Shilpa Shetty - The Biography. Julie Aspinall
only she was on the nominations list, and made her feelings very clear to poor Shilpa, and to the others, as well. Indeed, Carole and Danielle teamed up for a little bitch fest of their own, with Danielle moaning, ‘Why do you have to go? She’s vile!’
‘Someone they want to keep in, they don’t even involve them,’ sniffed Carole.
Unbeknownst to the housemates, of course, concern was rapidly growing on the outside with complaints beginning to flood in, while high-profile Asians living in Britain were appalled at what was going on. ‘I think it’s disgusting, and I do think that the behaviour shown towards Shilpa is racist,’ said the British-based writer, director and actor Manish Patel. ‘However, the people involved don’t actually realise what they’re doing. I think that the reason why Asians in Britain have taken this matter to task is because we actually thought that this problem had disappeared and didn’t exist any more. But it’s become quite clear that some people do have strong viewpoints about Asians and it is often something that they keep hidden inside. They may say one thing to your face, but behind your back they’ll be saying something completely different.’
Indeed, it was not just British Asians but people across the world who were beginning to wonder what modern-day Britain was really like. ‘Asian people may well now be wondering just what their white counterparts are really thinking about them,’ Manish Patel went on. ‘Do people really believe that someone from India eats with their hands? It’s quite ridiculous! Shilpa is a guest in our country. The housemates knew that she was different, they were aware that she knew very little about Great Britain and Big Brother and, instead of welcoming her, taking the time to find out about her, they have treated her abysmally.’
Back in the house, the men at least remained ardent fans. Dirk overcame his discomfiture at being nominated to leave by flirting even more heavily with Shilpa, while the lady herself continued to confide in Jermaine. Indeed, her sister was right: the experience did seem to be doing her some good in that she herself said that this was the first time in her life she had ever done anything, including going out on a date, without asking her parents first. (When she went out at night, she always had to be back by 2am.) She seemed to enjoy confiding in Jermaine: ‘I’m more chilled out when I’m off camera,’ she said. ‘I can’t do that now because I’ll let down all the Indian people who want me to project my culture … Krishna says you do your karma, do what you have to do, don’t wait for the fruits it will bear. People here don’t belong to my culture. They don’t understand my culture. I don’t expect anything but politeness and love.’
Some hope! But she was to get a good deal else out of it instead.
Day 10 in the Big Brother house and, although the full extent of what was to come was still not apparent, matters were hotting up. Two contestants had already walked out and now a third joined their ranks: Leo Sayer left after a hissy fit when Big Brother refused to send him more underpants. His abrupt departure might also have had something to do with the fact that he was the favourite to be evicted, but tensions had been building for days now, with the diminutive singer apparently unhappy about being forced to play the role of a servant. At any rate, he was gone now, having made a dramatic escape by bashing down a door with a shovel!
He did, however, have a chat with Davina about why he left. ‘It was the underpants … I’d run out and didn’t want to wash my smalls in front of everybody else,’ he explained. ‘When I got out of the house and looked properly, there was one more [clean] pair! I could have stayed another day. It’s a little bit disappointing,’ he continued. ‘I was tired, my energy went, I wasn’t feeling very good. I did lose it a few times … when you get tired, you get ratty and do silly things.’ He hadn’t been thrilled about the conditions in which he lived either. ‘Sharing the shower and [the house] being really messy,’ he said, of the factors that had irritated him. ‘I haven’t shared a house with people for a long time … I was ill-prepared mentally.’
Indeed, it was a welcome comic relief from the increasingly nasty atmosphere in the house. The first row about food blew up on the day Leo left, and so to have a distraction was a good morale boost all round. Leo himself was philosophical: asked what he felt about his escape becoming a moment of high comedy, he replied, ‘It kind of wasn’t very funny for me, but the amazing thing is that it has actually spread all over the globe. I’ve had people from Australia, San Francisco, people from Los Angeles, friends from New York, friends from Canada, friends from Italy, saying, “Oh my God, we have just downloaded you!” So I am everywhere – if only my records could make such an international impact.’
Like Ken before him, he felt the atmosphere in the house changed the moment the three new arrivals appeared. ‘I was trying to be a peacemaker and say we are all going to have to pull together, if you all show each other a bit of love then we can forgive each other afterwards for whatever,’ he said. ‘But that actually stopped the moment the Goodys came in.’
Funnily enough, he took a considerably more benign view towards them than some of the others did. Asked his opinion of Jackiey, he replied, ‘I loved her. She was the saddest exit from the house for me. I think she’s great because she’s like a child, she’s innocent, and if you don’t like it you tell her to shut up and she shuts up.’
He was of the opinion that no one else would head for the hills, which was good news for Shilpa, who had been worrying that her friend Jermaine might also want to get out. Instead, she applied cream to her face and began to prepare some food. Not that it was obvious that anything was amiss at the start: all she had to contend with initially was a lovestruck Dirk hanging around her; ‘I like your eyes, your laughter – everything,’ he said.
‘I need help here,’ Shilpa called to Jermaine, laughing.
‘Jermaine, stay away,’ commanded Dirk.
In the background the girls seethed.
As has already been chronicled here, matters then turned extremely nasty, with the row leading Jade declare, ‘She makes me feel sick. She makes my skin crawl.’
‘She’s a dog!’ responded Danielle.
Danielle was clearly the worse for wear, but Jermaine felt some responsibility for the unpleasantness, confiding to Big Brother that he shouldn’t have got Shilpa to talk to Danielle when the latter was drunk. ‘Shilpa is too wise to come between a friendship,’ he said. ‘I think Danielle’s youthfulness provoked all this unintentionally. Shilpa is balanced. She knows how to handle ups and downs. I’m not here to change anyone’s life. I’m not going out of my way. That’s what Shilpa did, and it got her into trouble.’
Shilpa and Jermaine continued to bond, the latter saying he thought he’d be leaving soon, while the former attempted to console him and told him there are lessons to be learned from every experience – and, goodness knows, she herself could have testified to that. Jade and Jack had both voted her the person they wanted to be evicted; Shilpa, meanwhile, nominated Jack for doing no work in the house, and Leo, who later left anyway, for verbal diarrhoea. Dirk contented himself with telling Shilpa he needed an Indian woman in his life.
Come the next morning, as complaints continued to flood into Channel 4, the housemates, totally unaware of the growing controversy outside, were given their next task. They were to divide into two groups, who would be called ‘Steps’ and ‘The Jackson Five’, in homage, of course, to Ian and Jermaine. Fittingly, Jermaine was the leader of the Jackson Five, with Shilpa, Dirk, Cleo and Danielle also joining the group to sing ‘I Want You Back’. The others, as Steps, were to sing ‘Deeper Shade of Blue’. Although Shilpa had never heard of the songs involved, this gave her the opportunity to do what she did best: dance. She was also highly complimentary of Jermaine as an instructor, saying that in his place she would have killed everyone, and she told Jermaine and Dirk that Danielle’s diatribe the previous evening was down to alcohol and she wasn’t taking it personally. This sweetness and forgiveness did nothing to endear her to the other women on the show.
Nor did the fact that, although she didn’t exactly distinguish herself in the singing stakes, she made a pretty good fist of dancing in The Jackson Five. The group was dressed up in giant Afro wigs and