Oh man, I hate this!  When the news stories are about stars being selfish and horrible instead of surprisingly kind and generous.  Although, I guess it is only news because we are so used to the other stories in which they are kind and generous.

In the case of this first story, not just the media but the people involved took the kindness and generosity for granted.  Months ago, a spotboy (one of the lowest of the low in the Indian film worker structure, a manual laborer with no chance of advancement) fainted on the set of Sultan.  He recovered, and then fainted again.  The onset doctor checked him out and sent him to the hospital where he died.  There was talk of a post-mortem, but it may never have been done.  After his death, his widow took their children to the Sultan set to talk with Salman and ask him for money.  Both Salman and YRF promised to help support the family.  But it’s been months and no money has been forthcoming.  So the widow has now filed a request with the police to look into the death and see whether YRF is culpable.

Obviously, I find it completely plausible that the poor spot boy was asked to do something terribly dangerous during filming (he’s a spot boy, they’re expendable) and that Yash Raj is covering it up.  But isn’t it interesting that the widow didn’t even care about that so long as the studio and Salman Khan took responsibility for her family afterwards?  And that everyone else has the same attitude?  The media, the police, the doctors, everyone just went with the “Death occurred on a Salman Khan set-Salman is answerable for it and it’s nobody else’s business!”  Until he failed to take responsibility.  In America, it would be a matter of trying the Institutions first (health insurance, police, probably a law suit against the studio), and then if they fail, you turn to personal sources of support.  But in India, it is the other way around, you start by begging Salman Khan for personal assistance, and only after he has failed to deliver for months at a time, then you take a try at a police report or a law suit.

Although, if this story follows the same pattern as usual, we will find out that Salman Khan actually did take responsibility.  I talked about this back when there was that big “Shahrukh Khan is a monster who is stealing food from the mouths of the children of the distributors!” story around the failure of Dilwale.  And then after a few weeks of that being trumpeted everywhere, Shahrukh’s team finally quietly revealed that he had actually paid the distributors back out of his own pocket, so no one was taking a loss.  That’s usually what happens with these things, there is a big loud shouting match about how horrible a star is, until finally the star is forced to reveal that they are secretly a saint.  I’m not saying that’s how this story is going to go necessarily, just that I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple of days from now there is a quiet release from Salman’s team and YRF saying that the widow and family have been getting full support from them all along, and the whole police report story is just blackmail for more funds.

And similarly, the Taxwallahs just filed with the High Court to open up Amitabh’s case, again, about income he got back in 2001-2002 from Kaun Banega Crorepati (sp?  Everyone just says KBC, I’m not sure how to spell it out!).  It’s been this whole thing, in 2008 the courts granted his petition that he be allowed to pay taxes on his income from the show at a rate 30% lower than usual, since it is artistic income.  The Bombay Court upheld this decision in 2015.  And now the taxwallahs are trying to get the High Court to let them look into it again.

Now, yes, it is ridiculous that Amitabh is paying a lower rate because he is an “artist”, I am assuming that law is on the books with the struggling painter in a garret kind of person in mind, not fabulously wealthy Amitabh Bachchan.  But you know what’s more ridiculous?  This whole 15 year saga is over 1.66 crore!!!!!  As was just revealed a couple of days ago, Amitabh pays close to 20 crore in taxes every year.  And they are going after him for 1.66 crore?  Which is surely as much as 15 years of fighting it in court have cost already?

(Aamir in Dobhi Ghat deserves tax relief: Aamir in real life does not)

Obviously, this is less about the old tax case and more about the Panama Papers reveals that he was hiding assets overseas.  I am a little curious about this, I have heard that in terms of a lot of people named in the Panama release, it’s not that they are breaking any tax laws of their home countries, just exploiting a legal loophole in a kind of scuzzy way.  I’m not clear if the same is true for Amitabh or not.  I know his position is that everything is legal and above board, he just happens to be connected to some companies who are based overseas.  I am sure he has the best accountants and lawyers money can by, and the Income Tax people are probably scrambling to find out if there is anything they can get him on related to the reveal.  And in the meantime, they have dredged up this old case, just so they can look like they are doing something.

And again, it makes the star look a little yucky, but on the other hand, do you know how much unpaid labor Amitabh has done for the government?  Anti-Polio campaign, Anti-TB campaign, Dengue campaign, Doordarshan publicity campaign, all for free!  Pretty sure if they had to pay going rates for him as a “Brand Ambassador”, it would be way more than 1.66 crore.