LATEST ON QAZI & RUPU FROM CAL

One has had a grand homecoming, the other is craving for one. Ruprekha Banerjee may have had a glorious comeback to Calcutta when she came down some days back for a performance at City Centre, but her Fame Jodi partner Qazi Tauqeer is yet to return to Kashmir after being crowned at Sony's Gurukul.

"I am really desperate to get back to my friends and just be in the middle of all the greenery and the snow," revealed Qazi at the Power FM studios on Friday afternoon. Both Qazi and Ruprekha were in town for a gig at the 107.8 station and then at HHI's Underground in the evening.

Ever since Qazi and Ruprekha beat the others to the coveted Fame Gurukul crown, the two have had a breakneck schedule — performing across the country, promoting other shows on Sony, cutting their first album and also shooting for the music video. "I am very, very tired," admitted Ruprekha with a feeble smile. A sleep-starved Qazi seconded it: "We have slept for just two hours every night for the past 20 days."

Such is the winning contract that the Fame Jodi will have to go by the Sony schedule for the next two years. "Even if I have to do playback for movies, I have to get it approved by the channel first," said Ruprekha.

It is acting, rather than playback singing, that Qazi's looking at. "Main to sirf film star banna chahta tha, public ne mujhe singer bana diya," he said.

"Offers have already started pouring in and I am considering a lot of scripts."

Few know that the first time Qazi came to Calcutta was when he was just 14. "I was part of an under-16 cricket team that had come to play at Kalyani," he recalled. "I travelled around in local trains and remember having rasgullas and mishti doi."

But the boy from Kashmir is yet to get his Bengali lines right. "I had told some girl, 'Aami tomare bhalobasi' and she started jumping with joy. It's only when she told me what the line meant did I realise my folly," laughed Qazi.

No such problems for Ruprekha, though, as she prefers communicating in Bengali even after shifting base to Mumbai. "It's only going to be playback for me, so Mumbai will suit my profession more," said the girl from Agarpara.

With dreams growing bigger by the day and a huge fan following to fall back on, the country's first musical jodi is set for quite a tryst with fame, on and off camera.

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