Well she has hit the big time – Ash – the reigning queen of all hearts in India- has become the first Indian actress to grace the cover of Time magazine. (Well it is Time Asia, but lets not quibble shall we!)

bq. Indian leading lady and former Miss World Aishwarya Rai leads the charge as a hipper, edgier, more professional Bollywood bids for global dominance.

The story uses the Bride & Prejudice shoot as a backdrop, and apparently everyone has been fascinated with this woman.

bq. Rai turned Western heads this spring as a Cannes festival jury member and the new face of cosmetics house L’Oreal. The attention led to her invitation to the airy hills north of London, where she is now playing the lead in Bride and Prejudice, Chadha’s hotly anticipated follow-up to her hit movie Bend it Like Beckham. Bride is a modern, Bollywood version of Jane Austen’s classic, in which the Bennetts of Pemberley become the all-singing, all-dancing Bakshis of Amritsar.

Mira Nair predicts, Rai “will be the next Penelope Cruz.”