Carelessly written

Rubina attained fame and celebrity-hood for a brief period when she was only a young child. At the start of this book she says, "After all the things I've seen and the luxury and the pampering showered upon me, I feel I am not too eager to go back to the filthy streets of the slum." Though it's easy to understand her reluctance to leave a life of comfort and cosseting, I found it hard to believe that anyone would dismiss the only home they have ever known as "filthy". This made me suspect the skill of the book's two ghostwriters, and believe that much of what was written here was a superimposition of their own views on their subject's. A few pages later they were having Rubina tell us that the railway station was to the east of her home which is not possible since she lives in Bandra East, and I thought it was careless and patronising that they should refer to Bhabha Hospital as "Baba" Hospital and Hotel Sun-n-Sand as Hotel "Sun and Sand". Perhaps all this prejudiced me, but I continued to find that the book was written in a contrived and inconsistent style. While it strives for local idiom with expressions like "tensed up" and "I particularly liked to observe while she got ready for her scenes", and the text is cutified by with verbatim Rubina quotes such as "Salim Daag Milli Nair", "rolla costa" and any number of Hindi phrases (fortunately without italicizing or translating them), all this is ruined when she suddenly lapses into adult-sounding grammar: she is "quite intimidated" by Sonia Gandhi's guard dogs, and apparently found Nicole Kidman to be "incredibly beautiful".

Still, and though I'm angry they didn't take more trouble to iron out the text and pick out its many horrid proofreading goof-ups, I did find Rubina's story interesting. Perhaps you already knew that Rubina, Azhar and Ayush were picked from 500 contenders to play their Slumdog roles; that the agent Parvesh kept part of her earning for himself; that the cesspit Salim falls into is actually a pit of chocolate; that Rubina adores her stepmother Munni u2013 and even all the details of her alleged attempted sale. What you may not know is that Rubina was promised a proper apartment with cement walls, windows and a toilet by many, including Sonia Gandhi. However, at the time of the book going to press, her family's slum had been demolished and they were homeless.

Since royalties of this book will be "shared with the author and Medicins du Monde in India", let's hope sales will be high and enable her to have the apartment she longs for and deserves.

So go ahead and buy the book. And don't worry it's easy to read and gets over quickly.

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