil guys claims …
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October 7, 2013 at 5:26 PM
Actually it’s not up for debate, and you completely made that bit up about his being able to “substantiate the sequence of events”; he hasn’t even seen Cuaron’s film! Any one who bothers to read (unfortunately, as always, reading is required!) can see that his synopsis is not related to Gravity’s basic plot in any way shape or form.
If you wanted to get your point across you could have cited the Spielberg-Ray “ET” anecdote. There’s something interesting there. But this guys claims were laughable, as are your attempts to make an argument out of this.
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October 7, 2013 at 5:33 PM
Haven’t seen gravity and it’s less likely this ‘claim’ is true —
but
Its not unreasonable to expect the big Hollywood writers to be more adept and capable than SRKs speechwriters (!) in modifying bits
But it’s the ‘central germ’ which is the bone of contention here ( as was in Tzp!)
It’s not the ‘argument’ but the default ‘defense’ of gravity (all this being equal) that’s interesting..
Think about it folks..
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October 7, 2013 at 5:45 PM
You can’t salvage your point here by pretending there’s a knee jerk defense. I defended Gravity because I knew what it was about, have since seen it, and I actually read this writer’s synopsis of his own work. There’s no water in this claim. And it’s funny you’re now saying the central germ is the bone of contention when the writer himself is saying his entire script was lifted with a few modifications! If the idea he states is somehow “modified” to become Gravity it’s like saying Enthiran was slightly modified to become Krrish.
What folks should take from this is how difficult it is for some people to admit when they’re on the wrong side!
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October 7, 2013 at 5:53 PM
Relax : u weren’t even named –Y r U feeling indignant as if u are cuaron
“I defended Gravity because I knew what it was about”– even before seeing it, u knew everything 🙂
Ps: perhaps it was something like a Scott Fitzgerald adaptation of great gatsby where the entire storyline was known beforehand.. 🙂
Nobody is ‘salvaging’ anything but the enthiran-krish analogy did seem one such attempt
Any folks –enjoy ‘plagiarism’
It’s an ‘art’ hahaha
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October 7, 2013 at 5:58 PM
Apex, actually GF really did know what this was about before its release.
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October 7, 2013 at 6:08 PM
It’s not indignation, it’s a correction. Sorry if it goes down like medicine pal.
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October 7, 2013 at 6:04 PM
@ Satyam– this is just an illustrative vignette
Not a general knowledge /awareness test of poor gf
Anyhow enuf ‘masala’ for today –‘bak 2work’
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October 7, 2013 at 5:20 PM
Indian writer claims ‘gravity’ script lifted from his story !!!
http://www.rediff.com/movies/report/hollywood-film-gravity-is-lifted-from-my-script/20131003.htm
Here the allegation is not about some portions of a speech
But a film that will make millions and get many oscar(s)!!!
And why is the right of speech of ms agatha dinakaran more than of this Tamil guy ?
Can someone plz post this link onto agathas website for her response (since I need to catch up some ‘work’ now 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 5:51 PM
He should hire a lawyer and sue them.
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October 7, 2013 at 5:56 PM
Good point munna
But the reality is that the legal machinery that the Hollywood company can throw at the poor guy and the possible financial repercussions incase his claim is unsubstantiated will be so extreme that the poor tamil guy won’t dare do that!
The ‘truth’ may stay hidden …
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October 7, 2013 at 5:57 PM
Here is the GRAVITY plagiarism news..for those who are interested..
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October 7, 2013 at 6:01 PM
Yes — pat on the back of annjo !!
And btw read the instant retort to this
-“LOL…this cracked me u”
BEFORE seeing the film gravity !!
🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 6:16 PM
LOL. Again, hope someone actually reads that writer’s synopsis. One doesn’t even have to see anything more than Gravity’s trailer to find this hysterical. Unless one can’t read, which is of course always where my sympathies go out to you.
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October 7, 2013 at 6:28 PM
Those who could read have done so already..
As for the Hollywood company, they can save the legal fees–they will be defended against the Tamil guy by gf
Free of charge 🙂
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October 7, 2013 at 7:05 PM
Meanwhile, here’s something free for you:
http://www.starfall.com
Never too late. Just saying.
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October 7, 2013 at 8:13 PM
As a friend of Agratha’s, I’m actually grateful that I came across this discussion because of how logical the statements here are. Most of the comments in many other posts just talk about what a cheap publicity stunt she’s doing and SRK fans seem to be badgering her extensively (just go to Twitter to see the nonsense tweeted to her). The girl is off Facebook already because the hate got so bad. Her last tweet is about how she is not apologizing for her post (the fans seem to have misconstrued something and claimed that she apologized).
And honestly, Shailaja’s defense of a YPO speech in a Google doc? That seems like a joke. And the whole 2007 SRK YPO speech crediting Rowling for a speech in 2008 makes no sense either. Shailaja is trying extremely hard to save her job.
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October 7, 2013 at 8:32 PM
Well, YPO Delhi happened on 21st May 2009.
http://www.timescontent.com/tss/showcase/preview-buy/147479/Bollywood/Shah-Rukh-Khan.html
Here are some snippets.
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2009-05-23/news-interviews/28170983_1_srk-king-khan-gauri
But Agree on GoogleDoc part. There is no available transcript in public sphere to verify the claim. In spite of that, it doesn’t condone the fact that if you use someone’s name once, the speech become yours.
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October 8, 2013 at 7:15 AM
Thank you for the clarity in the dates, Munna. Also think that the word ‘recycle’ has been used way too loosely for people to take advantage of.
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October 7, 2013 at 11:23 PM
Agratha deserves the support of every netizen who values the freedom of speech. The SRK fangroups (including his lead digital speech strat) are no better than net bullies. They are akin to the bikers swarming the SUV in Manhattan. As I had mentioned in my first comment above, I would not have been surprised if Agratha started fearing more than just verbal abuse online. No one knows the psychotic extent of a deranged SRK fan.
I was beginning to think that I went a bit too far in criticizing SRK fandom. But after reading your comment, I am glad I did not hold back in all my commentary above. If a group of people collude to be so vicious to any individual for an exercise of freedom of speech, they deserve every brickbat thrown at them.
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October 8, 2013 at 4:15 AM
@ rowlinginthedeep–thanx for a sensible & moving post
Agree there nykavi.
Agratha or even shailja shouldn’t have to run away and leave their blogs !!
Debating is a different thing and should continue though…
And by the way, it’s not only about the ‘srk fan'(I’m not an srk fan though ..)
Perhaps SRKs fandom is huge and (unlike Salmans fans) they are quite active online as well ….so makes em appear more vocal…
Btw on a related note—even here, some like sanjana and anu had to run away fearing backlash from fan-atics/zealots…
C’mon gals –don’t give in –assert your freedom
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October 8, 2013 at 7:13 AM
Well, imagine getting that many hate messages and threats. I think there’s only so much a person can take. I don’t know what that’s like though. She has already been victimized.
On a related note, did you also learn that SRK plagiarized from 6 other sources? And one of the authors of the sources Timothy Noah, is not happy. Wonder what Shailja has to say to this. https://twitter.com/TimothyNoah1/status/386955243894083584
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October 8, 2013 at 7:41 AM
>She has already been victimized.
And become famous. What’s a little discomfort for having more people talk of you than ever before.
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October 8, 2013 at 7:47 AM
To get more famous she should write more such posts about other famous people plagiarising this, this and that.
Concentrating on one person can lead to misconception. If this person is crusading against plagiarism – do it right!!
Let there be no dishonesty about it.
Otherwise dishonesty needs to be victimized – inversely too!!!
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October 8, 2013 at 7:58 AM
I don’t think she wrote this to become famous, that sounds pretty stupid IMO. She wrote a post on a personal blog that clearly pointed out SRK borrowed from JK Rowling’s speech. Do you really think she deserves that hate for pointing out mere facts when the whole world was applauding on how that was one of the best speeches a Bollywood actor has ever made?
She has been victimized, and it’s a shame. Shame that people couldn’t deal with it. Can’t attack the argument, so attack the person instead. And she doesn’t owe anyone to write more posts on other plagiarisms. It’s her PERSONAL blog. She has a right to freedom of speech just like everyone in this country does.
But apparently not.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:11 AM
> It’s her PERSONAL blog. She has a right to freedom of speech just like everyone in this country does.
How private is it if it is meant for everyone to read? If the ‘comment’ invites you to react to what’s written?
>And she doesn’t owe anyone to write more posts on other plagiarisms.
By attacking one dishonesty she should be prepared for attack on her personal dishonesty – or refrain from writing inflammatory and partisan posts.
A post discussing ‘the latest’ plagiarism, and then going on to discuss how rampant this activity is – even leading to amassing wealth – would have let her off the hook.
Don’t forget – there’s NOTHING private in writing a blog. Or she should deactivate the ‘comment’ link (which would be cowardly).
Coming to this blog to fight this person’t battle is a proof of how open to public/opinion blogs are.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:23 AM
And the attempts at defending the indefensible continue. Sadly, now they have managed to catch the attention of one of the sources Timothy Noah, who is giving it back to them with a sledgehammer.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:32 AM
No class, that’s why. I’m sure Rowling’s reaction would be more dignified.
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October 8, 2013 at 7:25 AM
Timothy Noah @TimothyNoah1 6 Oct
In other news, I’ve been plagiarized in a speech given by an Indian actor called Shah Rukh Khan (@iamsrk).
unicorn75 @unicorn_75 7 Oct
@TimothyNoah1 and he was using this words because he read your books and remember this, when he wrote his speak – it´s a honor
Timothy Noah @TimothyNoah1 19h
@unicorn_75 It’s an honor to have my words stolen? Would it be an honor for him to steal my wallet, too?
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October 8, 2013 at 8:13 AM
Ha! This story keeps providing with early morning entertainment!!
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October 8, 2013 at 8:18 AM
And the LOL with Timothy Noah continues:
https://twitter.com/TimothyNoah1
By now SRK shouldve intervened, given that Noah writes for MSNBC, SRK might end up becoming fodder for the likes of Jon Stewart soon.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:23 AM
These Americans!!!
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October 8, 2013 at 8:24 AM
Reminds me of those – what is called – car chasing lawyers or something.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:33 AM
KKKKK Kopy KAT KAUGHT..KAPUT !!!
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October 8, 2013 at 8:36 AM
Very entertaining 😉
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October 8, 2013 at 8:19 AM
Somebody should tweet to Nolan, he knows it IIRC, and laughed it off, as a self confident person would.
This Timothy person has a limited stage I think? Very uncouth to talk about stealing wallets, when others whose wallets got filled are not crying.
It’s entertaining indeed.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:28 AM
>when others whose wallets got filled are not crying.
Correction:
That should read,
The ones who have been plagiarised and filled others’ wallets, are not crying.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:47 AM
I recalled JK ROwling herself seemed to have lifted characters and story from another author.
Anyway here’s a list of 10 authors accused of plagiarism.
