Bollywood Queen Aishwarya Rai

image from Rediff

Bollywood's paragon of age-old, dutiful Indian femininity

That's what Indian press has to say about her. CBS featured her in January 2005 episode of 60 Minutes as the Most Beautiful Woman but who could ever imagine that this coveted title will be in the hands of Bollywood's cinematic royalty?

No wonder because her Hindi looks and deep-set eyes tells that she is a goddess incarnated into a beautiful woman. She took Hollywood by storm when she appeared in her latest offering The Last Legion as Mira, the female warrior.

Born in Manglore, Karnatka, India on the 1^st of November 1973, Aishu, together with her marine engineer father and writer mother transferred in Mumbai by the time she reached four years old. She's more than just good looks. She is a proficient student with academic honors before pursuing architecture but the call for modeling and films is inevitable for her.

She started her modeling career in a Camlin pencil commercial juggling her studies as a 9^th grader. Despite her numerous modeling stints, she still goes to school until the year 1994 when she joined Miss India. Aishu placed second while Sushmita Sen declared as the winner and with the same year, she brought the Miss World crown. After winning the pageant, she became more famous as movie offers and product endorsements became abundant.

Aishu had a little experience in acting but that doesn't hinder her to wow movie critics in her launching movie Iruvar (The Duo) in 1997. Her third movie Jeans, where she played a dual role garnered her Filmfare Best Actress Award South. As of this date, this emerald-eye beauty created almost 40 films including movie in production. Her performances in the movie Devdas earned her international fame as this movie is chosen to receive a special screening at Cannes Film Festival. Since then she became a regular in Cannes and eventually a member of the Jury in 2003. In October she released her first English film Bride and Prejudice, a musical taken from Jane Austen's famous novel along with her wax figure at Madame Tussaud's wax Museum.

As of this date, she will appear in movies such as Jodhaa Akbar and Sarkar for 2007, Raj Singularity and Bhopal Movie set in 2008 and Steve Martin's Pink Panther 2 where she replaced Beyonce as the female lead. She is also set to appear in US' hit sci-fi series Heroes where she has 8 episodes lined-up for her.

Aishu remained private in her personal life but her love life set her too many controversies. Her romance with Salman Khan ruled tabloids since she is a Hindu and Salman's a Muslim, they can't be together because it is not permitted in their culture. She also dated Vivek Oberoi and Abhishek Bachachan. Abhishek and Aishu got married last April 27, 2007.