Controversial Pakistani model and actress, Veena Malik, has been in the headlines almost every day of late, because of the cover page of FHM India's December issue. The allegedly nude photographs of Veena have become hot topics of discussion all across the world and particularly in the two countries she is connected with - India and Pakistan.

However, forgotten in all the fuss is one rather important mark - the tattoo on her body - the one that reads ISI; ISI is the acronym for Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan's intelligence agency.

Although the reasons for the tattoo are unclear, it cannot be doubted that it was used to gain mileage, both for the actress and the magazine.

Veena, in an interview with Geo News, said the idea for the tattoo was FHM India's editor, Kabeer Sharma. According to her, the tattoo was supposed to be a humorous addition, something along the lines of: If anything goes wrong... we say the ISI must be behind this,

Kabeer told me that this kind of a tattoo will be there and my upper portion will be covered with a big tattoo but the pictures were released without covering it, she told Geo News, seemingly putting the blame for the tattoo squarely on Sharma's head.

On the other hand, Sharma, although he does accept the idea was his, has much more to say.

In response to Veena's legal notice, Sharma's advocate wrote a letter which seemed to imply that the actress actually asked his client to make the tattoo bigger and bolder, not necessarily to cover the upper portions of her body but to provide more visibility to the tattoo.

In response to the idea of wearing the tattoo of ISI is concerned, your client was very much eager, excited and willing to wear the tattoo of ISI. It is further stated that your client was not only well aware of the concept; she even proactively took part in the execution of the shot. Your client spoke to Priyanka Palkar, in the presence of Kabeer Sharma, asking to make the 'ISI' marking on her shoulder 'bolder and bigger' so that it could be 'seen properly', reads the letter.

While the larger issue of the allegedly nude photographs will take some time to be cleared, what we can take away from all of this drama is that Veena Malik has quite overpowered the ISI in the art of creating controversies.

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