Mumbai: Megastar Amitabh Bachchan has shared the story behind the title of his 1973 blockbuster "Don", saying that many of the industry veterans were not happy with the choice of the film's name.
On Sunday, the 76-year-old actor celebrated the 41st anniversary of the release of "Don", which is one of the most popular characters essayed by him.
"'Don' was a name title that no one in the market approved of. They never understood what it meant and never felt that a name such as 'DON' was material for the title of a Hindi film. In fact if truth be told... for many it was quite an amusing title," Bachchan wrote on his blog.
The "Badla" star also shared a funny anecdote on the film title's comparison with a "very popular brand of vests".
"They were carrying the name 'DAWN'. DON phonetically sounded much like that brand of undergarment in the market. There was consternation in titling a film that conveyed an undergarment," he added.
The actor revealed after the release of Hollywood classic "Godfather", the title 'Don' became "respectable".
"Much later of course with the 'Godfather' series the word garnered enough publicity and reckoning, to be respectable enough. But till then initially it was in the realm of humour."
The film was written by popular writer duo Salim-Javed and directed by Chandra Barot. It also starred Zeenat Aman, Iftekhar, Helen and Pran.
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United Nations (PTI): A spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said the world body "hopes" that in India and any country that is having elections, people's "political and civil rights" are "protected" and everyone is able to vote in a "free and fair" atmosphere.
Spokesperson for the Secretary-General Stephane Dujarric made these remarks on Thursday while he was responding to a question on the "political unrest" in India ahead of the upcoming national elections in the wake of the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and the freezing of the opposition Congress Party's bank accounts.
"What we very much hope that in India, as in any country that is having elections, that everyone's rights are protected, including political and civil rights, and everyone is able to vote in an atmosphere that is free and fair," Dujarric said at the daily press briefing Thursday.
The response from the United Nations comes a day after the US also reacted to a similar question on Kejriwal's arrest and freezing of the Congress party's bank accounts.
On Wednesday, hours after India summoned a senior US diplomat to protest remarks on Kejriwal's arrest, Washington reiterated that it encourages fair, transparent, timely legal processes.
On the US diplomat being summoned in Delhi, US State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller said "I'm not going to talk about any private diplomatic conversations. But of course what we have said publicly is what I just said from here, that we encourage fair, transparent, timely legal processes. We don't think anyone should object to that, and we'll make the same thing clear privately."
Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) officials summoned Acting Deputy Chief of Mission Gloria Berbena to their office in South Block in the Indian capital. The meeting lasted for more than 30 minutes.
On Thursday, India said the US State Department's recent remarks on the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal are "unwarranted" and asserted the country is "proud of its independent and robust democratic institutions" and committed to protect them from any form of undue external influences.
Any "external imputation" on India's electoral and legal processes is "completely unacceptable", MEA Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in New Delhi during his weekly press briefing.
In India, legal processes are driven "only by the rule of law", Jaiswal said on Thursday.
Earlier on Wednesday, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said in a statement that India took strong objection to the remarks of the Spokesperson of the US State Department about certain legal proceedings in India.
"India's legal processes are based on an independent judiciary which is committed to objective and timely outcomes. Casting aspersions on that is unwarranted," the MEA had said.
The Enforcement Directorate has arrested Kejriwal in a money laundering case linked to the excise policy 'scam'.
The case pertains to alleged corruption and money laundering in formulating and executing the Delhi government's excise policy for 2021-22 which was later scrapped.