Shilpa Shetty's 'Bigg Boss' kick-starts, contenders promise fireworks

New Delhi, Aug 18(IANS) The second season of TV reality show "Bigg Boss" will have controversy galore. With politicians Rahul Mahajan and Sanjay Nirupam, notorious British reality TV star Jade Goody and gangster Abu Salem's companion Monica Bedi among many others, the show will make for exciting viewing over the next three months.

Fourteen contestants including television actors Ketki Dave and Rakhi Vijayan, item girl Sambhavna Seth, actors Payal Rohatgi and Monica Bedi, non-celebrity Elina apart from Jade Goody are part of the female inmates of the "Bigg Boss" house.

Among the men are model-actor Zulfi Syed, music reality show winner Debojit Saha, MTV Roadies 5.0 winner Ashutosh Kaushik, TV actress Shweta Tiwari's estranged husband Raja Chaudhry, Congress member Sanjay Nirupam, Rahul Mahajan - son of late Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Pramod Mahajan and famous comedian Ehsaan Qureshi.

While all of them will be closeted in a specially designed house for three months under 24-hour surveillance, with no access to telephones or television, Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty, who had won the international format of the show "Celebrity Big Brother" in 2007, will be hosting the show.

Shilpa had emerged winner despite racist remarks in "Celebrity Big Brother" by Goody, who has now come to India to "change people's perception" about her.

Also, Payal Rohatgi's reported closeness with Rahul Mahajan was also earlier this month, an alleged reason for his break-up with his wife Shweta.

The show, that kick-started late Sunday night, will air in a prime-time slot on the "Colors" channel seven days a week but Shilpa will appear only in the elimination episodes each Friday, communicating with the contestants through a TV screen. Each week, one contestant will be voted out.

• Television