As the Academy Awards committee hastily tweaks the results of the Oscars after a leaked 'list' of winners appeared on the internet, two children from the slums of Mumbai set off on the trip of a lifetime for the unimaginable glamour of Hollywood.
Rubina Ali and Azharuddin Ismail - both under 10 years old - both have roles in the film Slumdog Millionaire, which is widely tipped to pick up every award not already engraved with Kate Winslet's name, including categories in which has not even been entered.
The two appealingly-cute children, who are now able to go to school for the first time in their lives, and are tipped to appear in several Bollywood films, will reinforce many self-deluding white liberals' fondly-cherished illusions - central to Slumdog Millionaire's success - that there might exist some sort of hope of escape for the teeming tens of millions condemned to a miserable life of unremitting poverty at the bottom of Indian society.
As they boarded a flight bound for Los Angeles, the child actors said they were looking forward to shopping, and could not begin to imagine what kind of luxurious, life-changing Western consumer items they might bring home with the whopping 250 rupees (almost $5.04) they had managed to save for the trip to America. They are also said to be hugely excited about their once-in-a-lifetime chance to sleep rough amid the discarded trash of Sunset Boulevard.
Meanwhile, the whole of India is thought to be full of gratitude to director Danny Boyle for kindly coming to the sub-continent and showing them how to make a film.
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