For, movies and cricket are two passions of every Indian. Movie and cricket stars are so revered that they acquire cult figure personas. The result: marketers cash in on their popularity and use them to promote everything from underwears to colas.
Come to think of it, from the cricketing world, Sachin Tendulkar is the hottest property in India's celebrity endorsement market, making him the top money grosser in cricket history.
Now add Mukesh Ambani to the list along with Sachin Tendulkar and what happens? Aila...aala re aala. The birth of 'Mumbai Indians', one of the likely favourites to win the 2009 IPL played in South Africa.
But the question everyone's asking right now is, where are all the Mumbai's favourite Bollywood film stars who should be supporting their 'Mumbai Indians'?
We have already witnessed a strong line up of our Indian film fraternity with SRK and Juhi Chawla, Preity Zinta, Shilpa Shetty and Akshay Kumar supporting their individual teams 'Kolkata Knight Riders', 'Kings XI Punjab', 'Rajasthan Royals' and the 'Delhi Daredevils'.
Last year we saw Arjun Rampal and Karan Johar also support SRK's 'Knight Riders'. For Mukesh Ambani and Sachin Tendulkar, well, the wait might just end today. After Hrithik Roshan last year, the first Bollywood celebrity this year whom you will see supporting the Mumbai Indians today in the 12th match of the IPL season 2 in South Africa is Raveena Tandon.
Our sources have confirmed that the ravishing beauty, as we all know her by, flew to South Africa day before yesterday and is going to cheer her favourite team to the fullest along with her husband Anil Thadani who also accompanied her to the beautiful city. That's not it.
We have also been hearing from the grapevine that each time the 'Mumbai Indians' will play from now on, a Bollywood celeb will be seen supporting them. The next probable stars you may likely see on your television screens soon are Eesha Koppikhar, Harman Baweja, Celina Jaitly, Shreyas Talpade, Vatsal Seth, Sonal Chauhan and Riya Sen, all lending their popularity to the already popular team, the 'Mumbai Indians'.