Global designer Salim Asgarally brings fashion education to underprivileged

Supports Smile Foundation youth with scholarships to enter fashion industry

A name synonymous with high craftsmanship & articulation in his creations, with embellishments made from highly creative blend of east and the west, his world famous collections gracefully adorn the homes of Hollywood celebs like Brad Pitt & Madonna. Top models like Bipasha Basu & Aishwarya Rai have flaunted his creations in fashion shows.

Designer Salim Asgarally now makes fashion become a platform for change when he had top women directors walk the ramp for Smile Foundation's charity fashion show to signify their solidarity towards the girl child cause.Asgarally held  a Fashion Workshop forOHOWMANunderprivileged youngsters in association with the Smile Foundation. The youth are in the age group of 18 to 25 who are part of Smile Twin e-Learning Programme (STeP) conducted by Smile Foundation across its centres in Mumbai. 

STeP is the livelihood programme for the underprivileged youth, wherein the youth are given training on key employability skills like English proficiency, computer operations, personality development, etc. with the objective of helping them get a job in the growing retail and service sector. Smile Twin e-Learning Programme (STeP) is a national level livelihood programme of Smile Foundation that trains urban underprivileged youth with market-oriented job skills such as English, basic computer, personality development, retail management, relevant soft skills etc and makes them employed in retail and service sectors across India. More than 13,750 youth have been trained and 9850 have been placed in over 140 brands through 35 operational projects across India.

Through this Fashion Workshop, the first of its kind held by a fashion designer, Asgarally seeks to inspire these young minds towards a career in fashion as designers, costume designers, stylists, merchandisers, pattern makers, retail professionals, fashion buyers or other myriad options available in the trade at both a creative or management level.

The children inspired and wishing to be a part of the fashion business will then through the able offices of Asgarally be given scholarships for a year to study fashion at an institute of repute and will be assisted in making a career in the industry.

Asgarally was accompanied by the celebrated and award-winning filmmaker and director Kalpana Lajmi, who will give a talk on the importance, potential and need of qualified and trained Costume Designers in the film industry.Kalpana Lajmi to her credit has made several socially relevant films such as Rudaali, Darmiyaan, Daman and Chingaari. ”A beautiful endeavour by Smile Foundation and Salim Asgarally to introduce and absorb underprivileged children to the world of fashion. I am very glad I was a part of it,” said Kalpana Lajmi.

This endeavour succeeds a successful showing of Asgarally's collection titled RED for the Smile Foundation at a star studded fashion show in Mumbai last month in aid of providing education to a 1000 underprivileged children. This effort is now part of a continuing exercise with the Smile Foundation and Asgarally towards positive social change in the area of education for underprivileged children.

The current workshop will outline the role and function of the fashion business and explain the opportunities available for gainful employment and career growth in the world of fashion and costume.  Asgarally has managed to get scholarships for fashion design diploma for deserving students based on merit to cover their tuition and hostel facilities from Anupam Goyal, CEO of the Institute of Design Technology, Surat, and hopes to get more such organised in the near future with other schools of fashion in India and abroad to be able to facilitate the funding of education for these youth.  Says he, “it gives me great pleasure and a deep satisfaction to make a difference to the lives of those less fortunate children and their families through my talent, skills and work experience as a fashion designer.”

Asgarally believes that if every business dedicates a small percentage of its profits or resources towards upliftment and education of underprivileged children, this world will be devoid of stress, strife and poverty. And this move is merely one step in the right direction.

Sky is the limit: Ek Mutthi Aasmaan celebrates high TRPs

 

Tony & Deeya Singh of DJ’s A Creative Unit threw a bash for cast & crew of their show ‘Ek Mutthi Aasmaan’

With soaring TRPs, the family drama ‘Ek Mutthi Aasmaan’ on one of the biggest GECs has a reason to celebrate; Tony & Deeya Singh threw a success bash for the cast & crew of the daily soap.

Tony & Deeya played perfect hosts to the guests and the cast of the show Shilpa Shirodkar, Ashish Chaudhary, Mohit Dagga, Suman Shashi Kant, Tuhina Vohra, Ashish Nayyar, Shirina Singh, Rachana Parulkar & other crew present at the party at a posh suburban lounge.

Ek Mutthi Aasmaan follows the story of a domestic worker ‘Kamla’ played by Shilpa Shirodkar. She is a selfless maid who works in a big Seth’s house.

