No one in his right senses can deny or not perceive the two 'camps' in Bollywood. One is of the jagidars and the other of the unknwon soldiers. Simply put, the ones who 'inherit' the good earth, belonging to the filmi families and get all the advantages of 'royal blood'. And this camp by far was a majority and rather too powerful.

There were stray 'outsiders', the unknown soldiers, who by luck or sheer tenacity broke through, like Dharmendra and Hema Malini and Manoj Kumar and Rajendra Kumar and then Amitabh Bachchan -- though after they became big stars, their kids and family ties continued the run of 'royal blood' thereon.

Don't we know all about the Deol brothers three, or Esha, or Kunal Goswami or Kumar Gaurav? Or, then, Abhishek Bachchan?

The Indian film industry which produces the maximum number of films in the world annually is actually dependent on just a handful of stars with "a box" and a lesser number of production houses, which you could count on your fingers.

Yash Raj Films, the number one banner, works only with the big names -- the Bachchans, Shah Rukh Khan, Saif Ali Khan, Rani Mukherjee and Preity Zinta.

A close second is the Karan Johar camp (previously papa Yash Johar's), whose Dharma Productions again work mostly with the same set of marquee names. Rakesh Roshan's Filmkraft makes films only with Hrithik Roshan, and who can be a bigger star than that!

The Vidhu Vinod Chopra 'camp' works only with Amitabh Bachchan, Sanjay Dutt, Saif Ali Khan and his 'favourites'. Mukesh Bhatt's Vishesh Films also works only with 'their' kind of actors, like lesser known actresses, their own Pooja Bhatt and then models like Udita Goswami, Mallika Sherawat and Kangana Ranaut.

Earlier Ram Gopa Varma used to give 'breaks' to newcomers but when a series of his products began to bomb, his Factory had to do a rethink. In came Amitabh Bachchan and Ajay Devgan and wannabe stars got only the "side roles", as in his remake of Sholay.

In 1970s and 1980s, the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) used to be a good source of acting talent. AQ whole lot of acting, editing and directing talent kept an overflow into Bollywood. The acting course was shuit down for quite some time, and resumed only two years ago, but the graduates are not making any great news.

In between, the National School of Drama (NSD) made some headway and theatre actors were sought out a little bit. Recently in the name of reality shows, there have been a dime-a-dozen talent hunts, for stars and singers alike. But, once the show is over, and the simulated fanfare and some organised programmes are over, do you ever hear about their winners?

And even those lucky few, who get a chance, fade away before they arrive. Look at Sarwar Ahuja and Aditi Sharma, winners of some Zee contest who starred in the recent 'Khanna & Iyer'.

Although produced by Subhash Ghai's Mukta Arts and Zee Telefilms, it was only a case of keeping their promise that the film was made, it seems, and sank along with these budding babies without any trace because of the poor filmmaking and indifferent promotion.

Among the current lot, however, there have been more than just an Akshay Kumar who has climbed to the top. No godfather, no family ties, no filmi background, his is a success story so similar to the other Punjab da Puttar, Dharmendra's.

The other outsiders have been John Abraham, Arshad Warsi, Vidya Balan, Bipasha Basu, Kangana Ranaut, Ayesha Takia and Mallika Sherawat. More in number than ever before, but clearly, for the talent pool to grow, big banners need to launch films with newcomers and not just play safe.

Bollywood owes this to itself and tries to get rid of the label of being family-driven, a fraternity where just royal blood and connections count. - (SAMPURN)