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No red-carpet for Big Brother race row Briton
2007-01-26
India has said British celebrity Jade Goody, who tormented Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty on a reality TV show, will not get red-carpet treatment if she visits. Goody, who reduced Shetty to tears on British show Celebrity Big Brother, can visit India like "any free citizen" in the world but she would not be an "official guest of the country", Tourism Ministry Ambika Soni said Friday, according to the Indian Express newspaper. Soni's statement came after 25-year-old Goody, who has made millions and gained a celebrity status from reality television shows, applied for a visa to visit India. She is apparently bidding to improve her tarnished image after triggering a race row over her treatment of the Bollywood star. While the controversy over Goody's alleged racist bullying was at its peak, the Indian tourism office in London issued an invitation to her "to experience India's healing nature once your current commitments are over." The tourism minister said the ministry had never thought of officially inviting Goody to India and that the ads placed in British newspapers were meant to be "satirical". The Indian Express quoted unnamed sources close to the minister as saying she was "very upset" over the controversy surrounding the invitation. The Indian tourism ministry could not be reached for comment as Friday was a national public holiday. Goody, evicted last week by British viewers from the reality show, said afterwards she was "thinking of going over there (India) because I've been invited" by "some high-up people." A report in Britain's Sun tabloid claimed Goody planned to head to India next week in a bid to show she was not a racist and apologise for her behavior on the show, meant to be a 24-hour, warts-and-all programme. "We have not offered her a free visit," said Vivek Angra, director of the India Tourism office in London, according to the Indian Express. "The idea was to take advantage of the amount of coverage around Celebrity Big Brother," he said. "It was probably one of the most successful in terms of significant amount of coverage." India, which gets around 3.5 million tourists annually, has been keen to boost the number, which lags way behind neighbouring China's 124 million. The row over the show has been front-page news in India. It also caused an Anglo-Indian diplomatic ruckus and overshadowed British finance minister Gordon Brown's own visit here last week. Brown was forced to defend Britain against charges of racism. He described the treatment of Shetty as "offensive" and insisted that Britain was "a country of fairness and tolerance." Shetty, 31, now an odds-on favourite to win the show by remaining in the house after British viewers evict other housemates, had been taunted on the programme about her skin colour, accent and cooking. The newspaper said the ministry was keeping their fingers crossed that any visit by Goody would go off well. "If any untoward incident happens, the ministry will be in a fix," one senior official said.
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