@Rowlinginthedeep – this is how one writes a blog, not concentrating on one person, to make it neutral, and non inflammatory.
http://www.examiner.com/article/the-plagiarism-paradox-and-10-famous-authors-accused-of-plagiarism
To quote the passage on Rowling;
Yet, when I read Eva Ibbotson’s The Secret of Platform 13, I became convinced that Ms. Rowling had almost certainly lifted a number of details from Ms. Ibbotson. The story features an orphaned boy with unknown magical powers who lives with a family who treats him as a servant and their own obese and spoiled son (who has a fondness for Knickerbocker Glories) like a king. The only way the boy can get back into the magical world where he belongs is through Platform 13 at the London Station. Yikes. Do I think that Ms. Rowling borrowed — whether unintentionally or innocently — a few ideas from Ms. Ibbotson? Possibly. Does Ms. Ibbottsen think so? Actually, she says she doesn’t mind if Ms. Rowling did: when asked about the similiarities in an interview, Ms. Ibbottsen replied that she would like to shake Ms. Rowling, “by the hand. I think we all borrow from each other as writers.”
I think this Timothy fellow should also read this. Somebody, please tweet him this passage.
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October 8, 2013 at 8:49 AM
Great! So now lets do a shakedownof JK Rowling as well!!
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October 8, 2013 at 9:03 AM
Of course!!! Unless you’re vision is to attack SRK – NOT plagiarism!!!
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October 9, 2013 at 6:24 AM
1. This article is a news piece. When writing as a journalist, one must report neutrally and not have any bias in place. The paper will be in trouble for taking sides otherwise. Also, this is no proof, like how Agratha compared the screenshots of the speeches that were lifted word to word. This is about how an idea may have been borrowed, though they aren’t entirely sure. It’s still debatable. SRK’s plagiarism is quite blatant, especially with 6 sources.
2. Why do you think Timothy Noah has no class? Because he expects an apology and wants an answer as to why his work was plagiarized? He’s a writer and that was his work. It only seems fair that he gets an explanation, and at the very least, an apology.
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October 8, 2013 at 9:27 AM
SRK tried to woven his real life story by stealing and that not just make him accused of plagiarism but takes away all credibility of his claim of learning from his own life.
And the bigger problem is our stupidity to make reel life hero into a real life hero.
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October 8, 2013 at 9:43 AM
Duh?
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October 8, 2013 at 9:43 AM
Yes, what I had recalled was ‘muggles’ as originally appearing in another author’s book. A bit of searching brought this up.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/feb/28/jk-rowling-sued-plagiarism-dead-australian-author
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October 8, 2013 at 12:19 PM
Are U saying “stealing of stolen is not stealing (now that’s an original line and perhaps will have a better impact in Hindi..chori ka maal chori karna chori nahi hota!). It also implies that there is no need of copyright laws as there is nothing original. Let’s pirate software/movies-get caught and then defence on the basis of unoriginality!
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October 8, 2013 at 12:56 PM
>Are U saying “stealing of stolen is not stealing
NO!!!
I’m asking to make yourselves clear!
ARE YOU ALL ATTACKING SRK OR PLAGIARISM??
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October 8, 2013 at 3:48 PM
Thanx Oldgold –for this scoop on rowlings plagiarism–didn’t know this…
Maybe u can also set up a blog like agatha and become famous by exposing such stuff…cheers
Folks: for us it’s just entertainment and ‘masala’
But just checked out some Indian news sites–surprised to see this topic of srk-Rowling splashed all over
This is what happens when u r an srk–you are big news and will be used as a ‘scoop’
Anyhow srk won’t be affected and we are having our share of thrills—
Hope poor agratha and shailja don’t suffer due to this online barrage (ever ways)
They are welcome to express their views without fear of attack or intimidation & same for Oldgold, sanjana and anu 🙂
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October 8, 2013 at 10:21 AM
TImothy Noah in Slate
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/chatterbox/2009/05/wrong_commencement_speakers.html
“Eminence is the one universal precondition to being a commencement speaker, and an implied (often explicit) theme of the speeches is, “Here lieth the path to success and happiness.” There are two problems with this formula. The first is that any narrative of success is bound to be at least a little bit dull. The second is that successful people are almost never able to pinpoint what it was that made them so. Take Warren Buffet. Here’s a guy who must get asked five times a day how he became the most successful investor of his era. His answers—”Reinvest your profits,” “Limit what you borrow,” etc.—are no different from what any fool could tell you. Buffet isn’t being cagey. He doesn’t know. Success is a wonderful thing, but it tends not to be the sort of experience that we learn from. We enjoy it; perhaps we even deserve it. But we don’t acquire wisdom from it.”
SRK in his speech:
“The biggest problem with success is that any narrative of success is bound to be at least a little bit dull…because its not your story. I have sat down with people who tell me their stories of success…and I am like…man…get the hell out of my sight…if I want to feel jealous…I will see some other actors successful film…I don’t need the story of your life. Second..and more importantly so…successful people are almost never able to pinpoint what it was that made them so.
Take Warren Buffet. Here’s a guy who must get asked five times a day how he became the most successful investor of his era. His answers —
“Reinvest your profits,” “Limit what you borrow,” etc.—are no different from what any fool could tell you. Buffet isn’t being cagey. He simply doesn’t know. Success is a wonderful thing, but it tends not to be the sort of experience that we learn from. We enjoy it; perhaps we even deserve it. But we don’t acquire wisdom from it. ”
Kya rapchik copy-paste kiya hai baap! Yaani ke chor ki chori pakdi hi gayi. Bachon bolo: “Gali gali mein shor hai, Shah Rukh Khan chor hai”
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October 8, 2013 at 10:29 AM
I shall once again reference my older comment here:
In addition to this it’s amusing to see how we attack politicians at the drop of a hat but use the politician’s tactics of trying to change the subject or prevarication or whatever to defend what is plainly indefensible. Every strategy is brought to bear from saying SRK didn’t do anything wrong and/or he didn’t know what he was saying to suggesting that Rowling herself is a plagiarist and for good measure throwing in Aamir for 3I or whatever! The common thread that runs through all of this is obvious. And so again I bring up the more important question — even if some folks are attacking SRK for cynical reasons (I’d say though that isn’t true for 95% of the commenters in this thread if not more) that still doesn’t prevent one from making an ‘honest’ statement about what has happened. Muddying up the waters further is basically behaving like a politician. One could do this in every single debate. For instance why say Salman beat up some of his girlfriends or that he ran over people or that he shot endangered animals? Clearly he isn’t the ONLY person who did all of this. Those accusing him might have other infractions on their own part. Those doing so online might not be Salman fans anyway. So on and so forth. Anyone could be defended using these tactics. One’s favorite star could rape someone and one could say ‘we only have the woman’s word for it’! At some point it stops becoming about being a fan or even a defender and gets into the territory of pure zealotry. And I think this is an unfortunate position for anyone to be in irrespective of anything else. And then we sit around and blame political and religious fanatics when we are so about movie stars! Again everyone has a right to be as partial and as biased about their favorites as they wish to be. But to lose all reason in the process ought to make one a bit queasy.
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October 8, 2013 at 10:52 AM
Maybe Agratha should open her blog back with a link to our discussion here. All evidence and retaliatory ambushes have been clearly documented in our lengthy discussion… doodh ka doodh, paani ka paani saaf nazar ayega. Uske baad SRKfans apni uchli hui keechad se apne hi mooh dhoyenge.
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October 8, 2013 at 11:31 AM
Her blog is open
http://mercurialpurple.blogspot.com/
Her facebook page has been disabled. She could just change the setting where people can not comment on your wall.
Twitter is still open but no activity.
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October 8, 2013 at 3:42 PM
Thanx munna–for all the inside info on Agratha
Btw even the rest of her blog is interesting like
http://mercurialpurple.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/eves-life.html
Quite an eye-opener —
Didn’t know these ‘vaginal fairness’ creams exist !!!
Seriously —Is it a joke ?
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October 8, 2013 at 1:20 PM
In short you want my comments about so called ‘defence’ to be seen wider? LOL!!!
This is really the extreme.
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October 8, 2013 at 12:53 PM
More dishonest intentions have come to light.
The ONLY person expressing opposing views is me (and as usual alex sitting on the fence).
I HAVE NOT DEFENDED SRK!!! NEITHER HAVE I ATTACKED HIM.
So using this ‘defending’ theory to feel good about yourselves and is like clutching at straws.
The stand here is – aha! Now we can lampoon SRK.
That’s the plain and simple strategy.
This dishonesty gets clearer and clearer with every comment that comes up.
Just as the defenders are hell bent upon defending, the attackers are hell bent upon attacking. Bringing in all kinds of theories.
This holier than thou attitude (when comparing oneself to SRK fans) is such a big myth. Another lie.
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October 8, 2013 at 1:25 PM
Wud like to make it clear that all those anti-SRKfan statements are not aimed at you, but at all the twitterati who have been making life hell for anyone questioning his integrity. A lot of the stuff stated out in blogosphere is beyond vicious.
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October 8, 2013 at 12:56 PM
Looks like SRK did give credit clearly to Rowling. This makes sense, he is egoistic but not dumb.
http://theshailja.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/shah-rukh-khans-aima-ypo-million-other-speeches/
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October 8, 2013 at 1:04 PM
But what about Timothy Noah and the others ( Bill Cosby, Soichiro Honda, Thomas Huxley, John Wooden and Eddie Rickenbacker)?
At least Noah has questioned it on Twitter (read above comments)
and
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October 8, 2013 at 1:27 PM
Didn’t read the whole thing….there is no excusing this kind of freewheeling pilfering.
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October 8, 2013 at 1:14 PM
So, what emerges from above discussion:
1.SRK borrows freely from other writers/speeches. Occassionally, he acknowledges the origin.
2. It is not just limited to JK Rawling
3. He recycles his speeches, which then his fans lap it up as great.
4. His fans will defend him no matter what, truth be damned
5.For his fans, ‘poor’ SRK is always the victim.
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October 8, 2013 at 1:22 PM
Defence strategy for the zealot fans
1. Others do it, too
2. The person SRK stole from also has stolen something sometime
3.SRK acknowledged it, in another speech.
Interesting things about the YPO speech- it was given six years ago and Rawling speech was given five years ago.So SRK, acknowledged Rawling sapeech one year before she gave it!
Interestingly, the said acknowledgement was not in the actual speech he gave but a personal copy of the speech!!
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October 8, 2013 at 1:22 PM
http://www.hindustantimes.com/Entertainment/Tabloid/SRK-borrowed-from-Rowling-speech-blogger/Article1-1131506.aspx
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October 8, 2013 at 1:27 PM
Ek jooth chhupane ke liye………………..
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October 8, 2013 at 1:35 PM
Jhooth boley kauva kaatey…
Magar yahaan to kauvey bechari whistleblower (Agratha) ko kaat rahe they, yeh kahaan ka insaaf? Finally aaj asli baap (Timothy Noah) ne sab kauvon ko seedha kar diya.
