Thaindian News

By Radhika Bhirani
New Delhi, June 23 (IANS) Bollywood’s celebrated item girl Rakhi Sawant loves publicity of all kinds - positive or negative. And she doesn’t mind even if it comes from her rival Kashmera Shah. “Whether she loves me or hates me, she has made me famous by playing my role,” Rakhi told IANS on telephone from Mumbai.

Kashmera apparently played an item girl named Rakhi who aspires to become an actress in a big budget musical called “City of Dreams” held in Mumbai last week.

But the “Jungle” girl maintained that her role had no resemblance to Rakhi. Rakhi, however, asserts that it was undoubtedly a character inspired by her life.

“Kashmera definitely played Rakhi Sawant’s role in that play. It was entirely based on me,” said Rakhi, who has just won a reality dance contest, “Yeh Hai Jalwa”.

“But even if it wasn’t Kashmera, somebody else would have surely played the role,” Rakhi added.

Asked if she would ever play a role based on Kashmera’s life, she remarked: “No, never! I would never play any such role.”

She added: “Kashmera is such a girl that you befriend her and then she would backstab you. She never talks anything positive. I associate only negativity with her.”

Rakhi’s remarks are a continuation of the war of words between the two Bollywood item girls.

Kashmera had recently said of Rakhi: “I love to hate her and I hate to love her.”

Rakhi and Kashmera’s rivalry goes back to Sony TV’s reality show “Big Boss”, where the two were participants. They started off as good pals but their relations soured during the show. The duo accused each other of maligning their image to gain sympathy votes.

Their relations only worsened during reality dance show “Nach Baliye 3″, in which they even took personal potshots at each other.

Rivalry apart, Rakhi is currently basking in the happiness of finally winning “Yeh Hai Jalwa”.

“I am feeling great and very confident. My mother is very happy. Just like when the Indian cricket team wins and gets back, my win was also celebrated like that,” she said joyously.

Till date, Rakhi, who stood runners-up on “Nach Baliye” believes that she was the winner of the show. “I was the winner of ‘Nach Baliye’. Abhishek (Awasthi) and I got the maximum points but the voting system was bad,” she said.

Rakhi and her partner Abhishek had filed an official complaint against STAR Plus after the “Nach Baliye” results were announced. They had levelled several accusations against the channel, including tampering with SMS votes and indulging in software manipulation.