KJO finds Alia-Kareena comparison 'unfair'

Three-film-old Alia Bhatt is often compared to her senior Kareena Kapoor, but filmmaker Karan Johar says it's unfair to draw a comparison between the two actresses.

After launching Alia in filmdom with his directorial venture "Student Of The Year", Karan teamed up with the 21-year-old again for his production venture "Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania". In fact, the "Highway" girl will be seen as a huge Kareena fan in the film.

"There is only one Kareena Kapoor and I am not only a huge fan of hers on the celluloid, I also like her personally. I am very close to her and Kareena and Alia are two different people," Karan Johar told reporters during the trailer launch of "Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania".

"Kareena has created a tremendous niche for herself and set a bar so high that it's unfair to compare her with Alia. Alia has her individual charm and I am sure even Alia will make her own space," he added.

At a time when innovative marketing is key to a film's success, Alia turned into a new marketing guru and decided to use her and co-star Varun Dhawan's selfie as part of the film's promotion.

Taking pride in her decision, she said: "It was my idea. I love selfies; so I said let's do a selfie poster. But I would call it a 'Humpty' poster."

Varun said: "Alia has got great marketing skills. It was her idea. She interferes in marketing, editing and everything (Laughs)."

Television actor Siiddarth Shukla, known for his role as Shiv in TV show "Balika Vadhu", is making his debut in Bollywood with director Shashank Khaitan's "Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania", and Varun says he has a huge fan following.

"We were shooting in Borivali and all the crowd were like Siiddarth, Siiddarth... He has an incredible fan following and we can use this for our film."