The death of Rajkumar, a legendary Bollywood star has triggered riots at the offices of companies that did not close for a day of mourning:
Mobs torched buses and cars, attacked the offices of international companies and stoned police on the streets of India’s technology hub, Bangalore, ahead of the funeral Thursday of film icon Rajkumar…
Offices belonging to French insurance firm AXA and Microsoft had been attacked overnight after news of Rajkumar’s death spread across the city.
Drivers pasted pictures of the actor to their windows in the hope of avoiding the mob’s attention, cable television companies closed entertainment channels, and the president of India’s main opposition party, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, decided to skip the Karnataka leg of a high-profile campaign tour.
(Thanks, Brad!)
Update: George sez, “The term ‘Bollywood’ refers to the Bombay (now Mumbai) -based film
industry in India and not to the film industry of the nation as a
whole. Similar terms exist to describe other regional filmmaking zones
in the nation — e.g. the term Kollywood is often used to describe the
Tamil film industry and Tollywood is used to describe both the Telugu
and Bengali film hubs.”