| Indian Idol in third avatar is larger, better: claim judges |
| Indiantelevision.com Team |
| (16 March 2007 6:00 am) |
| NEW DELHI: "Creative differences are necessary as this shows there are no biases among the judges," said Anu Malik at the first press conference of the third edition of 'Indian Idol' which launched its marketing drive in Delhi. The singer-composer, who was a judge in the first two editions of Indian Idol produced by Miditech for Sony TV, was reacting to a question on sharing the podium of the judge with Alisha Chinai, with whom he had reportedly had a clash some years earlier. The third judge is singer Udit Narayan. The judges made a dramatic entrance during the press meet at a five-star hotel here, when they where brought in one after another in separate palanquins carried by four to five young men with young women showering them with rose petals. Anu said being a judge was a major responsibility and though he had been accused of being rude, he was merely honest and frank. He said he had been more tough than usual this time round, since the aim was to find just one voice who would be 'Bharat ki shaan' (Pride of India) and would be proficient in modern, classical, semi-classical, pop and also in dancing. Noting that 'Delhi rocks', Alisha said the aim was not to sermonize but to find a person with charisma and chart-topping talent. Udit said he had treated every assignment as a learning process, and hoped to learn in his first stint as a judge. Minnie Mathur, who will anchor the show with Hussain, said the presenters act as 'human handkerchiefs' for contestants in contests like Indian Idol. Three former participants in the earlier versions of Indian Idol, Meenal Jain, Rahul Vaidya and Adithi also addressed the press conference. Aseem Kapoor, Senior Vice-President of Marketing and Communications for Sony Entertainment Network, said the second edition had been seen by an approximate 53 million viewers with as many as 55 million voting in the finals. The third series will be a Friday-Saturday show, starting with 24 contestants and gradually coming down to 12, and then three in the finals to select the lone winner. He disclosed that in addition to a recording contract with Sony BMG, the winner will be awarded a contract worth Rs 10 million with Sony Entertainment Television. He said this edition was moving to a total of 12 cities in search of talent, of which nine had already been covered. The cities are Jodhpur, Bhubaneswar, Hyderabad, Amritsar, Srinagar, Nagpur, Vadodra, Bhopal, Kampur, Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai. The auditions in Delhi are from 17 to 19 March, while in Kolkata they will be from 24 to 26 March and in Mumbai from 31 March to 2 April. Launched in Britain, the Idol series had already traversed 28 countries on 40 channels all over the world. |
| https://www.indiantelevision.com/headlines/y2k7/mar/mar202.ph p |
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