Remember the outrage that the public expressed over the fact that the "Slumdog Millionaire" children were underpaid? Well,apparently the Mumbai government has decided to step up & give them a free home.Here's more from The Guardian:
"Forget the Oscars, the biggest Indian winners of the Slumdog Millionaire fairytale are two of the film's child actors plucked from the shanty towns of Mumbai, after it emerged they are to be given "free homes" by the state government.
Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, 10, and Rubina Ali Qureshi, nine, who play the lead characters in their younger years, currently live in shacks in the Garib Nagar slum in Bandra East, Mumbai. But Amarjit Singh Manhas, the chairman of the Maharashtra housing authority, told the Times of India: "We felt that since the children have made the nation proud, they must be given free houses."
There had been anger after pictures emerged of the child stars living in squalor despite the £10m movie earning about £69m since its north American release in November. Set in Mumbai, which is part of Maharashtra state, Slumdog Millionaire won eight awards at the Oscars on Monday, including best picture.
Danny Boyle, who won best director for the movie and cast the Hindi-speaking children from Mumbai's slums in the two lead roles, has repeatedly denied accusations he had exploited the children and not paid them enough. Film-makers pointed out that trust funds had been set up for the children and they had been sent to school.
The Mumbai board's decision has delighted the children's families, according to the Times of India. Azharrudin's father, Mohammed Ismail, told the newspaper: "We have barely got any money from the film-makers. In fact, whatever came, has already been spent. We do not even have a pucca wall in this shanty and our future is equally uncertain. In fact, this decision is definitely a piece of good news for us."(END OF EXCERPT)Read the entire article here.
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