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October 8, 2013 at 1:49 PM
Yup, his slapdown of the self-proclaimed digital strategist’s defence was quite acerbic: “Impressive bit of nonsense…
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October 8, 2013 at 1:52 PM
May be SRK should use the time machine he used to acknowledge the speech to be given a year later and go back and undo all the damage this has caused to him and his shameless fans!!!
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October 10, 2013 at 9:34 PM
Why Bachchan fans always thrash Srk?For me this is just a mystery.I can understand Amir,Salman or Hrithik fans doing this but Bachchan fans???Can somebody clarify it for me?
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October 11, 2013 at 12:43 AM
There is no mystery Samar..We all take the angry young/middle-aged man role damn seriously!!
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October 8, 2013 at 1:27 PM
Another defense- the lines are so famous everybody knows their origin!!!
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October 8, 2013 at 2:17 PM
Well i guess freedom of speech and expression also involves freedom to plagiarise!
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October 9, 2013 at 8:06 AM
Day 3 and no apologies to Timothy Noah yet!
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October 9, 2013 at 10:38 AM
He is busy dancing away and minting crores in Sydney. In the meantime his fans (a certain unicorn or something) has been tweeting desperately to SRK’s publicity designer called Dadlani or something and whoever is associated with the TEMPTATIONS tour to pinch SRK and inform him to take action against people basking in reflective glory..like Agratha, Cosby, Huxley etc etc..
So I don’t think there will be any clarification until he lands in good ole Bombay..
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October 9, 2013 at 11:01 AM
I hope people can realize that he said that speech was “recycled”, so, he has given due credits in another speech where he used those words. At the start of the speech, he literally said, “Let me forewarn you, this is a recycled speech. Whenever I am called to give speeches at ypo or some such big organisation…I use this speech. Its generic…simple…and makes me give no commitment in our first meeting. Somewhat like the corporate world itself.”
His speech from before was uploaded here, and the important words are bolded.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QlDABHkaIvu4nJn1YW1mE61MQC3Ji9IcmVUm5buejNI/edit?pli=1
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October 9, 2013 at 12:19 PM
Recycled doesn’t mean stolen. It means recycling one’s own words. And a Google doc for proof? Sounds pretty ridiculous.
Also, do read this. Things will be clearer. http://www.firstpost.com/living/srk-rowling-and-the-dummys-guide-to-plagiarism-1159765.html
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October 9, 2013 at 1:17 PM
Correct…anyone who does not know a large part of this speech belongs to Rowling, Noah or whoever (I for one did not ) and does not know about SRK’s previous yale speech is bound to think this is all original. It’s not like it was the same audience sitting for both speeches, and even then this is highly questionable behavior.
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October 9, 2013 at 1:48 PM
I’m not saying that his first speech was an original speech. I know he copied from Rowling. Not denying that. Rather, I’m just saying that he has given due credit to JK Rowling.
I’m not siding with Shahrukh, but, just saying that if his executives are anything to go by, he gave credit in his first speech. And here, he acknowledged that this is a recycled speech. I personally think that he should have acknowledged Rowling in this speech too.
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October 9, 2013 at 3:06 PM
But he still did not give due credit to Noah, Cosby, Honda, et al. Why do you guys keep repeating his giving of credit to Rowling (questionably so in a Googledoc??) without mentioning the other 6 victims? If you just read the links from Timothy Noah above, you can clearly see the fantastic copy-paste job done by SRK’s speechwriters from an original Noah article in Slate.com
You just cannot hush this away without accepting that SRK did indeed plagiarize without credit.
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October 9, 2013 at 4:42 PM
I don’t know. He may have. I’m not denying that the speechwriters didn’t copy/paste things. But, we haven’t heard anything from Shahrukh himself.
But, of course, one cannot just put this plagiarism to the side. I’m actually with you on this NyKavi.
PS — It’s not just a googledoc. One of his executives stated that he gave credit to Rowling. 🙂
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October 9, 2013 at 11:46 AM
@Henry and Arsh it seems you both are recycling the links 😉
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October 9, 2013 at 11:47 AM
So atleast credit the original link provider 😛
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October 9, 2013 at 1:18 PM
After all I am a shameless SRK fan (this line is also stolen from someone) 🙂
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October 9, 2013 at 1:48 PM
Oh, were we? LOL. Whoops.
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October 9, 2013 at 1:59 PM
I guess if inception was to be remade in India, we know the ideal candidate to play Leo!
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October 9, 2013 at 2:03 PM
And to make it desi so that ‘going by the comments in someone’s defence’ audience can understand instead of stealing the idea inside a mind, we can have how to steal the speech spoken by various great speakers.
1) Steve Jobs
2) J K Rowling ( Inspired from real life events )
3) Timothy Noah ( inspired from real life events )
etc!!
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October 9, 2013 at 2:08 PM
Abbas-Mastan, Sanjay Gupta and the Bhatts, who have also never plagiarized intentionally, need to defend SRK here – chor ka dost chor.
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October 9, 2013 at 2:23 PM
@rowlinginthedeep–this srk plagiarism Is old news now– we have fast turnover rate…
What’s the latest on your friends agratha & shailja–DK they still have their ‘jobs’ etc…Also tell us about your own taste in films ..
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October 9, 2013 at 6:59 PM
Well, Agratha is being hounded by the media and a lot of threats. But she says that she will not apologize. Not sure about her job scene though.
http://www.dc-epaper.com/PUBLICATIONS/DC/DCH/2013/10/09/ArticleHtmls/Blogger-in-hiding-09102013103012.shtml?Mode=1
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October 9, 2013 at 7:30 PM
This is preposterous. What kind of a superstar lets his minions run roughshod over people like this? Truely shameless. Netizens really need to rally to support her.
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October 9, 2013 at 8:07 PM
Yeah, but I don’t think that’s quite happened yet. All that you see on the blogs and the social media spaces is hate and lots of it.
And, oh, there is juice on Shailja. She made a movie called Walkaway in 2010, and relied heavily on SRK. She has a lot riding on his goodwill. Hence the personal defense.
http://www.glamsham.com/movies/interviews/15-shalija-gupta-interview-061303.asp
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October 9, 2013 at 8:23 PM
Lol, SRK fans take the cake when it comes to this kind of behaviour. But again,hardly surprising!
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October 10, 2013 at 8:31 AM
@rowlinginthedeep—Thanx for all the updates (& investigations) on agratha and shailja
They seem both good sensible girls who just spoke their minds–hope they don’t come to any harm due to that …
Btw what films/actors do u like
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October 22, 2013 at 4:18 PM
“there is juice on Shailja. ”
Hey rowlinginthedeep
No ‘vulgarity’ here –what do u mean by ‘juice on shailja?’
This is a blog frequented by prudes, minors, easily offended adults and suggestible girls 🙂
Btw do say my hello to shailja
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October 10, 2013 at 8:56 AM
Something for srk fans Oldgold & shailja
http://www.indiatimes.com/entertainment/bollywood/shahrukh-khan-madhuri-dixit-rani-mukerji-jacqueline-enthrall-sydney-temptation-reloaded-105970.html
Srk in full flow (& minting cash) in Australia /NZ
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October 10, 2013 at 9:01 AM
Good news for srk fans like Oldgold –basically the ‘srk juggernaut’ had apparently ended with bra1 & JTHJ …
But the record breaking success of chennai express has given him a shot in the arm
http://www.indiatimes.com/entertainment/bollywood/shahrukh-khan-madhuri-dixit-rani-mukerji-jacqueline-enthrall-sydney-temptation-reloaded-105970-3.html
With ‘mature beauties’ –rani and madhuri here –he’s trying to ‘milk’ it while he can 🙂
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October 14, 2013 at 1:19 AM
http://www.dnaindia.com/entertainment/1903292/column-shah-rukh-khan-talks-about-balance-belief-and-hashtags
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October 14, 2013 at 9:38 PM
With no further action, this one seems to have died a natural media death.
Zindabad! Zindabad! Hai plagiarism Zindabad!
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October 22, 2013 at 4:35 AM
Agratha has responded. Not sure if this will work in her favour or against though. http://mercurialpurple.blogspot.in/2013/10/when-i-was-cyberbullied.html
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October 22, 2013 at 4:15 PM
Thanx rowlinginthedeep for all the info about agatha..
One feels sympathetic towards her —she just expressed her views in a civil manner.
And the same for what’s her name (SRKs media manager)
Yeah shailja –how’s she doing?
Ps: lol @ agatha having to go into ‘digital hiding’
There are some here who have to resort to the same for various reasons 🙂
Ps2: Rowlingdeep u do come intermittently with your agatha-shailja ‘bulletins’ but who are YOU? Tell is about your tastes in films (& men!)
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October 22, 2013 at 8:02 PM
LOL. I’m a friend of Agratha’s and we’ve known each other for more than 10 years. Our love of Harry Potter brought us together and we have been friends ever since. I like the Drama genre in films largely. And I like men who respect women. I hope that’s enough information. 🙂
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October 23, 2013 at 3:46 PM
“I’m a friend of Agratha’s and we’ve known each other for more than 10 years. Our love of Harry Potter brought us together and we have been friends ever since.”— hmm. Seems a ‘deep’ sisterly bond
‘Harry potter’ be bana Di Jodi hehe
“And I like men who respect women. I hope that’s enough information.”– wow @ the classy first sentence.
The answer to the second sentence is ‘no’– that’s not enough info 🙂
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October 22, 2013 at 4:25 PM
Now that the media has dropped this story, SRK fans will not bother her anymore. In their world, Agratha’s 15 mins are up. It did not mattter to them that they unleashed such mayhem on her, that her ’15 mins’ gave her a lesson of a lifetime. They even managed to hang a plagiarism garland on JK Rowling herself! The little people like TImothy Noah are of no consequence anyway.
And off course, the lazy ‘factless’ media will not bother to followup either, so all’s well in SRK’s world.
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October 22, 2013 at 4:50 PM
“all’s well in SRK’s world.”—it better be
Stable tall ships like srk have to travel far–they can’t get agitated by small fish –I mean it!
On this occasion–am srk track I like
For shailja and agatha –(i know one of u is lurking here lol) –enjoy 🙂
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October 22, 2013 at 5:39 PM
Hope she learnt a lesson and will not pick and choose her victims – BUT rather she’ll pick and choose her topic well.
Choose topic ‘plagiarism’ and NOT some actor you’re not a fan of and would love to attack.
Please give her this message Rowlinginthedeep, since you seem to be her messenger.
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October 22, 2013 at 5:51 PM
PS: She should call a spade a spade and not take a righteous stand in attacking a star she doesn’t like in the garb of ‘plagiarism’.
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October 22, 2013 at 6:03 PM
Haha
C’mon oldgold & amy– let’s ‘plagiarise’ each other 😉
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October 22, 2013 at 6:36 PM
So you should criticize corruption but not Kalmadis, Yedurappas, Jindals?
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October 23, 2013 at 6:55 AM
If you talk of corruption only related to Jindals, what would it look like?
Or only of Kalmadis!
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October 23, 2013 at 8:00 AM
It is OK to ONLY and all the time go after Modi and BJP…..lekin SRK is Only SRK ..wah wah wah !!!
