CNN-IBN & NDTV - The Lying Macaulay Cousins

There used to be that old graphic joke that was widely circulated on the net. It was about the bosses asking you to rate your own performance and seeking your own salary raise. All you had to do was click a button and fill up a form. Only problem was that when you tried to click the button it moved away and your cursor or mouse kept chasing the button all over the screen till you realised you’ve been pranked. Most of us have been pranked with it sometime or the other. This prank became popular in the political domain to ridicule election candidates. For the last 2 centuries there’s a website that lists all of Rahul Gandhi’s achievements and those of his ancestors; www.rahulgandhiachievements.com. It’s a ‘comprehensive guide’ to all of RahulG’s achievements in life as the site’s tagline says. Not happy with this, the Congress eNREGA team members (a team now headed by Shashi Tharoor) came up with a counter-site called NarendraModiPlans.Com. This was about NaMo’s plans if he were to become PM. This is how it looked with the ‘Get Details’ button as the prank.

The site has since been pulled but it was just a humorous site to ridicule NaMo and there wasn’t anything wrong in it. After all, politics without ridicule and humour is no fun at all. Such gentle humour, even if offensive to some, must always be welcomed. Even politicians take pride if gentle fun is poked at them. Only the most worthless and useless politicians would have no humour directed at them. The only thing that is murky about this site is that it seems some media cronies were hand-in-glove with the ones who created the site. Our very own Scoopendra Chaubeji of CNN-IBN was among the first to tweet about the site and publicise it. He must have discovered the site through his “sources” through which he routinely scoops a lot of breaking stories. We can now reasonably suspect that CNN-IBN is part of the Congress’ eNREGA social media team. So once the NaMo fans traced the site’s builders, the ones who put up the site pulled it and now it’s gone. What a pity!

Not just that. The site’s creator started playing victim and claimed being threatened and so on. That is the real nonsense part. Some people may be annoyed with such humour (that’s the intention) but nobody would go as far as threatening someone for a silly site. You see, even Ruchica Tomar of Headlines Today was disappointed. She then tweeted that the RahulGandhiAchievements site was also not working. This site has been blank for the last 200 years or so and we are all waiting for it to fill up someday in 2150 when RahulG is likely to mature and have some achievements to his credit. But what raises suspicion of media folks being involved in the NaMo plans site is the sympathy and outrage of the original media-bimbo and she tweeted thus:

The absolute category-5 moron that she is, Sagarika Ghose half the time doesn’t think before she writes or says anything. Observe carefully. She equates attacks on UPA with attacks on Modi. This is how she keeps giving us proof over and over again that God too can be lazy and forgot to bestow her with some brains. The UPA is an entity and a political alliance which is the ruling party and Modi is an individual. How does attacking an entity like UPA get to be equated with attacking an individual? But that is their carefully crafted crime. When it comes to UPA or Congress they will attack the party or alliance. They will not attack Sonia Gandhi who is responsible for the entire mess that the country is in. But when it comes to Modi, individual attacks on him, tarring him, mindlessly discrediting everything he says is game for them. For the whole sequence of the story just read @sureshnakhua’s storified piece.

This is why it is right for NaMo supporters to lampoon this bimbo and the entire media for selectively targeting Modi as an individual but mildly targeting the party in power (UPA) when it comes to Sonia Gandhi or Rahul Gandhi. I’ve said before, the moment they mention “Gandhi” our media celebs pee in their pants and skirts. And if CNN-IBN is busy perpetrating lies can their colonial cousins be far behind? These Macaulay sisters never miss a chance. Here’s NDTV once again deleting a page from their website. “Love has this nasty habit of disappearing overnight, your lips are moving, I cannot hear… You don’t look different but you have changed, I’m looking through you, you’re not the same”. That describes NDTV’s frequently disappearing pages perfectly. Doesn’t it? **

