First there was the rumor that she’d be reuniting with Shahrukh Khan in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Bajirao Mastani, a historical epic that would bring together the much-loved jodi for the first time since Devdas. That rumor was flatly denied. Then it was said Aishwarya would be doing a cameo role for Rajinikanth’s big-budget film, Kochadaiyaan. So far nothing has been made official on that front, but given that the role is quite small and there are no plans to release the film anytime before the end of 2012, it’s possible that Aishwarya wouldn’t have to begin shooting for it for at least a year.

However, the latest rumor surrounding Aishwarya Rai’s work offers is somewhat… odd. Sanjay Leela Bhansali has reportedly requested that Aishwarya take a seat on the judging panel of a television competition show he’s planning. There aren’t any further details given about the project, though Aishwarya has been made such offers in the past. (She and Madhuri Dixit were offered jobs as judges for a reality dance competition, and just two years ago there were rumors that Aishwarya Rai would be one of the judges on India’s Got Talent, though the offer was turned down.)

It could be very interesting to see Aishwarya on a reality competition show, but frankly, jobs like that require individuals with spark and fire, and Aishwarya just doesn’t have the personality it takes to be engaging on the small screen.

Plus so far there is no confirmation of the offer at all, making it easy to dismiss as just another silly rumor.

As Aishwarya Rai baby news continues to receive daily attention, there’s also another aspect to Mrs. Bachchan (pictured). She’s not only a Bollywood mom, but also an actress. She’ll be among those being considered for a role in the new Runelords movie. Joining her is Katrina Kaif, another Bollywood babe, as well as Deepika Padukone. All three of these Bollywood babes will be up for the same role.

The Hollywood “heavyweights” included in the voting are Kellan Lutz of “Twilight” fame, Bruce Willis, Brad Pitt, Zak Efron, Russell Crowe, and Hayden Christensen. SF Gate reports that the public will cast votes on their choices to appear in the “Runelords” cast. It appears there will be three actors chosen of the nine. Voting will conclude Jaunary 31, 2012.

“Runelords” is a fantasy series written by David Farland about a mythical universe which involves superhuman beings. These “lords” are able to take endowments from others to increase their magical abilities, and in the process become even more powerful.

The role that could go to Katrina, Deepika, or Aishwarya is that of Iome, the “outrageously beautiful princess.” Brad Pitt, Bruce Willis, or Russell Crowe may get the part of “wise King Orden.” Prince Gaborn will go to either Zak Efron, Hayden Christensen, Kellan Lutz. So now it’s up to fans to decide who plays who!

It will be interesting to see which of these stars ends up winning the public votes. Aishwarya Rai has always been popular, but has surged in popularity even more since having her baby, Beti B. Someone like Brad Pitt seems like a shoe-in to get enough votes for a role, but is he “wise king” material more so than Crowe? Which young actor will get the role of Prince Gaborn, a “Twilight” star, Darth Vader, or Mr. “High School Musical” himself?

When asked at a recent function as to who his grand daughter resembles, Amitabh Bachchan said that though the little girl looked exactly like her mother Aishwarya Rai Bachchan when she was born, the girl is slowly beginning to resemble her dad Abhishek as well.

While Aamir Khan and Kiran Rao, whose son was born on December 1st, have already named their boy Azad Roy Khan; Aishwarya, who delivered a baby girl on November 16th is yet to finalise a name for her daughter. However, it seems like as for now grandfather Amitabh Bachchan is happy to call her Bitiya.

Speaking at a recent function, Amitabh Bachchan said, “Hopefully, we’ll zero in on one that everyone unanimously agrees on soon. My father (Harivansh Rai Bachchan) named my two other grandchildren Navya Naveli and Agastya. This time, the task has fallen on us, and until we find an appropriate name for her, she’s bitiya.”

Amitabh Bachchan wants to spend as much time as possible with Aishwarya and Abhishek’s daughter and has therefore taken month and a half off, so that he could spend as much time as possible with her.