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October 23, 2013 at 8:58 AM
@omrocky
There is Congress and there is BJP!!
Till now one went after this or the other.
Now AAP is going for BOTH of them – and how! 😀
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October 22, 2013 at 6:38 PM
I would say SRK fanatic should get a life…There are more things in world than supporting everything your star does.
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October 23, 2013 at 7:01 AM
Munna please not:e
SRK fantaics work alongside with fanatic SRK attackers. Count the number of comments here. THe latter let unleash all their suppressed nagativity they seem to be harbouring,.
The *reverse SRK fanatics* should get a life and not start something about which they have to cry afterwards..
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October 23, 2013 at 11:05 AM
I am talking about people who are hounding the blogger on twitter and Facebook with threats. Giving your opinion on a topic in support or opposition is fine but to stop someone from expressing opinion is wrong.
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October 23, 2013 at 11:15 AM
The SRK haters attack SRK with verbal opinons (or insults). There is nothing wrong in that, everyone has a right to opine about a public individual. But the SRK fanatics tend to viciously attack the haters, and go well beyond just verbal mudslings. These zealots were posting the work address of Agratha and her relatives online, a fact that should actually call for an investigation by the proper authorities. No one should be threatening to harm life and limb for express of opinion. But the SRK fanatics are not programmed to stop until they inflict max damage. I will not be surprised if in their zeal, they do end up physically harming a person expressing opinion against SRK.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:39 PM
I love the way ‘attackers’ of SRK and their attack is taken so flippantly. Come on!!!! You all are as poisonous as the other – and very very dishonest. At least give the fanatics credit for honesty.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:57 PM
“Hope she learnt a lesson”?
Are you kidding? She was receiving online hate for a fact that she simply pointed out and you think that’s justified just because she wrote about an actor instead?
You, sir, don’t make any sense!
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October 23, 2013 at 7:09 AM
>she *simply* pointed out
It wasn’t a case of ‘simply’ pointing out. I’ve written enough comments to express what I think of this *simply* pointing out.
>You, sir, don’t make any sense!
I’ve written enough comments to show you the sense about such articles.
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October 23, 2013 at 10:25 AM
Rotey hue aatey hain sab, hansta hua jo jayega….
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October 22, 2013 at 3:26 PM
Munna:
Thanks for the DNA link. There is hardly any doubt that this is an entertaining read. Unfortunately, one has to doubt whether this came from his pen — sorry, key strokes — or his writer’s.
Frankly, I simply don’t have any moral right to complain of ‘plagiarism.’ Because I have indulged in it during my school days in India and did my share bit of ‘copying’ from the girl or guy in front of me during those ‘unit’ tests. That’s why I have stayed away from this topic.
But there might be wee bit of a difference between my resorting to plagiarism and SRK’s. Not defending myself or anybody in my place but the fact is, I did it because I HAD to do in order to proceed to the next class or face failure of a serious proportion – one which meant a bleak or almost non-existent future that at its most basal, meant not being able to put food on the table for myself. And more importantly, of avoiding the humiliation for my parents that would confront my kakas and mamas and their mama’s friends who would boast of how their sons or daughters came first in extempore debates or word-building contests or quizzes or what have you. To ‘feel’ belonged, I cut corners to feel that I ‘rightly’ belonged on the seats next to them.
And coming from India and being at an age when surrounding atmosphere was such that there was HARDLY hue and cry raised when students copied and moved on the rungs of academic ladders, I TRULY did not understand the ‘significance’ of originality. The foldings in my cerebrum were still raw (they still are although my work as an engineer sometimes tweaks them) and were unable to grasp the bigger picture of how such acts were not stand-alone acts but were tethered to morals and ethics and rewards and applause; they were unable to decipher the monstrous moral gap between what actually was yours and what you ‘claimed’ was yours.
But as soon as I came to the US – luckily 7 days before the buildings fell; otherwise there was no way I could have gotten a student visa from Bombay’s Amreekan consulate—I realized the enormity of originality by way of an ETHICS 101 in publishing; it really changed my world. After nailing the course with top grades in the class—(yes, managed to beat the goras too..what an irony: A desi beating a Gora/I in an originality/rules/ethics course!!)—and wading through the course of this course, my entire outlook changed. I made a conscious effort to follow APA’s 5-word rule or any other rule or the tons of citation rules whether I wrote for scarcely visited blogs or internationally published and scrutinized journals.
The point is, is there something called ‘relative’ morality? I did that in India because I had to survive. But most importantly, I realized that this might help me climb a few ladders but the snake of ethics will ultimately crash me down. Not sounding filmy, but yes, this is the classic Deewar replay of the famous bread-loaf stealing scene comprising Hangal, Shashi, and Hangal’s on-screen kid or even Jean Valjean’s struggle to restore life to normalcy thanks to the crime of stealing bread for his family.
So SRK’s ‘pattern’ of plagiarism I think is an issue not because of the issue of plagiarism per se, but of HOW it ties to other factors in his life. He is a classic case of success. I still think he barely has even 5 % of Amitabh’s talent but SRK’s success story IS a success story I simply cannot deny. Yes he has been TREMENDOUSLY helped by media. He came at an age when information was starting to travel at the speed of light thanks to cyber-technology and went on to prosper at a time when one’s popularity is determined not much by the talent that oozes out of your screen characterizations but by your ‘being in the right twitter zone at the right twitter moment’ or by being at the right publicity party at the opportune time when you have a thousand cameras swarmed around you. SRK is a damn better performer off-screen than he has ever been on-screen. And when he took this performance to expand it infinitely, I guess the law of elasticity hit back at him with this incident of plagiarism. I always find him patronizing and his constant resorting to his Pathan-hood or to his ‘poverty’ really vexing because frankly, with a good education (he always boasts in his write-ups or interviews that he is educated – his education does seem to change with interviews; one day it is the IITs and the other days it is Jamia Milla communications and some other day it is a commerce degree), I am not really sure what is he complaining of. He truly is one celebrity that has lived the PERFECT American dream in India.
What I find displeasing about SRK stealing from 7 sources is that he did that for all the wrong reasons. Here’s the deal: when one’s troubles, circumstances, stories of one coming out trumps by sheer dint of hard work from testing backgrounds are genuine, one really DOESN’T need to ‘garnish’ these with word-pearls borrowed from somewhere else. In other words, the circumstances themselves are so high on content that even the most basic of words are enough to paint a picture more honestly and beautifully than the greatest of wordsmiths could put together. In SRK’s case, the following could be a possibility: a) His constant harking back to his circumstances, his ‘poverty’ etc are not really that big or true to the extent that he feels necessary to pull them out of his history bag every-time he is giving an interview or giving a speech. So, the need to embellish a comparatively comfortable background with beautifully punctuated and calibrated words – never mind if they are from someone else. B) Even if his background/upbringing are genuinely full of miseries, he is so caught up in show-biz’s complex of underlining and italicizing these things at the drop of hat, & to stay in the lime-light, that he chooses ways to ‘magnify’ these struggles and has fallen prey to the syndrome of picking new ways or ‘words’ – without even thinking for a moment that he might be actually trivializing his own struggles by threading them with somebody else’s intellect. I really do not want to insult SRK’s awareness-quotient by saying that he just didn’t know; that he simply didn’t know for all these years that he was quoting verbatim somebody else’s thoughts and words to juxtapose with his own ‘struggles.’
And what is funny is how the 7 original thinkers didn’t think of suing SRK!! Not that I want him sued; but I find it surprising that one could sue a Korean laundry owner in Minneapolis for a small hole in his suit – a suit that brought the laundry owner out on the street forcing him, his wife, and his kids to wear the dreaded ‘homeless’ placard in an American city. Or the umpteen cases where you some convenience store worker because the coffee was ‘hot.’
And herewith I finish my attempt to gain 15 minutes of fame, thanks to the reflective glory shone upon me by SRK’s presence in the celebrity-world.
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October 22, 2013 at 4:05 PM
“I did it because I HAD to do in order to proceed to the next class or face failure of a serious proportion “–no my dear—u always had the option of reading up/cramming/regurgitating/practically analysing and working hard to ‘go to the next class’ (as im sure many still do even in India!) 🙂
This has to be a laughable comparison…
Did anyone ban u from actually reading and doing it the ‘right way’.
As for citing sources in scientific journals, it’s not a result of the mandatory ‘ethics’ course u passed in flying colors, but by necessity! Most of the them nowadays have anti plagiarism software and I’m sure u know e consequences of misquoting can be professionally quite damaging
As for srk, I’ve never traditionally been his fan.
But the more the time passes and the guy maintains his standing,
year after year after year –his detractors are cutting a sorry figure
Like those who predicted an 80 crores business for chennai express (!) but box office is not what’s impressed me this time..
It’s the relative calm after scoring the biggest blockbuster of all time from SRKs corner.
As for the Rowling controversy—
Srk has given the PERFECT response
No response 🙂
Here I’m reminded of a hindi saying
Maybe srk fan Oldgold may help–
Something about the elephant who keeps walking while …
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October 22, 2013 at 4:10 PM
munna –read only bits of the DNA link–is this one actually written by srk–seems good
Ps2: about the plagiarism issue –I would like to stay mum.
Being a culprit both ways
Jus now had loads of ‘research data’ which needed to be analysed and made presentable –which is not difficult but needs me to ‘exert’.
Just like srk told his writer to jot something for him–I give the stuff to an overeager and ‘hungry’ /desperate ‘junior’ who will also get her name to it but will do all the ‘donkey work’ 🙂
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October 22, 2013 at 4:19 PM
That is why I don’t write much 🙂
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October 22, 2013 at 4:26 PM
Haha munna 🙂
Btw rowlinginthedeep –y don’t u invite your friend agatha to visit this blog —I will like to learn from her
Don’t wanna post on her blog since I’m against ‘lurking’ and ‘online stalking’ and so on…
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October 22, 2013 at 4:57 PM
Well done SEL for the music, javed Akhtar for the lyrics,
PC for the ‘scenery’
And Shankar Mahadevan for being the closest any singer has got to the voice timbre of kishore Kumar
And above all
Shah Rukh Khan
“Mujhe dhoondna
Aasaan hai kahaan
Zameen dekh lo ya aasmaan
Main ik pal yahan
Main ik pal hoon wahan
Nahin paaoge..
Mera nishaan”
🙂
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October 22, 2013 at 6:27 PM
Well…Seems reading comprehension still continues to be a problem here for some/one..
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October 22, 2013 at 6:32 PM
To heck with reading n comprehension!!
Lemme enjoy amy and oldgold…sandwich
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October 22, 2013 at 6:50 PM
I’m no SRK fan (as those who have read my previous comments about him will be well aware) but this is getting ridiculous. Every single person in Bollywood, including his holiness Aamir Khan, have indulged in some form of plaigarism or the other. When people like Sanjay Gupta or Pritam have built their entire career on stolen ideas, without facing much repurcussion, why then should SRK be persecuted for a speech that he intially attribtued to JKR anyway?