NDTV posted a spurious report about the Hyderabad rally of NaMo where there is an entrance fee of Rs.5 to listen to his speech. Of course, if not for anything else, at least NaMo’s speeches are a treat for anyone. I’m sure even their group-editor Barkha Dutt secretly watches and listens to his speeches and wishes she had such popularity instead of the tag of Radia-girl. Okay, here’s what they posted:

Isn’t that a typical NDTV headline? Now this fraud-loving channel also acts a mouth-feeder to the Congress party and it’s spokies. Naturally, Manish Tewari started barking early on about how Modi is lower priced than cinema tickets and how this act of his shows blah blah. Everyone quickly joined in to condemn Modi and BJP for reducing politics to mere commerce. Although, I sincerely wonder if anyone would pay to even see Manish Tewari dancing as a bar-girl. There is simply no worth in anything he utters, just as most reports of NDTV must be treated with suspicion. Nowhere in this NDTV report does it mention that the Rs.5 was a token collection for the Uttarakhand Relief Fund. It’s a first in Indian politics that people are willing to pay to listen to a politician. Usually, the Congress is known to pay people and feed them food to attend their rallies. No wonder it shocks them and the likes of Manish Tewari.

However, in their enthusiasm to condemn Modi with lies both NDTV and the Congress forgot something. It was Mahatma Gandhi who started the practice of raising funds by charging a small fee for his autograph. Well, he used to charge Rs.5 too. If you do a minor math you will also realise that Rs.5 in the Mahatma’s would probably be as good as Rs.500 in the current times. His grandson, Arun Gandhi, writes that he used to help in collecting these funds. So like the impatient fools that they are, both NDTV and Congress, particularly Manish Tewari, indirectly ended up lampooning the Mahatma too. When the facts came out all these charlatans scrambled back into the holes they crawled out from and NDTV once again deleted a report.

The Macaulay sisters, NDTV and CNN-IBN, will continue to peddle their lies and their mischief till Elections 2014. They desperately want Modi and the BJP to lose because, as Modi himself puts it, their “Roji-Roti” comes from abusing him. That these colonial cousins will faithfully do for their bosses. After ending up with egg on their faces, the Congress, NDTV and CNN-IBN have now to deal with a new site called UPAPlans.Com. Enjoy!

** Lyrics from the song “I’m looking through you” by The Beatles.

 

An Idiot's Guide To Bharat Nirman

Someone wisely said "If you can't blind them with brilliance, then bedazzle them with bullshit..." This works fine for our media folks. For the eighth straight day yesterday they continued to fool the people with the distraction of IPL Spotfixing issue. This is not to suggest that they shouldn’t cover it but it certainly doesn’t deserve the 24X7 coverage that it is being given. Perhaps there were orders from upstairs that the GOI didn’t want adverse coverage of its non-performance on Rajiv Gandhi’s death anniversary and particularly so on the 4th anniversary of UPA2. Both these events passed with minimal assessment of the UPA and Congress performance. The most corrupt govt in the history of the democratic world and the most non-performing one too. That is how I would summarise the govt of Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh. The latter is easily the most insipid PM this country has ever had. There was another event that the GOI may not have wanted to spoil; the Chinese Premier’s visit.

So Spotfixing was handy for the media to fool the nation. And there was enough incentive too. The spate of Bharat Nirman ads by the Congress with public money has pushed all other ads into back of the mind position. Some have compared it to the “India Shining” campaign of BJP in 2004 which backfired. But the Nirman ads are being viewed in the age of Social Media (SM) which doesn’t hesitate to call BS when it sees it. A couple of news media houses have debated the Nirman ads but other than that most news channels are just happy to enjoy the luxury dole that has dropped into their lap. Why complain! The other big difference from 2004 is that the Congress cannot help making you believe that everything in this country was brought to you by the Nehrus and Gandhis, the rest of India are just passengers who ride their train. You know, like if you travel on national highways of the Golden Quadrilateral the pics of AB Vajpayee have been removed and replaced by Sonia Gandhi. It’s like ‘Made by Sonia Gandhi’ even when she had absolutely nothing to do with it.

