Media Summit on HIV/AIDS

January 4, 2005

Manmohan keeps word to Gere:

[india News]: New Delhi, Jan 4 : Keeping his promise to Hollywood

actor and anti-AIDS activist Gere, Prime Minister Manmohan

Singh will share the dais with him Thursday to discuss the epidemic

that has infected an estimated 5.1 million Indians.

Manmohan Singh will preside over a gathering of India's top media

leaders to discuss what media companies can do to address the HIV/AIDS

epidemic in India.

Jointly organised by the Heroes Project and the ministries of

information and broadcasting and health, the summit will be held at

the prime minister's 7, Race Course Road residence.

Gere had specially sought Manmohan Singh's participation in

the summit for AIDS awareness when he called on the prime minister

last year. He was glad when the prime minister acceded to his request,

agreeing that India needed to tackle the serious problem.

The Hollywood star has been urging India to take more action to check

the spread of HIV/AIDS, which, he believed, was raging " totally out of

control " in the country of a billion-plus people.

" You are in the cusp of horrors beyond imagination. The pandemic is

totally out of control in India, " Gere said at a conference, only to

be countered by Indian officials who criticised the statement as an

exaggeration.

The actor has been a practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism for a long time

and is considered close to the Dalai Lama. Gere has made AIDS in India

his cause and helped several fundraisers in its support in Mumbai and

elsewhere.

One of these is the Heroes' Project, a three-year public education

partnership with the Gates Foundation, Kaiser Family Foundation, and

the media company STAR India. The project will include 26,000 public

service advertisements aimed at reducing the stigma regarding HIV/AIDS.

Information and Broadcasting Minister S. Jaipal Reddy and Health

Minister Ambumani Ramadoss will also be present at Thursday's event.

Indo-Asian News Service

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