American Idol’s Sanjaya Dials The Apprentice’s Surya
SURYA Yamanchili, in his final hours as the most-recently fired Apprentice candidate, is the latest to weigh in on the worldwide debate over our report on suspicions that Sanjaya Malakar’s stay on American Idol is being extended by bloc voting in India – specifically from workers and technology in outsourced call centers in cities like New Delhi. writes Tabloid Baby.
Surya, like Sanjaya, is a hero to the Desi community because of his prominence on an American reality TV series (Indian-American couple Vipul and Arti Patel didn’t make it past the first episode of last season’s Amazing Race). He doesn’t buy the theory.
“What the hell?” he writes us. “This seems pretty idiotic to me. There are no facts supporting it all – just total speculation. Why don’t they just speculate that Martians are voting for him because Martians consider themselves Asian?”
Hard-core rap fan Surya (who, like Sanjaya, was born in the USA) admits, “I haven’t followed Idol. I think the fact that you can ‘manufacture’ a pop music star on national TV is proof what shit most pop music is today! Although I think if I watched the show, I’d probably like it!”
The story was based on a wave of Internet chatter on Indian and Desi blog and news sites. Since it’s been picked up around the world, new suspicions and theories have emerged.
But the potential scandal has picked up even more traction and debate in the UK, where anti-Asian bias is more of a problem, and became a national scandal amid charges of racism on Celebrity Big Brother.
Read about it here.
Posted: 18th, March 2007 | In: TV & Radio Comments (6) | TrackBack | Permalink
