We reported last week that Star TV was launching a day long event next month to showcase its programming in the UK

At London’s Old Billingsgate, each Star channel will be brought to life through four dedicated zones – Star One, Star News, Star Gold and Star Plus.

And we have 5 pairs of tickets to give away…
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One of India’s most critically acclaimed and popular films – Mother India – has been remixed, re-edited and rescored into a 45-minute silent film. (A preview is below)

The work is a project by Kala Phool, an arts and development agency, which has brought in DJ Tigerstyle to reinterpret the score through a unique live performance.

The resulting work, called MI21, is currently on a sell-out tour across the UK.
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Picture above by professional photographer Sonalle, who has just completed a project called Ethnic Minorities Coming Out’, which will tour London and nationally from August 2009 until August 2010. More at her website.

The Birmingham Symphony Orchestra has joined hands with Ustad Rahat Fateh Ali Khan & group to pay tribute to one of the world’s greatest vocalists: the late Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.
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Star, the India-based television network, is launching a day long event next month to showcase its programming in the UK.

The event will also serve as a type of Mela with live performances, celebrity interviews and appearances, exhibitor stalls, a food court and an array of activities for families.

The ‘Simply Star’ event will be held on 12th September in London.
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A former journalist, showbiz editor and television presenter is making a leap from the media industry to the charity sector to help bone barrow and blood donation charities.

Reena Combo, the former editor of Desi Xpress newspaper and then Ikonz magazine, has co-founded ‘Desi Donors’ and is organising an event in Birmingham this week to raise money for the Anthony Nolan Trust.
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AIM Magazine has teamed up with Media Moguls to offer readers two tickets to see a special charity match on 6th July at Lords cricket grounds.

To win answer the question below.
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A BBc team scooped the Radio Documentary prize this week at the prestigious One World Awards. Crossing Continents: Dharavi, by Mukul Devichand, John Murphy and Maria Balinska for Radio 4 was a special report about the audacious plan to demolish Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi in Mumbai.

Devichand first visited Dharavi in 2007, and returned a number of times before sleeping over in the slum with his producer John Murphy in March 2008. It was recorded well before Slumdog Millionarre brought the poverty of Mumbai’s slums to the big screen.

The reporter told AIM Magazine: “Like anyone who peered out of the car window at heartbreaking slums on childhood visits to South Asia, one part of me is hugely glad that India is now able to think about clearing the slums.”

“But that means it’s time for an urgent debate about what cities like Mumbai will look like in the future — and whether they’ll push the poor out into distant cramped tower blocks, storing up problems for the future. John and I were grateful to make a contribution to that discussion, and it’s wonderful to be recognised for it.”

Is media freedom being strangled across Commonwealth countries? That is the subject is a debate next week at Portcullis House in Westminster.

The event, organised by the Commonwealth Journalists Association (UK), why journalists are not better protected and media laws being ignored in many countries around the world.
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The prestigious One World Media Awards – regarded as the ‘Oscars’ of factual broadcasting and journalism – will celebrate its 21st anniversary at this year’s ceremony on Monday 22nd June 2009.

Among nominees for the prestigious Broadcast Journalist of the Year award are Nadene Ghouri, which AIM previously profiled here, and the BBC’s Mukul Devichand.

The 12 award categories recognise excellence in coverage of the developing world.
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As part of the GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards Dinner 2009, the Asian Media and Marketing Group (AMG) are launching a hunt to find the country’s best young journalist from an ethnic minority background. The only criteria other than ability and talent is that they must be under the age of 30.

So if you know of a young talented journalist who deserves to be recognized, please nominate and help inspire the next generation of young journalists. The winner will receive a bursary cheque of £500 from the Daily Mail and will have the chance, if appropriate, of a week’s work experience on the newspaper. Closing date is Friday July 24th 2009.
Email: Minaxi Mistry / More info: GG2 Awards

The annual Muslim Writers Award takes place this week in London. Nominations for its presitigious journalism prize include writers Ziauddin Sardar, Faisal al Yafai and Kia Abdullah.

