It isn't very clear who stands to gain by spreading this rumour. But the information about a midair patch-up between Aishwarya Rai and Rani Mukherjee is pure bunkum.

According to someone who flew on the flight, this is what happened: "Ash was with her mom while Rani was with Karan Johar. It was Karan's idea that Rani say hello to Ash and break the ice."

For those who came in late, Ash and Rani were the best of friends...until the latter nimbly stepped into Ash's role opposite Shah Rukh Khan in Aziz Mirza's "Chalte Chalte" after Salman Khan disrupted the first schedule of the film and Ash was asked to pack up.

What really hurt Aishwarya was that Rani didn't even bother to ask if it was okay... unlike Preity Zinta who rang up Ash when she, Preity, was finalised for "Veer-Zaara".

Prior to this incident, Rani treated Aishwarya like an elder sister. Ash would in turn even give Rani makeup tips.

Cut to the mid-air flight where Rani, egged on by Karan, walked over to Ash who was fast asleep. Tapping her awake, Rani said, "Hello...sleeping?" Ash said she was... end of the conversation. Back to square one.

Sorry no-patch up. The incident is reminiscent of one of the most Famous female cold wars of Bollywood - Shabana Azmi and Smita Patil vied for the same roles and continued to love to hate each other until Smita breathed her last.

Their spouses Javed Akhtar and Raj Babbar had tried their utmost to bring them together, even arranged a dinner for the foursome, but to no avail. One could say Ash and Rani couldn't be friends because they shared the same hero. Rani of course is now the favourite with Shah Rukh.

So that takes care of that. Many moons ago, Sridevi and Jaya Prada were at war. All efforts to bring them together came to nought. Once, during the shooting of a K. Bappaiah film called "Maqsad", Rajesh Khanna and Jeetendra locked the two warring queens in the same makeup room hoping they'd make up. No such thing happened.

Some animosities in the film industry, specially those involving two actresses, are for keeps.

The only two warring actresses who finally made up are Sharmila Tagore and Raakhee. Having cold-warred through Yash Chopra's "Daag", they finally met and hugged when decades later Rituparno Ghosh cast them together in a Bengali movie.

As for the rest, let's leave them to their own devices, shall we?