The core Congress message of these Bharat Nirman ads are: 1) You are a bunch of idiots and you can be fooled over and over again. 2) You are not smart enough to notice our hypocrisy. 3) We have nothing brilliant to show for performance so you we are going to bedazzle you with bullshit.

So let’s look at a couple of these Bharat Nirman ads and see what the Congress and the GOI really want to communicate to us. The first one is about the great educational institutions their govt has created so that your kid never has to go abroad (Video 1.01mins)

Voila! Move over US and Japan! Our kids have now made robots that serve tea to guests. I can believe that part definitely because Indian kids have proven themselves to be smarter than many others in the world. But for all the screaming about so many great institutions the Congress has created so that your children don’t have to go abroad, where do the ‘motor mouths’ of the Congress have their kids going? You have unauthorised spokies Digvijaya Singh and Sanjay Jha of the Congress thrilled being in New York for the graduation of the sons and nephews. Of course, their party boss doesn’t trust any Indian doctor or hospital at all. Nobody knows her illness but whenever she sneezes she rushes off to New York, Amsterdam or Rome or wherever ‘Veni Vidi Vici’ will take her to be treated. So these institutions are created for desi bumpkins by the Nehru-Gandhi clan, so be grateful and vote for Congress.

As a marketing person, I can tell you, one of the first things in selling a product is to imagine a picture of who your customer is. Preferably even draw a sketch of that customer or group. You will find that exercise quite enjoyable. The Congress is a master at drawing this picture. In other words they are quite clear who their voter is. This is a good thing for any political party. They are even better, they ensure their customer stays the way he has always been; a perfect village bumpkin or a village idiot. Keep them permanently in low education levels and low development of their villages so that they marvel at the wonders of the world the Congress creates. This village bumpkin explains how he saw magic stairs that go up and down. He describes how this that magic thing goes “Trrrrrrr” above ground and “Trrrrrrr” underground and how it has magic doors that open and close. Whoa! What could that possibly be? And the other village bumpkins are stunned and wonder if the Bumpkin No.1 has gone crazy or senile. Watch (0.34mins):

The political tactic of the Congress is stark in the ad. Keep them uneducated, keep them in unemployment. Then the white-skinned ones will come and deliver “magic” to them and overawe them with a basket of doles like NREGA or FSB and make them feel “look at what your mai-baap have done for you”. If after 65 years of independence our villagers have to be still overawed by metro trains then it speaks a lot for how pathetic our govts have been, mostly the Congress govt. Considering the first metro started in Kolkata around 1986-87 you can calculate how far behind in time other cities are. And even the urban transport system is named JNURM after Jawaharlal Nehru. So there you go, if you have BRTS or better buses in your city, it’s a gift from Nehru. Be grateful, bumpkins! While the media does analyse whether these Bharat Nirman ads are “image make-overs” they don’t look at how clinically deceptive they are. Why would they? After all the Gandhi name spells money all over.

Lately, the Congress has been screaming the Opposition is “anti-poor” because the Food Security Bill (FSB) wasn’t passed in the last parliament session. That was washed out over Ashwani Kumar and Pawan Bansal. How long can you sustain the poor with doles and overawe them with metro rails? Well, as long as you “walk the dog” and make sure the crumbs are delivered to the poodles in time. Considering the PM and Sonia Gandhi are so concerned for the poor, how does it explain an expense of over 140 crores over the last 3 years on various anniversaries? 

There are many newspapers and channels which survive purely on the govt doles. Not surprising! This is why I once wrote “Saving Shekhar’s Express” on the ads doled out to the paper. That is just the official spend. If you add up other state expenditures and other surrogate ads the total could go well over 300 crores (Do read “The Gandhi Septology”). Now on top of all these comes election and boom-time with Bharat Nirman. Do you really expect the poodles to be honest? Naturally, the media doesn’t challenge it when RahulG and SoniaG go around stating “RajivG brought computer to India” or “Nehru brought gas to India”. These statements are now the butt of jokes on the SM. That’s how Bharat was Nirmaned!

