Aishwarya Rai

Reports that Aishwarya Rai wants her mother to write her biography left us stumped! Now why would a 34-year-old actress who is yet to peak in her career commission a biography? Is she finished with Bollywood?

Or is she planning a sabbatical to start and bring up a family?

There could be less plausible reasons that would make good tabloid fodder. Perhaps she intends to expose her detractors in the industry.

One of our team members, not known to be in good humor most of the time, even suggested she was trying to generate employment for her mother!

We would have readily dismissed the report as wild speculation by the Mumbai tabloid press but the news did not appear in the tabloid press. Besides, Aishwarya’s business manager, Hari Singh, issued a long winded statement confirming the news without confirming it, like good business managers and publicists tend to do.

“Aishwarya writes personal notes on the daily basis. Considering her career graph, the idea of a biography makes absolute sense,” Hari Singh said.

How come it doesn’t to us?

Anyway, Hari Singh continues:

“Time and again, she has been approached by many authors and publishing houses. But Ash never considered the same, considering her shooting commitments.”

Hari Singh is telling us something here, and this is what we think he is telling us.

Aishwarya has no films on hand, which our records tell us is correct. (She is rumored to have opted out of Robot and is balking at giving dates for Sriram Raghavan’s Next with co-star John Abraham.)

Our hunch is that Aishwarya may well have settled on a long sabbatical from showbiz, just like her mother in law Jaya Bachchan did after Silsila in 1981.

The Bachchans have always maintained that it is for Aishwarya to choose whether she wants to continue with her career following her marriage. Going by her public statements we feel Aishwarya sees herself more as a Bachchan bahu than as a film star now and she comes through as resolute, endearingly resolute we would say.

We will be surprised if Aishwarya does continue her career. Maybe she will make a comeback in 2020 when the Americans and Chinese are competing for real estate on the moon!