And the idea that Aamir’s theft of intellectual property is somehow more noble than SRK’s is even funnier: Aamir used a partially plaigarised plot to make an enormously successfuly film that millions of people watched (many without realizing who the original writer of the film was), and that made him vastly richer. How is this in anyway better behaviour than SRK not attributing a few lines in his speech to JKR every time he ‘recycled’ said speech?
I’m not saying that what SRK did was right: I’m simply saying that the fault is not with him alone, but with the moral moorings of the industry that he functions in, and he should not be the sole target for such criticism When many of our biggest blockbusters and hit songs are made from the fruits of another’s creativity, why should SRK be demonized for a mere speech?
Having said that, the behaviour of the SRK fans who villified Agratha is equally ridiculous and condemnable.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:21 PM
Lets just aptly apply the moorings of Bwood to every other avenue, be it academia. industry etc. Why not, they are all the same when it comes to plagiarizing. Lets just not dare to raise the standards even a little bit in these non-bwood worlds. The fault actually lies with the organizers who thought that SRK will deliver some original thought-provoking advise to the gathering of their intellectuals.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:33 PM
If you want to raise the standards then target the problem in it’s entireity instead of being so slective about it! Why not outrage against plaigarism in Bollywood as a whole, instead of simply condemning one (relatively) minor act of plaigarism and making it look like a failing that is unique to SRK, insetad of endemic to the entire indsutry?
And you absolutely could NOT apply these strigent standards to Indian academia, unless you wanted to be left with empyt lecture halls! For example, most Universities in the West have harsh punishments for plaigarism BUT they also have mandatory courses on academic integrity/ honesty and repatedly warn their students of the serious cosnquences of not attributing your sources.
On the other hand, most Indian universities do nothing of this sort (although a few rare Unistreat plaigarism seriously) , and as a result, students will happily cobble together essays and projects from a variety of different sources (inclduing blatantly obvious ones like Wikipedia), proper credit be damned! If you were to suddenly step into one such university without warning, pull out a student at random, run their essay through a plaigarism detection software and then penalise them alone, it would certainly be unfair!
The problem here is that the indsutry as a holw has such scant respect for intellectual rights, and this is the problem that needs to be addressed, not one speech of one actor!
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October 22, 2013 at 7:34 PM
*indsutry as a whole
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October 22, 2013 at 7:36 PM
PS: Not accusing you of being anti-SRK or anything, I just think that the anger against plaigarism here is understandable but misdirected. People should be angry with how there is no general culture of condemning plaigarism/ respecting ideas, not how SRK pilfered JKR’s words of wisdom.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:59 PM
No one gave a free pass to Aamir, Salman, BigB etc etc. Bwood plagiarism is all pervasive, and everyone of them are to blame for it. It is pointless to criticize them because (unlike Hollywood) their commercial model has withstood any negative effects of their lack of creativity. They don’t care about creative felicitation (eg Oscars) as long as their target audience comes in droves to witness the crap they generate. However, none of these other stars are out there in academia, trying to prove themselves as intellectuals. Assumedly, they know their shortcomings, and have not exposed their lack of creativity in forums outside bwood. But apparently, SRK could not resist from presenting a uber-intellectual face of himself, albeit with totally pilfered advise.
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October 22, 2013 at 8:06 PM
“is pointless to criticize them because (unlike Hollywood) their commercial model has withstood any negative effects of their lack of creativity. They don’t care about creative felicitation (eg Oscars) as long as their target audience comes in droves to witness the crap they generate.”
My point exactly. And Aamir hasn’t tried to prove his ‘serious thinker’ credentials, c’mon? 😛
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October 22, 2013 at 8:15 PM
No, you are not getting it. It is useless to criticize their plagiarism in Bwood, because clearly the Indian audience does not reward creativity. However, trying to foist the same ethics on an academic forum (because of a plagiaristic habit I suppose?) is a totally different matter. Everyone is defending SRK by pointing fingers at bwood. But all these other stars of bwood are not imposing their plagiarism on academia. That is the difference here.
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October 22, 2013 at 8:16 PM
No, my point is that Indian academia in itself has very little awareness of plaigarism as a serious crime.
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October 22, 2013 at 8:21 PM
Maybe at the school level. But this audience consisted of business graduates, and alumni from the corporate world. IMO, at least Indian industry is seriously trying to imbibe creativity in its stakeholders, cause if they do not, they lose out to global competition.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:54 PM
Agree with main point, But don’t agree on SRK part (that he has been unnecessarily vilified). Aamir and Pritam have been castigated whenever they have copied. Things which are wrong are wrong. I don’t see any context to reduce the blame. I don’t blame SRK completely but whatever machinery he has setup, has fault. As a public personality SRK should change that setup so that such things don’t happen.
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October 22, 2013 at 7:58 PM
Hmm..I don’t recall Aamir gettingvery much flak over Ghajini? Pritam has recieved criticism, but compared to the magnitude of his plaigiarism, it is pretty minor, as opposed to SRK, where his swiping a couple of lines of JKR’s speech became national breaking news!
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October 22, 2013 at 8:01 PM
I think you haven’t read ibnlive link posted above. It is not just JKR, there are six other people!
ps : http://ibnlive.in.com/news/did-shah-rukh-khan-plagiarise-jk-rowlings-speech/426674-8-66.html
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October 22, 2013 at 8:08 PM
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October 24, 2013 at 3:54 AM
I can safely say that these six people may have also plagiarised a line or two somewhere.
How can you guarantee they haven’t been doing that?
This Tim, Jim and Larry should have sued SRK instead of being bird witted and twittering away. Is he afraid he might get caught?
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October 23, 2013 at 4:29 AM
“Bollywood’s slippery relationship with originality should not be the yardstick here.”
Read more at: http://www.firstpost.com/living/srk-rowling-and-the-dummys-guide-to-plagiarism-1159765.html?utm_source=ref_article
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October 22, 2013 at 6:58 PM
Brilliant: Amy–u are on a roll…(& will soon get another ‘role’) 🙂
Ps: agree though that poor agatha didn’t deserve to be vilified like this for just speaking out her mind–ditto for shailja
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October 23, 2013 at 6:00 AM
@ Ami — you are wrong in saying that ‘ — Aamir used a partially plaigarised plot to make an enormously successfuly film that millions of people watched (many without realizing who the original writer of the film was), and that made him vastly richer. How is this in anyway better behaviour than SRK not attributing a few lines in his speech to JKR every time he ‘recycled’ said speech?’
I am not an SRK hater even if I lean towards Aamir, but here you are totally wrong. 3 Idiots was NOT plagiarized, much as that impression was created by Bhagat and his supporters. Bhagat was paid for his Five Point Someone book rights. Before the film’s release producer Vinod Chopra had fully paid Bhagat the agreed amount ( apparently 1 lakh initially and then Rs 10 lakhs as bonus closing amount). Bhagat’s grouse was that his name appeared in small print towards the later part of the credits. Bhagat did attend the premiere, was seen smiling, but obviously felt he had been shortchanged. The film was a success right from day one and the team was partying away, but the writer of the original source managed to spoil the party to an extent.
As regards SRK’s speech — i don’t think too much should be made of the fact that the speech was inspired by other speeches. I feel that in this case SRK is more sinned against than sinning.
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October 23, 2013 at 11:01 AM
I think Ami is talking about Ghajini?
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October 23, 2013 at 2:52 PM
Yes…
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October 23, 2013 at 2:56 PM
Ok, my mistake. Forgot about Ghajini.
Whilst the speech-plagiarism charge is not something I would take seriously , I have problems with SRK playing the victim-poverty card. From whatever I have read he was middle class, never poor.His mother was a magistrate and his father…dunno, but he did manage to send his son and daughter to leading schools in Delhi. Most middle-class Indians feel the pinch at some stage in their lives –even supposedly rich film kids– Hritik Roshan and Aamir Khan have spoken( in a couple of interviews over the years) about the lean years faced by their families whenever the father could not bring home the roti. Farah khan too had a tough ‘poor’ childhood. Generally we — film or non-film folk — survive the ‘poor’ periods, don’t make a noise about it.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:24 PM
Have you heard Hrithik’s latest poverty card game?
What’s your opinion?
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October 23, 2013 at 3:24 PM
Sorry. Forgot to link to this article.
http://www.pinkvilla.com/entertainment/discussion/there-was-time-when-he-had-no-money-buy-groceries-hrithik-roshan-his-dad
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October 23, 2013 at 3:40 PM
Haha Oldgold– even hritik has found his ‘poverty card game’
Hmm think we all should find one –it’s handy 🙂
Ps: hmm so u r lurking onto pinkvilla lol
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October 23, 2013 at 3:46 PM
OK just read your comment in detail.
LOL. you have problems with SRK but accept the other Filmi people’s poverty stories without problems.
Why don’t you have a problem with their stories?
You are equating middle class with these film people?
What game are you playing?
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October 23, 2013 at 12:47 PM
I think very simply put there are two ways of looking at it.
One is – Big deal if SRK stole a few lines from multiple people. Nothing to vilify him for.After all, he is hardly a shining example of personal integrity otherwise.
or
One could say if he wants to put himself out as a role model and a badshah and if his fans want to claim his speeches are some master strokes of genius, then he needs to be held to a higher standard. And, hounding of the blkogger who pointed this out is characteristic of SRK fan mentality,class and modus operandi.
Ghajini’s being inspired by Memento is not material to discussion. I think these ‘crimes’ are of different nature and invoking one to justify other is disingenuous or stupid or dishonest or all three.
Which actors have been a part of movies inspired by other movies/books without acknowledging the source and how we regard these is a separate and potentially interesting discussion but not germane to this issue.
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October 23, 2013 at 1:02 PM
Re: “Big deal if SRK stole a few lines from multiple people. Nothing to vilify him for.After all, he is hardly a shining example of personal integrity otherwise.”
LOL!
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October 23, 2013 at 1:34 PM
great comment!
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October 23, 2013 at 2:47 PM
Actually, Rajen there are more than 2 ways of looking at it. And no, not everyone who disagrees with you is ‘disingenuous, stupid or dishonest or all three’.
My point is simply that SRK’s behaviour is wrong, but he is getting a dispropotional amount of flak for this, compared to other actors who have committed a similar crime. And believe it or not, the reaction to similar crimes of other actors is then germane to this discussion!
And I do absolutely think that the reaction in other other, similar cases is always relevant! Isn’t the whole point of justice that it should be uniform and equal?
I find your retort especially amusing, considering that in other situations you have used this same line of logic to defend Modi, pointing out that it is only the pogroms that happen on his watch that are criticized and not those that happen on the watch of other ministers!