Notably, Aishwarya Rai was Rajni’s heroine in the much acclaimed Enthiran. The Superstar is said to be greatly impressed by Aishwarya Rai’s performance in Enthiran and himself asked his daughter to rope in Aishwarya Rai to play a key role in Kochadaiyaan, it is heard.

On the other hand, Aishwarya Rai who recently gave birth to a baby girl, had decided not to act in films for a year, but sources said that on Rajanikanth’s insistence, she agreed to do the cameo.

Meanwhile, the hunt for the heroine is on. It is rumoured that names like Anuskha Shetty, Asin and Vidya Balan are being considered. Kochadaiyaan will be made in 3D motion capture format in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi.

Apparently a lot if you’re Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. The Bollywood beauty and her doting family have so far taken a month to come up with one for her daughter, and there doesn’t seem to be a decision in sight!

The only hint given so far about what little Beti B will be formally called has come from Amitabh and Abhishek, who indicated that if fans wanted to assist in thinking up names, they should contribute some that start with the letter A. A for Amitabh, A for Abhishek, A for Aishwarya, A for… Aaliya? Aditi? Aarti? Anushka? Who knows!

Amitabh told the Times of India today that Aishwarya Rai and the rest of family are still making their way through all the suggestions that have been given so far:

We are working on the name and should have finality on it soon. There have been hundreds of suggestions not just from the family and relatives, but also from the people, voluntarily. For this, I would like to extend my gratitude.

Pity that poor family! Most families find themselves choosing between five and ten names for their baby, but the Bachchans are dealing with hundreds, all presumably having some special significance.

At this rate Aishwarya Rai’s daughter will remain Beti B for years!

It might be a rising starlet from Asia, a random cutie from a crowd shot in Europe, or Charlie Sheen (if you have really bad taste).

Then just think about this amazing fact: He or she has a friend who is a friend of a friend of someone you actually know.

That should cheer you up. And if you have time, you can even track the person down.

A techie reader showed me a recent study which shows that more than 90 per cent of Facebook users now have only four degrees of separation.

What that means is that you can pick any Facebook person at random, and someone you know will have a friend of a friend of someone who actually knows him or her. We’re all that closely connected.

Here’s how to make best use of this factoid. You wait till your buddy is salivating over some image in a magazine: “That Katy Perry/ Faye Wong/ Aishwarya Rai is SOOO cute.” YOU: “Thanks. I’ll tell her you said that.” HIM: “You KNOW her?” YOU: “Not personally, but she has a friend who is a friend of a friend of one of my good buddies.” HIM: “Wow! Can you introduce me?” YOU: “Gimme your World of Warcraft card collection and I’ll think about it.” Try it. The goodies should come rolling in. *** HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SMS! Wow. We just passed the 19th anniversary of the first text message. Just think, 19 years ago there was NO WAY to send the message “Hi” to another human being, other than e-mail, instant messages, faxes, talking, letters, smoke signals, sign language, telegrams, morse code, semaphore etc. How did we survive? *** A MASSIVE steel bridge in Kolkata is in danger of collapse because many of its 500,000 daily pedestrian users spit corrosive splatters of chewing tobacco on it. Newspaper commentators said the moral of the story is that tiny bits of corruption can bring down a huge structure. Surely the lesson is: Don’t destroy the bridge you’re standing on? *** FACEBOOK IS advertising to hire staff. I’m tempted. Look, it’s got to be the one place on earth which will never ban its staff from doing Facebook at work. *** HAD FUN the other day tormenting a lawyer who was using the Act of God defense in a case involving a “material breach of contract.” I told him that since he was an atheist, he had no right to use an Act of God defense. He got really upset.”Don’t worry,” I told him. “I’ll pray for you.” Send ideas and comments via www.mrjam.org

Aishwarya Rai appeared on placards at the event, which also featured photos of prominent Indian women such as Indira Gandhi and Gangubai Hangal (who was mother to a daughter herself).