The show has recently soared  to  high TRPs , although the show had a buzz since the very beginning after going on air, Tony & Deeya surely have a reason to celebrate with the cast , DJ's creative unit parties are always super successor and so was this one , The dance floor was floored with the gorgeous performances, Shilpa Shirodkar seemed to be enjoying and was seen dancing , Ashish chowdhary , Deeya Singh and Tony  Singh all were pulled on the floor . 

Deeya Singh says " It feels great to have Shilpa shirodkar on out show and now with TRPs soaring highs at the moment , both Shilpa and ashish are having fun on the show and we are happy to associate with them .

Tony Singh says " we want all our shows to scale this horizon and we are looking forward for other shows too.

Hugh Jackman goes nude for X Men Days Of Future Past!!

The actor reveals all about his nude scene!

The excitement and anticipated around the 7th X Men movie X Men Days of Future Past releasing on 23rd may is already reaching dizzying heights.

But now it might just reach fever pitch, as Hugh Jackman has revealed there’s ‘a naked shot’ in the film!!!

The actor who is back as Wolverine in Days Of Future Past has revealed all about his nude back scene in the opening scenes of the film which shows his entire backside!!

Hugh said that the scene in question is ‘not front naked – it’s PG-13 – but full-body.’

He explained: ‘So I made it very clear that I wanted to know the date I’d be shooting that stuff. That was May 21. And I remember about three weeks before that, I hear, "Oh, we’re having some trouble with the day, we might push it off a few weeks."

‘I said, “Absolutely not! I don’t care, you can push anything back you want, but I’m naked on that day!”

The 45-year-old works out all the time, and it seems he upped the ante before showing off his hunky body in all its glory doing extra lunges and squats.

The actor also had given a brief but memorable backside glimpse during The Wolverine last year.

Though the scene is likely to be censored in India well for all you Hugh Jackman fans out there this is one more icing on the cake!!

Emraan Hashmi meets street hustlers for his role in Raja Natwarlal.

In order to effectively play a conman in Raja Natwarlal, Emraan Hashmi read a lot about Mithilesh Kumar Srivastava alias Natwarlal, a notorious conman who was known for his elaborate cons like selling the Taj Mahal, the Red Fort and the Parliament House.

Apart from this, he also met a few street hustlers to learn ‘sleight of hand’ or what is known as ‘haat ki safai’ for the role. Director Kunal Deshmukh said, “Emraan learned a lot of sleight of hand tricks from these hustlers and we have used as few hand doubles as possible for the scenes involving these tricks as Emraan has shot for most of such scenes himself.”

Also starring Paresh Rawal, Humaima Malik and Kay Kay Menon, ‘Raja Natwarlal’ shot in Mumbai, Dharamshala and Cape Town, will present the dark horse of Bollywood in a ‘never-before-seen’ avatar.

 Emraan plays a modern day Natwarlal who along with his partner in crime, lives off short cons and day-to-day hustles in Mumbai. The movie progresses through many twists and turns, cons and more cons, leading to a big one. The film is a total masala entertainer, which will take you through the world of con and philosophies of conmen.

The film is slated for release on August 29th 2014.

Aalia Bhatt hosts special screening for Citylights

Mahesh Bhatt youngest daughter  Aalia Bhatt held a special screening of Hansal Mehta's City lights on Sunday evening for her family and friends along with Rajkummar Rao, Patralekha , director Hansal Mehta and Producer Mahesh Bhatt.

The actress was in for a complete surprise and was awestruck by Rajkummar Rao and Patralekha's performance in the film and couldn't stop praising the duo. The experience was overwhelming for Aalia and the movie left her speechless!

A source close to the team said , ' Aalia has been excited for this film since she has been hearing a lot about it from everyone. So the moment she came to know that the film is ready she requested if she could watch it. And she is extremely overwhelmed by the performances from everyone in the film.'

Well, with the screenings just begun we hope that the film does wonders.

CITYLIGHTS is based on the life of a trader in Rajasthan who comes to the City of Mumbai with his wife and daughter in hope of a better life. The challenges they face, their encounter with a big city and how they rise to meet those challenges nurtured by the power of their love is what Citylights is all about.

Releasing on 30^th May, 2014, CITYLIGHTS will give the audiences an altogether new cinematic experience