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October 23, 2013 at 2:58 PM
For the record I have never ever pointed to excesses during other regimes to defend Modi. I, actually find that argument somewhat weak i.e to point out happenings during some Congress regime to try and minimise Modi episode and also tiresome. So, no – I would never make that argument. I do believe they cannot be compared just like here the two things are not comparable. There are no pogrom’s sanctioned/started/favored by Modi.There was one episode and I wouldnt defend it. What I have argued for is to look past it. If someone cant, ;they cant. It is their loss and country’s loss at the end of the day if we continue to beat Modi with the same stick again and again and by default end up with a corrupt,self serving Congress led coalition. If that is what one prefers, that is what people will get. In the end we get the leaders and govt that we deserve.This argument is better reserved for the Left of Right thrad but one problem with liberals is they fall in love with te cause so much they practically become blind to everything else and incapable of rational thinking.
Part of the reason SRK is getting the amount of flak is his past behaviour, the effort by his PR machine to minimise this and the incredibly low behaviour of his fans. Is his fans behaviour a reflection on him. Absolutely yes. After the while the star starts behaving like his fans or may be he just attracts like minded fans. Trying to defend SRK in name of fairness and impartiality
sounds like a noble cause ( the very fact tsomeone like Alex is supporting it should be a warning that it is dubious!) but the facts cannot be twisted and intellectually corrupt arguments wont fly.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:17 PM
“This argument is better reserved for the Left of Right thrad but one problem with liberals is they fall in love with te cause so much they practically become blind to everything else and incapable of rational thinking.”
LOL! First, I wasn’t arguing about Modi, merely pointing out that you have used this line of logic earlier yourself.(If I was mistaken about this, I apologize, but I’m trying to find the comment I was refering to). Second, I am not a liberal, but thank you for making assumptions about my poltiical views and for making blanket generations about a large and heretogenous segment of the world’s population.
Also, I am as far away from an SRK fan as possible. I am very sorry that you have deemed my arguments ‘intellectually corrupt’; perhaps you should also inform common law legal systems across the world that they do not meet your incredibly lofty standards of intellectual purity, since they also operate on this supposedly bizarre and illogical principle of similar outcomes for similar crimes?
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October 23, 2013 at 3:03 PM
Ami, without getting into this larger debate I do think it’s hard to maintain that making Ghajini and quoting Rowling or whoever without proper attribution are the same thing. Much as lots of Hollywood films steal shamelessly from earlier Hollywood attempts (but not ‘plagiarizing’ as a technical matter) but Biden had his ’87-’88 Presidential run rudely interrupted when it was discovered that he was stealing from Churchill’s speeches (rather stupid to do this but that’s another matter). A lot of these questions are about legality for sure but also those forms of illegality that are more socially sanctioned than others. This is so for every country. Smoking pot is illegal in many places but also not considered as big a deal as stealing off the web to write a middle school paper (let alone a high school or a college one). In much of Asia plagiarized Hollywood attempts are simply the order of the day. A lot of Bollywood would simply cease to exist if we stuck to the rules, not just Ghajini. From plots to characters to lines to situations to iconic imagery and so on. the same is true in East Asia. Not condoning it but clearly there are more complex and complicated questions of colonization involved here that cannot only be reduced to the legalities of plagiarism.
But more importantly the defense of SRK comes about by resorting to a whole series of mutually exclusive logical positions (you’re not part of this but many are). In other words if someone wanted to pull up Aamir for doing Ghajini my defense wouldn’t be ‘first get SRK for stealing from Rowling’! Plus the positions seem to be:
1)He didn’t steal, it’s a misunderstanding
2)Even if he did get Aamir first
3)He didn’t steal and a complicated textual analysis shows how ever single word on its own is really common to the English language and has been used by others
4)Rowling herself steals
5)people who hate SRK now want to get him for this
So any one logic might be defensible (or not) but all put together it’s simply a bad faith exercise. The point then is that even if there is merit to the arguments the people making them are possibly not the best messengers!
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October 23, 2013 at 3:06 PM
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October 23, 2013 at 3:14 PM
“much of Asia plagiarized Hollywood attempts are simply the order of the day. A lot of Bollywood would simply cease to exist if we stuck to the rules, not just Ghajini”
This is very much (or even more so) the case for unattributed sources in speeches as well! There simply is no cultural value attached to proper and perfect citation in India, and you could probably find such unattributed quotes in countless convocation speeches, if you chose to look for them!
Since you’ve said yourself that I am not part of those mutually exclusive logical positions, I don’t see what they have to do with my arguement; I certainly don’t seek to defend or condone delusional fan behaviour! 😛
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October 23, 2013 at 3:20 PM
Here is how I see it: both copying a script without proper attribution, and copying a quote without proper attribution violate same principle i.e. that it is wrong to use somebody’s idea without giving them due credit and/or compensation.
However, one case of plaigarism involves a much greater gain (Ghajni) than the other (a speech), therefore the first one is an even graver issue.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:22 PM
So, let me understand your position:
Is it – It is okay because Aamir also stole a movie idea
or
Is it- One cannot criticise SRK unless one also cirticises Aamir in the same breath
or
Is it- Stealing lines from someone’s speech verbatim without acknowledging is not a big deal when done by a star
or
Is it – One shouldnt raise these issues because they have potential to snow ball from a mere observation into a public denouncement
Is it- It is ok because it happens all the time
or all of the above
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October 23, 2013 at 3:26 PM
I disagree very much with the second paragraph. Using similar platitudes in speeches is one thing and specific quotes or even extended passages quite another. I don’t think it’s fair to suggest that entire passages from speeches are being plagiarized all the time. Do you really think there are convocation speeches in India where political speeches are pilfered? In a specific sense? And if so those aren’t excusable either but I can’t recall another high-profile figure getting away with it in a culture sense once he or she is discovered. and think about it, the very fact that these pieces appeared in the media proves the culture is not ok with it. Surely the entire media cannot be anti-SRK? It’s been quite the opposite historically. Now there are often stories of how films have been plagiarized or poster designs copied. So this too registers somewhere but clearly the SRK thing was treated as something more extraordinary.
But I introduced these points overall because the debate here has been taking place for weeks now within those contexts.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:27 PM
*yawn* you need to stop attributing views to my that I have never voiced. My point, as I stated in a previous comment, is simply that SRK is receiving disproprotionate amounts of flak for this comment and that this is all getting a bit ridiculous now.
As I said earlier, this view of expecting similar outcomes for similar crimes is not entirely as revolutionary as you are pretending it is, considering that it is a basic principle of common law!
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October 23, 2013 at 3:32 PM
^^This comment was meant for Rajen, not Satyam.
Satyam: the media also occasionally outrages over plaigarism in cinema, but you yourself admitted that it is pretty much endemic to Bollywood. The same is true of unattributed soruces in speeches: there is very occasional outrage such as this, but for most, it is par for the course.
I am surprised that I even have to explain this to you: surely the gaping absense of academic integrity/ honesty in most Indian curriculum until very recently should be ample indication of the lack of cultural emphasis on citation? As somebody who had little idea about referencing/ citiation as long as I studied in the Indian education system, I have to say that I absolutely do not think that it is perceived as a serious moral wrong in India, and even less so in Bollywood which is anyway already dependant on plaigarism for a alrge number of its ideas.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:18 PM
Point 5 hits the nail on the head.
Those trying to prove their morally high standard by pointing fingers in one direction only are *definitely* exercising in bad faith and dishonestly.
Point 2 is very apt.
Why not?
So also is point 4.
Spinning it this way won’t change the fact that this was a clear case of ‘andhe ko kya chahiye – do aankhen’ for most people.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:42 PM
Satyam: Superbly said. But I even completely disagree with the fact t a Ghajini was a copy/rip-off. Was it influenced by Memento? Yes. Did it borrow the central trope which Memento had? Yes (though Memento is not the only film working around that trope. The Memory of A Killer comes to my mind). But did it rip-off the plot? Absolutely No. And Sanjay Gupta is essentially the wrong example because he not just copies the entire plot but also specific scenes.
And if Ghajini was a rip-off, Tarantino has never made an original film. Neither has RGV.
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October 23, 2013 at 4:11 PM
Wouldn’t go that far. Ghajini’s central memory conceit aside there were specific gestures from the Nolan film (the tattoos, the poloroids, the revenge angle) that were, to my mind, (and I suspect Nolans!) uncomfortably close to Memento. Ghajini is quite obviously a very different film, but it’s also one that very clearly owes a debt that the filmmakers (to my knowledge) never acknowledged.
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October 23, 2013 at 4:25 PM
GF: That’s true. But Bluffmaster, for instance, also clearly is more than just influenced from quite a few films (in this case not just specific scenes but even the plot. That said don’t think BM is a rip-off). And it was never acknowledged in the film either. All I am saying that Sanjay Gupta is the wrong example here.
BTW, not sure if you have seen this, but I checked out this Malayalam film called Left Right Left. I haven’t seen a more scathing commentary on the Left politics, or politics itself, in an Indian film since probably Gulzar’s Hu Tu Tu. And one realises that this kind of a film can never probably come out from the current mainstream Hindi cinema. For me this is very easily the best Indian film of the year. Yet to catch Shahid though
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October 23, 2013 at 5:18 PM
The difference to my mind is that BM is a better film than Ghajini! More seriously though I do think that Rohan Sippy manages a more tactful series of lifts here than Murugadoss. Part of the reason being that Sippy is far more interested in using the references he does (from Nine Queens, from The Game) in service of a narrative that in some ways recalls older works, older tropes of Hindi cinema, and is finally sly in using several heist film conceits to deliver the underlying idea that cinema itself is a grand act of basically hoodwinking an audience. On the other hand I’m less convinced that Ghajini needed the specific Memento references it used to realize its own objectives. The difference to my mind is in the filmmaking. I’m a greater fan of the more measured pitch of someone like Rohan Sippy than I am the loudness of Murugadoss.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:27 PM
I think Amy is spot on here –regarding the srk Rowling issue.
What he allegedly did (or his screen writers did!) was technically wrong
BUT
certain crucial aspects are important
1) RELEVANCE and PERSPECTIVE
Does SRK become bigger than he is by plagiarising or not plagiarising and writing a beautifully original speech? No
How important is this plagiarisation to SRKs career graph ? Zilch!
Is this make him pass an important exam or get a crucial assignment or project ? nope!
It’s just a small feather (if u consider it one!! In his already strong resume –yeah this allegation is a slight ‘blot’ (again if u consider it one) but doesn’t affect his standing
So LOW interms of both RELEVANCE AND PERSPECTIVE
BUT it’s
HIGH interms of NUISANCE VALUE AND AGENDIC DISCOURSE
2) people here are talking about Aamirs ghajini
Although it’s not directly relevant but since aamir is a contemporary and a sort of competitor and a model one at that —
All Three idiots
Taare zameen par
Peepli live
Were shrouded in crediting and/or plagiarism issues
3) and now I will come to the most important thing here which has probably been untouched henceforth
VISIBLE PLAGIARISM is highly INNOCUOUS
Infact is NAIVE, EASILY DETECTABLE
Run ANY ANTI-PLAGIARISM software on your laptop –as simple as that!!
Nothing is TRULY original actually
The ‘influences’ one has in childhood, growing up,
Or ‘coming of age’ (sic!) are subtle but STRONGEST
Should we go that far to usurp credit?