The Chinese Premier was recently here after the Ladakh incursion. Seems peace was made and that just reminded me of something; an old story. When the Chinese and Japanese made peace after the world war the Chinese decided to present the Japs with a gift. They presented them with a 1mm thick and one-metre long pure-Gold thread. The Japs accepted it but were stunned how the Chinese could create such a marvel. So they got together their best engineers to find out how they could do better. The Japanese finally got it and they drilled a hole right through the 1mm gold thread and presented it to Germany. The Germans accepted it but were rattled that the Chinese and Japs could be better than them at such marvellous engineering and their govt couldn’t rest till they had outdone those two. So the German govt employed their best scientists to make an improvement to the thread. Finally, the German engineers created an even thinner golden thread and passed it through the thin hole in the 1mm gold thread given by the Japs and tied a knot at both ends. The German govt was thrilled and told the Japs and Chinese what they had accomplished.

Years later the Germans presented the golden thread to the Indian govt. Our govt didn’t waste any time calling engineers and scientists to add value to it. The big boss just ordered that it be named as “Rajiv Gandhi Golden Wonder” and the village bumpkins came and marvelled at this wonder. That is how Bharat Nirman happens. Anything that is done, anything that is created with people’s money and energy is courtesy some Nehru or Gandhi. Build anything, dole out anything and just put a stamp on it: “Made by Gandhis”. Bharat Nirman! 

Update: This post quoted some figures from a Newslaundry report on advertisement figures on May 21 Rajiv Gandhi death anniversary. The site has since reported those figures being inaccurate and therefore the figures quoting them have been removed. 

  

Come Fly With Us

On the Wharton-WIEF episode this is what I wrote a few days ago: “One of the things about USA that I admire is that they consider even one American being attacked as an act against the country. Reprisal is assured. Any American attacked anywhere in the world is taken very seriously by the US govt. In contrast, the Indian GOI values Indian lives very casually”. The anti-national elements thrill and cheer when an Indian is “snubbed” by other countries or institutes abroad because of their political ideologies. To the Congress and the Communists India or Indians never came first. So it’s hardly surprising that Italy has now refused to return the two Marines charged with two fishermen off the coast of Kerala. I don’t blame the Italians one bit. On the contrary I applaud their govt for standing by their citizens' right through the whole incident and events after.

It’s funny to think Ram Singh, the accused in the Delhi Gangrape case, decided to commit suicide in Tihar jail. And though there isn’t a final confirmation if it was suicide or murder Ram Singh could have used some innovative excuses. He could have asked to visit his wife or family for Holi or Shivratri and then disappeared. After all, another rape-accused, Bitty Mohanty, did jump parole and disappear for seven years. Till a few months back Durai Dayanidhi, son of a top politician and accused in the granite scam in Tamil Nadu, was absconding for many months till a court allowed him bail. In the Gopal Kanda case (Geetika Sharma suicide) another accused, Chanshivroop Singh has jumped bail and fled to the US. The sob story can go on and on.

In the famous murder case of Gulshan Kumar of T-Series tapes the Mumbai police had named musician Nadeem (of Nadeem-Shravan fame) as a suspect while he was abroad. Nadeem, who was in the UK then, decided never to come back to India and face trial and still lives in the UK. You would think it is quite silly of the police who want to nab a suspect but would announce his name so he can happily stay away from interrogation or trial. Any sensible Police unit would have stayed quiet till the suspect returned and then announced and arrested him. Nadeem, on learning he was named a suspect, stayed on in the UK and his asylum case went right up to the House of Lords who refused to extradite him. Back then the House of Lords was like a Supreme Court and the UK now has a separate Supreme Court. The rule for Indian police is to first be foolish and then play out a long-drawn extradition exercise. It’s a very repetitive story, isn’t it?