Organisers have announced a partnership with publishers group Penguin Group.
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The critically acclaimed band Asian Dub Foundation have announced their first UK tour in year – with a particular focus on attacking the BNP. (dates & video below)
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The 2009 Satyajit Ray Short Film Competition was won by Nikesh Shukla (Yam Boy) and Laura Taflinger for their film The Great Identity Swindle, it was announced last week.

“It fuses perfectly the mediums of poetry, cinema, comic books and music resulting in a hilarious study of Asian culture in contemporary Britain. I feel I learnt more about this protagonist’s life in sixty seconds than I do at the end of most Hollywood blockbusters,” said one of the judges.

The one-minute short is part of moti roti’s 60 x 60 project, where established and emerging artists from the South Asian Diaspora – twenty each from Britain, India and Pakistan – present their personal perspective on what ‘home and boundaries’ mean to them.

After his career was shattered by a massive head injury and memory loss, Irshad Ashraf began a recovery that is coming to fruition this month.
Nominated for next month’s Penguin muslim writers awards for his story The Drowners, his photography exhibition No Pork features abstract depictions of New York.

The Exhibition opens on May 18 in London. A film he made for The South Bank Show, with Melvyn Bragg, transmits in May.
To attend, email: vulvana.williams@irshad.tv.
www.irshad.tv

London based Asia House is launching its ‘Festival of Asian Literature’ this month, hosting an array of writers including Ziauddin Sardar, Kenan Malik, Pankaj Mishra and Hardeep Singh Kohli.
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Trafalgar Square is hosting its annual Vaisakhi In The Square this Sunday, 3rd May. The event will feature religious hymns (Shabad Kirtan) as well as Bhangra performances by Veronica, H-Dhami, Shekie ‘n’ Sham, Navin, 3Mix, D-Boy & Des-C.

Sunrise Radio is the main media partner. This year the event also commemorates 300 years of the consecration of Sri Guru Granth Sahib as the eternal Guru. The free event, organised by the GLA, will be held from 12pm to 5:30pm.

The International Buddhist Film Festival comes to London in May, offering films from across the world with a Buddhist touch – from documentaries to Hollywood blockbusters.
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The BBC will showcase this year’s Proms 2009 Season with a first-ever Bollywood Prom performance.

The 2009 Season will be the biggest ever, according to the BBC, featuring a 100 concerts and 70 further Proms Plus events.
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by Kuljit Bhamra
Artistic director

The Southall Story is a project in celebration of a town that has welcomed new communities throughout the last century, enabling them to excel and influence both the social and political structures of this country.

Southall is also a place that has come to be affectionately known as Little India, but for many it is much more than that. Being a port, (Heathrow is a stones throw away), Southall has been a home to such diverse groups as the West Indians, Indians and Pakistanis in the 50′s through to the Ugandan Asians in the 70′s. Most recently, new arrivals include Sikhs from Afghanistan and Somalians.
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Last Mango in Paris, aka spoken word artist Shane Solanki, releases his first single ‘Manbag!!’ on 20th April through Soundeasy Records. That will be followed up by his debut album ‘Broken English’, featuring Birmingham grime artist RT.
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Baroness Sayeeda Warsi was named the most powerful British Muslim woman last night at an event hosted by the Equalities and Human Rights Comission.

Picking up the award at the Manchester event, the shadow minister for Community Cohesion said: “I personally come from a family of all girls and was brought up to believe that anything was possible and being a Muslim woman should in no way be seen as a barrier but as an asset to achievement.”
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Have you had documentary commissions or some other success on Asian and Muslim channels? Are you ready to get onto mainstream TV? Then this opportunity is for you.

The Cineforum on Muslim Women: Visibility and Leadership is a one day film festival and conference on the 30th March 2009 in London. They are offering 10 people the chance to pitch to a panel of commissioners from mainstream broadcast channels.
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The third annual Muslim Writers award will take place on the 27th of May at the Hilton on Park Lane, organisers announced this week. The event aims to recognise the very best of British Muslim literary talent.

Project director Irfan Akram said: “[Our] staggering growth reflects a growing desire for good quality literature amongst what’s expected to be the fastest growing sector of the book buying public over the coming months and years.”

Theatre group Tamasha launches its latest production – Wuthering Heights – this week in Oldham. The Bollywood adaptation of the classic novel will then tour around the UK, including the Lyric Hammersmith at the end of April.

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