4)Of much bigger scale, intensity and relevance is CORPORATE or even NATIONAL political scale ‘INTELLECTUAL’ plagiarism between countries –
For eg one country spends money on R&D, burns the fingers, the others watch and take corrective measures, saving millions of pounds and dollars
The same applies to most fields (including films)
AA
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October 23, 2013 at 3:30 PM
Yawn- sums it up.
Hate to see people going around in circles and getting tangled up
in their own webs ! It is ok to feel whatever you feel and go with your gut! We have all said what we wanted to say!
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October 23, 2013 at 3:45 PM
I think we’ve sliced-diced and discussed this issue from every conceivable angle there can be. We have written on realms of blogspace, Is ghatna pur ek kitab likhi ja sakti hai. Perhaps this page from Satyamshot can be used as a reference, and hopefully no one will plagiarize that book.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:48 PM
LOL!
OTOH, I enjoy these discussions as they serve as a window into people’s minds! The more self righteous they get, less sure they are of the stance they adapted. It is a hoot!
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October 23, 2013 at 4:03 PM
Your fatuous strawmen and absurd blanket generalisations have been equally amusing for me, I assure you. I’m just waiting for you to reform common law with your faultlessly rational and incorruptible intellect now.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:49 PM
>We have all said what we wanted to say!
>I think we’ve sliced-diced and discussed this issue from every conceivable angle there can be.
Then why don’t you all stop?
It will help me from wasting time in responding to these rehashed attacks.
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October 23, 2013 at 3:53 PM
Aatey-jaatey musafir jab is drishtikon mein naye kon jodtey rehenge, to phir humari kalam ko hum khud bhi rok nahi saktey.
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October 23, 2013 at 4:22 PM
waise bhi kalam nahin rukti SRK par prahar ke liye
koi toh doosra aur kaam dhoondo bhagwan ke liye
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October 23, 2013 at 4:38 PM
og- Waah! 🙂
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October 23, 2013 at 5:04 PM
Na-insaafi ko faash karne ke liye uthti hai kalam
Vagharna roz-marah mein hi mashgul hain hum.
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October 24, 2013 at 3:51 AM
parda e faash ke bahane uthate hain jo kalam
khud ka hi parda faash kiye jaate hain
likhte hain kuch dil o dimaagh mein hai kuch
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October 24, 2013 at 9:42 AM
Ilzaam khudgarzi ka khoob aata hai aapko lagana,
Diljale nahi, hum hain Faash-e-parwana,
Josh-o-dilayri se ho jaatey hain shama mein shaamil,
Aapkey lavz kitna rokenge haasil-e-manzil?
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October 24, 2013 at 10:25 AM
And to carry the thought further:
Khudgarz parwaaney kartey hain mom pighalney ka intezaar,
Maut-e-shama ley aati hai unkey liye bahaar,
Deewangi hai hum mein, hum to thahrey sarfarosh,
Kood jaatey hain bhujti lau mein, humein nahi koi afsos.
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October 24, 2013 at 2:35 PM
shama aur parwane ka fasaana bana diya
masle aur bhi hain sarfaroshi ke liye
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October 24, 2013 at 6:11 PM
“masle aur bhi hain sarfaroshi ke liye”
Exactly og– that sums this up (& lyrically so lol)
It’s a question of ‘relevance’ & ‘perspective’….
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October 23, 2013 at 4:01 PM
Man. Somewhere Surya is thanking the gods he’s not a contemporary of SRKs!
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October 23, 2013 at 4:12 PM
LOL!
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October 23, 2013 at 4:56 PM
So there’s a deal then:
Before writing ANYTHING ‘derogatory’ on SRK, his ‘hater-fanatics’ should have a disclaimer at the beginning in these typical circumstances:
I was thinking about how to handle situations where one has to write about SRK doing something inappropriate. I have an idea that would meet the twin objectives of – a) Not ‘venting’ one’s frustrations on SRK for personal resuscitation b) Still able to write about SRK doing an unacceptable thing with SRK coming off as NEVER the first person to have committed any wrong-doing EVER.
Here are 10 possible situations and here’s a deal then:
Before writing ANYTHING ‘derogatory’ on SRK, his ‘hater-fanatics’ should have a disclaimer at the beginning in these typical circumstances:
1. SRK decides to widen his already wide Mannat compound:
First ask Ambani how the hell he managed to get permission to build Antilla
2. SRK pays a bribe to Brihanmumbai Corporation to widen his already wide Mannat compound:
First ask Yedyurappa, Gadkari, and Kalmadi to rest their asses in a jail and then you may talk (due credit to Yedyurappa who when asked why the hell he wasn’t quitting the CM’s post retorted: ‘Am I the only one? What about so many scams before me? How can I be caught when they go scot-free?’
3. SRK keeps harping on his supposed ‘poverty’:
First ask Amitabh Bachchan to stop mentioning at the drop of a hat that he slept on a bench in Marine Drive when he first arrived in Bombay; first ask Jackie Shroff to stop repeating his story of how he lived in a Bombay chawl that had one loo with at least 10 people in queue standing at any time
4. SRK beats up a guard at the Eden Gardens and proudly says, ‘Hum Dilliwaale hain aur haath pair chalana bahut acchi tarah jaante hain’
First ask Armaan Kohli in Big Boss to stop raising his hands on everyone and everything in the frame
5. SRK says he made a film mainly for children but squeezes in lot of boob and butt-grabbing and non-veg jokes:
First remove Dada Kondke’s filmography from the film industry and then talk to me; remove those WEAR ZAPATA or NOTHING slide-ins from video cassettes of the 1980s
6. SRK says, ‘I am a Muslim in India HENCE I am the only one ALWAYS called a Pakistani by people with vested interests’:
First ask Mohammed Azharuddin who suddenly realized the people (Hindus?) of India were celebrating his wonderful stroke-play as a ‘Muslim’ batsman when the match-fixing controversy was scalding him
7. When talking exultingly on public podiums, SRK lifts some sentences or paragraphs not once, but many times over either completely ‘naïve’ (an insult to his awareness-quotient) or deliberately (an insult to his actual struggles)
First strike off Sanjay Gupta’s filmography from Hi-fi and sue him millions of dollars for all the losses he made as a director/producer; kick Pritam out of the industry; ask everyone from Dadasaheb Phalke to Imtiaz Ali to Satyajit Ray to Spielberg to Tarantino to apologize for stealing snippets/scenes/words from another source without crediting and then I shall apologize too..
8. SRK becomes a brand-ambassador for a project under Modi-led Gujarat (which is truly hypothetical since Modi would hardly want a Muslim brand-ambassador for his state according to the libtard English-incorrectly speaking English media ..)
First ask Amitabh Bachchan to stop kow-towing to Modi and promoting his state’s wild animals (no not the rioters I am talking about but the actual wild-animals living in the forest and sanctuaries)
9. SRK starts an illegitimate affair with Priyanka Chopra or Anushka Sharma or Rekha
First ask Amitabh Bachchan to swear on Bhoothnath 2’s script that there was NO with Rekha post-marriage
10. SRK starts acting in movies depicting violence and gore and his fans and the press are disappointed at the turn of events & say that he should not have stooped down to such an extent now that he is a role model
First strike-off Amitabh Bachchan’s angst-ridden movies of the ‘70s which caused young and not at all young men to come out of the theatres and beat the hell of pani-puri preparing guys because they over-charged 10 naya paise
11. SRK dances at rich(er) people’s weddings and takes money for that
What about the band-baaja that goes on in Indian weddings? If those trumpeters and dholak-wearing guys can mint money, why can’t I? First stop them, then come to me.
12. SRK slaps a socialite (I hope it is Suheil Seth)
First go and ask SRK to strike-off from history gate the famous SRK – Kunder slap gate (Oh crap that’s me!!)
So by following the above rules, SRK’s fans are happy since he is NOT stained with the blot of being a FIRST – which is an irony she HE IS THE KING; and the SRK fanatic-haters are happy since they could still vent their personal life’s frustrations out on SRK and bask in 15 minutes of reflective glory…
Note: This tree of thought has its seed taken from DEEWAR’s classic line, ‘,Jao Pehele Unke Sign le aao jinhone mere haath pe yeh likh diya tha..
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October 23, 2013 at 5:02 PM
In other words:
OMG HOW DARE ANYBODY SUGGEST THAT ITS UNFAIR IF ONE PERSON IS RELENTLESSLY CRITICIZED FOR PLAIGARISM WHEN MOST OTHERS ARE NOT, SHE MUST CLEARLY BE A DELUSIONAL SRK-LOVING IDIOT! HAHAHAHA, LOOK HOW INCREDIBLY WITTY AND INTELLIGENT I AM!
Like I said earlier, the principle of similar consequences for similar crimes seems to be a strangely revolutionary idea for you.
But what’s even more amusing is that I am now apparently an SRK fanatic, despite having made the most scathing comments about him on several other threads in this blog.
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October 24, 2013 at 2:28 AM
Leave Armaan Kohli out of this, he is still extremely pissed about the Jaani dushman jokes people keep making anywhere he goes 🙂
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October 23, 2013 at 5:21 PM
Rajenmaniar Says:
July 19, 2013 at 4:39 PM
“Something to ponder:
….
But when we remind them, 1947 Bengal riots, 1969 Gujarat riots,1980 Moradabad riots, 1984 anti-Sikh riots, 1983 Nellie Assam riots, 1989 Bhagalpur riots and more than 18 riots, all of which occured during CONgress rule,
THEY CHANGE THE TOPIC Altogether!!”
And here I was, thinking that my reminding SRK’s critics of Pritam, Sanjay Gupta and Ghajini was a disingenuous, dishonest and stupid tactic dreamed up by the blind, irrational, Modi-hating, SRK-worshipping sickular fiberals! How is it then that such an intellectually incorruptible doyen of the right came to suggest that such a hideously filthy idea was worth pondering over?
(I apologize humbly for mentioning Modi on a non-politics thread but I am a) just drawing an anology not debating about him and b) even the great and perfect Rajen deemed to post his political comment on a box office thread and not in a political discussion forum, so I have unimpeachable precedent for my behavior. Oops, I forgot, the idea of precedent is fradulent, dishonest and unacceptable! 😛 )
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October 23, 2013 at 5:38 PM
I remember that post,Ami and was thimking thats what you must be referring to! It was just something that I had come across and reposted here but is not an argument that I buy into.
What that argument seems to suggest is that excesses based on religion/cast occured during other times too, so its ok if Modi lets that happen. IMO, that is the weakest defence of Modi and a weaker argument to support him. Modi’s episode has to be dealt with on its own merits/demerits and I see plenty of reasons to support his candidacy but thats a different battle!
My support for Modi while seemingly at odds with my extreme distaste for genocides/ pogroms / racial-ethnic discrimination etc is grounded in practicality and ground realities.
Thanks for looking up and bringing up the post in question as it gives me an oppurtunity to disown it! I couldnt locate it!
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October 23, 2013 at 5:45 PM
BTW, am not accusing you of being an SRK but I do think you are a little too enamored of your image of yourself as a crusader for the oppressed and a champion of fairplay. Unfortunately to the point that you fail to realise that atleast in this case your sympathies are misplaced and the cause is a lost one!
