A suicide? An accident? Was she 19 years old as her father claimed or 23? Her death threw up one more question: Are the pressures from the family, the industry, from men, too much for young women who see the beauty and film industry as the pinnacle of their personal and professional ambitions?

The question holds a mirror to Bangalore, the nerve centre of India's beauty industry. After Nivedita's tragedy, Bangalore is beginning to look at the other side of glamour, the darker one which eludes the pages of glossies and even gossip columns. Her death brings to the fore the pressure the girls face to reach the top of the glamour industry and remain there.

Increasingly, glamour industry is becoming a profession and the obscure object of desirefor Bangalore girls. Fashion designer Sujit Mukherjee, who's had his share of meeting wannabe wunderkinds heading for fame, says: ``It's inevitable that school kids want to be models. You can't open a single newspaper or magazine without reading something on some beauty contest or the other. It's a fast way to make money and get exposure.''The quest for fame begins early. Often pushed by ambitious parents, the girls begin to walk their way to the ramp, to the small screen, to tinsel town. ``There is certainly a lot of parental pressure in this field. People around film stars live off them, that's always been the case,'' says V.N. Subba Rao, veteran journalist who has been associated with the Karnataka Film Chamber for 30 years.

Photographer Waseem Khan remembers the first time he saw Nivedita. ``She was like a child. She walked into my studio wearing her Baldwin's school uniform and eating a candy.'' Khan says he often gets calls from 15-year-old girls saying they want to model. ``They know what they want.If they don't want to stick to it a few months down the line, they quit. But the teen-agers these days are infinitely smarter than the generation before.''

With every passing year, they have new role models as more Bangalore girls make it big on the national glamour scene. Rani Jayraj, Nafisa Joseph, Diya Abraham... the list grows. But for those who don't make it, the going gets tough.

Then, there's the pressure from the families -- to remain at the top and still be within the circle of a conservative South Indian society. ``The family ethos in the South is more orthodox,'' says Subba Rao. ``Our girls are very insecure inside. Our problem is that we ape Bombay, so much so that Bangalore is the only synthetic city in the South. Madras and Trivandrum have a character of their own, but how do you identify Bangalore?''

It's even tougher if the target is the film industry. There's more pressure and more kinds of pressure. ``There is on-screen and off-screen exploitation but it's not forced, it's voluntary,''says actress Chaithali, who at age 20 is already the Film Critic's Choice. ``If you're emotionally vulnerable and you want to make it at any cost, then the casting couch syndrome comes into play. Fifty per cent of the time I was offered the couch and I had to diplomatically refuse.'' To survive in the big bad world of glamour, the women pay a price. Sometimes, they pay with their lives.