It’s not the first time Aishwarya has been held up as a positive example for the rights of girl children—in fact immediately after it was announced that she had given birth to a girl, major Indian print publications congratulated her and her family for their obvious joy over their daughter. In a country where the worths of too many women are judged by their ability to bear sons, celebrating the birth of a girl was the best example Aishwarya Rai and the Bachchan family could have set.

The organizers of the Pune International Marathon certainly agreed. This was one situation where using Aishwarya’s image for public benefit was absolutely the correct choice, and one that Aishwarya Rai likely would have been happy to endorse.

Filmfare Magazine every year holds an annual poll among the Indian college students requesting them to name and rank their favourite stars based on different qualifications. This year too Aishwarya Rai was voted as “Most Beautiful” by the college students.

Aishwarya Rai has been out of sight for most of 2011 while getting ready to have her baby. Even though this Bollywood favourite was not in field, Rai is not out of mind. News of her fitting award came via Twitter Tuesday when Filmfare managing editor Jitesh Pillaai proudly announced her win in 140 words or less.

“The most beautiful. Forever and ever. Aishwarya tops the @filmfare college poll yet again ,” tweeted Filmfare’s editor, Jitesh Pillaai.

The 38-year-old Indian actress worked as a model before beginning her acting career in 1997. She was an architect student when she won the prestigious Miss World pageant in 1994 and is often cited as “the most beautiful woman in the world.”

Aishwarya Rai continued to pursue a career as a model until she became an actress. Rai debuted as a film actress in a Tamil movie “Iruvar” (1997) and had her first commercial success in the 1998 film “Jeans.” She won Filmfare’s “Best Actress Award” in 2002 for her work in “Devdas.”

The results of the poll can be seen in the current issue of Filmfare.
Other big winners for the Filmfare awards included:

Priyanka Chopra as “Big Lips”
Kareena Kapoor as “Best Hair” “Best Skin” and “Glam Diva #1”
Hrithik Roshan won “Sexiest Hero”
Katrina Kaif was named “Most Datable Actor”
John Abraham for “Best Body”
Deepika Padukone won both “Best Figure” and “Best Legs”
Sonam Kappoor was voted “Best Dressed”
Madhuri Dixit as “Best Smile”
Shahrukh Khan shared “Best Smile”
Ranbir Kapoor won “Most Eligible Bachelor.”

The final award was given to Aishwarya Rai’s father-in-law Amitabh Bachchan who was named “Most Stylish Actor” by Filmfare Magazine.

As Aishwarya Rai’s baby is seen by friends and family, she continues to go by the catchy nickname that has been given to her. Meanwhile, fans have been invited to send in their ideas for names for Beti B via Twitter and elsewhere. The family may choose one of them as their latest member’s new name. A Twitter user named @ShvetaSharma5 suggested the following to Abhishek on Wednesday:

@juniorbachchan – Another Name suggestion fr ur Daughter is ABHINANDIKA (sic)….:)

To which Junior Bachchan simply tweeted “thanks” several hours ago. The previous reports suggested that the Bachchan family would officially select a name for Beti B and reveal it to the world in December 2011. That gives them a little over 3 weeks in the month for the naming to occur. Whether or not Abhinandika is the chosen name will remain to be seen, but it seems at this point that “Beti B” has stuck and may remain with Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan’s daughter throughout her life!

In a Kashmir Digest editorial, titled ‘Justice Katju and Indian Media,’ Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was labelled as a “failed actress.” The editorial also alleged that Aishwarya enjoyed all the media attention due to the delivery of her new born.

The author Inam ul Rehman from a Kashmiri media organisation accused the Indian media for giving undue attention to the wealthy and urban minority group by ignoring the needs and news that would be of importance to anyone outside that group. The editorial is in direct response to the critical remarks about the Indian media made by Justice Katju.

Taking Aishwarya Rai Bachchan as an example, the editorial tried to bring to focus the fact about the Indian media giving ‘more than required’ attention to the subjects that could be of importance only to a certain section of the community.