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October 23, 2013 at 5:46 PM
Being an Srk fanatic- correction
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October 23, 2013 at 5:56 PM
LOL! I promise you that I am not yet crazy enough to consider a powerful filmstar, who has earned fame and fortune that are absurdly disproportionate to his woefully limited talents, to be oppressed and in need of my defence! 😛
If anything, the poor ‘whistle-blowing’ blogger would have appealed far more to a champion of the oppresed, considering the opprobium that has come her way!
I could understand if we were debating religion/ politics/ racism/ gender and you accused me of having an agenda, but this was just an innocuous comment about a filmstar I am not even otherwise fond of; why does it have to be that I am being dishonest to propagate a certain image of myself, and not just that I am expressing a view that I genuinely believe in, and that you happen to disagree with? 😛
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October 23, 2013 at 6:23 PM
Here I must actually defend SRK. Absurdly enough. I detest SRK’s politics (all of this has been discussed before and I won’t get into it), this is quite apart from my sense of his talents (also not anything special), a distinction that most SRK fans do not get in these debates. In other words without the former I wouldn’t really care about the latter. There are plenty of other stars far worse or at the same level and I am not particularly bothered. But I defend him purely from your charge that he’s achieved disproportionate success relative to his talents. I think this is true of 90-95% of stars in any industry. In a way the only star who truly ‘deserves’ it is one who can be judged truly exceptional in a variety of ways. Does Salman ‘deserve’ to be in the industry? No! But nor do many others. This is however half the story. Because stardom, perennially mysterious, is about creating a fiction on screen or a persona that somehow connects with the audience for one reason or another. That connection is pretty singular, specially when it comes to a star as iconic as SRK. This is where contra the popular opinion ‘politics’ is all important. Stars suggest certain things to an audience based on who they are and where they come from. They don’t always have to spell this out. And they are also most authentic supporting a politics or a set of codes in their films that are most consonant with their ideologies off-screen. For instance the narcissistic lover SRK played in film after film in his key genre are much closer to his own real self (including on ‘political’ grounds). This despite the fact that he never really liked this genre. The character was nonetheless ‘true’ for him. Dutt was most convincing representing the kind of urban angst that he carried within him in various ways even otherwise. If Bachchan was the quintessential Desai hero it’s because his politics off screen most closely matches that director’s. I’d could keep multiplying the examples but I have never come across a significant star whose politics truly surprised me once I’d seen enough of him on screen. In other words the star gives off certain vibes, you then learn about some of his views and you’re not surprised. And obviously I mean ‘politics’ in the widest ideology sense of the term. The caveat here is that I am really referring to Indian commercial cinema. In Hollywood this discussion would be more complicated for certain reasons. But no star is completely undeserving at least in this sense. And later ages find them mysterious not least because they were never cued into the original contexts (though some defeat all theorizing.. Rajendra Kumar within the Hindi context always stumps me!). But to end this note SRK is deserving inasmuch as he was able to embody for an age what no one else could. Here I should add that my own considerable quarrels with SRK (or Johar) are also those with a wider audience and in fact a larger political dispensation for which the shorthand ‘new India’ is convenient. I have never trusted this configuration.
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October 23, 2013 at 6:37 PM
LOL! Satyam, I was not writing a treatise on the source of a celebrity’s stardom, I was merely explaining why I think that SRK is actually incredibly fortunate, and not a wretched nobody deserving of my sympathy and defence! 😛
I agree with everything you say, especially that most stars in any industry are successful in a manner that is vastly disproportionate to their talents, and primarily dependent on their connect with the audience.
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October 24, 2013 at 2:57 AM
Rajen, I think she has some good ‘specific’ points, but everything sounds more convincing when you use poetic but ‘general’ phrases like ‘crusader for the oppressed’ and ‘champion of fairplay’.
Ps i think you are right because outside of this blog and all the criticims you read here, his networth is still around 600 million dollars. Man I would love to be that oppressed.
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October 23, 2013 at 5:35 PM
Ha Amy– well pointed out.
That’s how in these ‘debates’–
SHI(F)T happens 🙂
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October 23, 2013 at 5:49 PM
On a related note–Im somewhat ‘inspired’ to pen down something —NON-plagiarised /totally ‘original’ lol
Now n then I will be trying my hand in ‘poetry’ (shudder!!)-my nu hobby-horse…
& that too in hindi (shudder x2)
“Khwaab hai tu, neend hoon main
Dono mile, raat bane…
Main rang sharbaton ka
Tu meethe ghaat ka paani….”
Ps: sometimes the ‘source’ is immaterial,
It’s the ‘usage’ that’s all that matters…
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October 23, 2013 at 5:54 PM
Not bad:-)
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October 24, 2013 at 2:49 AM
I think some of the charges (or whatever you want to call them) laid against SRK about being a product of new age india twisted politics can also be laid against Amitabh in some ways. One example – the 71 year old man still carries a facade of having real hair (hiding his balding head with a hat even during times when he is hospitalized) when its all too evident its either a wig or a damn good transplant. And what is new India other than an obsession with everything superficial?
Honestly I dont blame Amitabh for this, he would lose half his fans (especially the post 90 born folks) if he showed up with a half-moon like Anupam Kher’s or Rajnikanth’s for that matter.
I am not trying to say Srk and Amitabh are in any way equal perpetartors, just that both like to carry a very new india-friendly image.
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October 24, 2013 at 4:10 AM
Do you think AB has significant fans from post 90 born folks?
I think looking (or aspiration) good and what people represent are two different things.
This thread is going to add more comments 🙂
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October 24, 2013 at 4:37 AM
>But when we remind them, 1947 Bengal riots, 1969 Gujarat riots,1980 Moradabad riots, 1984 anti-Sikh riots, 1983 Nellie Assam riots, 1989 Bhagalpur riots and more than 18 riots, all of which occured during CONgress rule,
THEY CHANGE THE TOPIC Altogether!!”
DUH!!!
The only reason people talk of Gujarat riots more is because of Modi because he’s pushing himself forward for more and more importance and has aspirations of becoming PM!!
You are also confusing between individual and party. Neither Congress nor BJP died in those riots. Modi’s political career should have died then, just as one doesn’t hear of who was there at the time of the other riots.
Comparing riots with SRK’s plagiarism only proves the lack of weight in the arguments being put forward by the so called ‘standing up for morals’ people.
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October 24, 2013 at 7:18 AM
DUH !! here we go again !!!!!!!!
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November 6, 2013 at 2:30 AM
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November 6, 2013 at 4:04 AM
What is so “difficult” about writing your own speech?
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November 6, 2013 at 8:08 AM
I guess as difficult as writing your own script.
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November 6, 2013 at 8:34 AM
Silly me, a few words in front of people is the same as writing a 3 hour script for a film.
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November 6, 2013 at 8:46 AM
Few lines copied is unnnnforgivable,
3 hours copied is aaaaalright.
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November 6, 2013 at 8:59 AM
I shall reintroduce part of an older comment in this thread to demonstrate the mutually exclusive (logical) positions you and some others have engaged in to defend the indefensible:
1)He didn’t steal, it’s a misunderstanding
2)Even if he did get Aamir first
3)He didn’t steal and a complicated textual analysis shows how ever single word on its own is really common to the English language and has been used by others
4)Rowling herself steals
5)people who hate SRK now want to get him for this
On the 3hr thing by the way I am sure you’re referring to MNIK. You know.. all those Hollywood films with autistic guys and then the whole Gump angle and finality the disaster at the end and so forth.
I wonder if you’ve read Moby Dick. Aamir is really that big white whale that SRK fans are never going to be able to catch though the attempts (and obsession) might kill them (as with Ahab). With d3 and a Hirani back to back that whale’s only getting bigger. LOL!
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November 6, 2013 at 10:25 AM
>1)He didn’t steal, it’s a misunderstanding
No it isn’t. He did steal, like many others. You know them – in spite of a lack of enthusiastic attack in their case.
>2)Even if he did get Aamir first
Get them together, since you missed out when Amir did it. Instead you still drool over Ghjani.
>4)Rowling herself steals
You mean she doesn’t?
>5)people who hate SRK now want to get him for this
LOL! That’s as clear as crystal. Just look!! A post of it’s own, with cathartic comments of people who *love* him – not hate, no, no.
>On the 3hr thing by the way I am sure you’re referring to MNIK.
Yes, that too, and Ghajni, and TZP (you know, all those numerous TV series), and 3i, and D3 etc etc
>Aamir is really that big white whale
Moby Dick? *snigger* A fin of Moby Dick, perhaps?
>the attempts (and obsession) might kill them
Satyam’s hopes and wishful thinking – of love – not hate.
>(as with Ahab)
Who’s Ahab?
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November 6, 2013 at 10:38 AM
Sounding just like Rand Paul! You’re in good (Tea Party) company!
Well as long as you’re accepting SRK plagiarized and that MNIK is one such film! You could have saved yourself a lot of trouble!
Next time when I get a ticket speeding at 75 I’ll tell the officer he should leave me alone and get the other guy who went by before me at 85. Or he should first get the guy who snatched the old lady’s bag. Or the kid who stole gum from the store. At the very least he should have got me on previous days for doing a lot more than 75! In this world no one does any wrong if they’re not the only persons doing it or if they’re not the first! Of course even such logic is not consistently applied when one celebrates Britain and Europe and attacks the US for all the imperialist excesses that Britain and Europe were ‘first’ in (or at least preceded the US).
The problem as always Oldgold is pulling anything and everything out of thin air to defend the indefensible when it comes to SRK. But even magic tricks have to be convincing..!
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November 6, 2013 at 10:48 AM
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November 6, 2013 at 10:59 AM
LOL! Looks like you are at a loss, satyam. Anyway;
Who’s Rand Paul?
What Tea Party?
Who’s Ahab?
>The problem as always Oldgold is pulling anything and everything out of thin air
Who made the air thin? You! By having already pulled out anything and everything for your loooooong comments.
I’m sorry, but I don’t get your rantings about kids pulling out guns, and all that follows.
I do celebrate Britain and India. Sorry if you don’t like it.
You have no idea.
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November 6, 2013 at 2:28 PM
“I guess as difficult as writing your own script.”—
rofl Oldgolds rocking here..
“Silly me, a few words in front of people is the same as writing a 3 hour script for a film.”-
That’s how people get caught in their own spin…
So it’s not worth copying it’s just for a few lines –heck, why not copy when it’s something big and worthwhile…
In other words, students shouldn’t cheat in small inconsequential exams or those needing little preparation–but hey, go for it when the stakes are high and it’s a difficult exam…
So much for all the ‘principles’ that some are protecting here 🙂
ps: og : gimme a high 5…
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November 6, 2013 at 8:48 AM
yeah he initially tried to pretend this was a liberal plot against him but his serial plagiarizing has forced him to reconsider! Now he’s saying he’s being held to a higher standard. LOL, where have I heard that before recently?!
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