Other countries make it extremely difficult for us to get a criminal back to India for a trial. And I’m talking about an “Indian” criminal not a Honduran or a foreigner from Burkina Faso. But what happens if there is a rare case of someone being actually extradited? Remember Abu Salem? His wife was hired for Reality shows. Salem himself wanted to contest elections from Azamgarh (he would have won too). The Portuguese even demanded that Salem be returned for improper treatment of the accused. The late Jagjit Singh Chauhan, master-mind of the Khalistan terror movement was given asylum abroad. And our media never forgets to do favours to those absconding. MF Hussain who was wanted by Indian courts absconded and finally went into exile and died. The Indian media hailed him as a hero who was hounded out. No matter what the cause, a person running from Indian courts is a fugitive and must be treated as such. Media glorifies criminals and fugitives.

Lalit K Modi, the former IPL boss, is wanted in India for questioning. He is happily in the UK and frequently appears on TV shows as a panellist. Really nice! How did we get here? Firstly, it wouldn’t be wrong to say our govt has turned this into a Banana republic that many have chosen to call it. The Italian Marines were first sent home for Christmas and returned. They were allowed to go home again to vote. To vote? How absurd can this get? Most Armed-forces personnel are allowed to vote through post from where ever they are located. This could have been considered for the Italians too but no our govt wanted to be generous.

It now raises the suspicion why the Italians backed out. Of course, I maintain that I applaud the Italian govt for standing up for their Marines. They had disputed the legality of the shooting incident right from the start. It’s the Indian govt that has shamed itself and the nation. There will be whispers and then a general connection made that there may have been some backdoor deals with the Italians. This comes at a time when the Italians are investigating the Agusta Westland Chopper scam and many inconvenient names from India may have popped out. So is this a deal with the Italians to protect such names? Time will tell (or maybe time will bury this scam too).

What we do know is that far from being a super-power or any close to it, we have truly become the laughing stock of the world. When it’s terror we play “dossier-dossier” with Pakistan. I’m convinced we will do the same with Italy as we have been doing with Pakistan, with the Bofors players, with Nadeem and many such cases. The Indian govt has a permanent label on its head “come fly with us”.

PS: On a different note, I had a chat with Prasanna Vishwanathan of CRI last week. Those who didn’t get the link through Twitter/FB can hear it on Youtube.
 

Twenty Two Yards Of Dead Bodies

“He who joyfully marches to music, rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice.” - Albert Einstein

According to a TOI report some 4000 soldiers have died since 1999 for various reasons when there has been no “official war”. There is something strange about soldiers being recruited in the Army. Quite a lot of them are from villages, rural towns and mostly from poor families. There are villages in Rajasthan and Himachal that have at least one veteran or soldier in the army. There are villages in Rajasthan where at least one member of every family is in the Army or is a veteran. You know… young men and women around the age of 21-22 willing to die for their country if required. Many, if not all, fortunate ones in the same age-group are addicted to the latest mobiles, malls and movie stars. The slogan “Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan” does seem to have a deep meaning and prudence. It’s either the farmer or the soldier who is dying lately. Very frequently!

Last night some TV channels were discussing Captain Saurabh Kalia the soldier who first noticed the Kargil infiltration in 1999. He and five others were captured, tortured and their dead bodies returned to India by Pakistan. There was Arnab Goswami on TimesNow talking about him. And yes, there was Barkha Dutt, the Kargil heroine, on NDTV. Both channels had to discuss Capt. Kalia with some Pakistani guests also. Barkha was looking to an open and honest discussion and the Pakistani, Gen. Qureshi, decided he had enough and it was pointless. I’m even amazed that it takes him to tell her that it’s pointless talking to a representative of your enemy of that war about a situation. Well, Barkha and Arnab show you how intelligent our media is and how concerned our govt is. Barkha even ended her program with the words that it takes something sensational to talk about our war heroes. So what was this sudden reason to talk about Saurabh Kalia? Well, after 13 years of waiting his father, Dr. NK Kalia, has petitioned the Supreme Court to direct the GOI to seek an apology from Pakistan for “war crimes” in returning the body of his son tortured.

“Kargil martyr Saurabh Kalia's torture: Violations by Pakistan unacceptable, says government” says the NDTV report. If you read the headline you’d think our govt has suddenly woken up and it had nothing to do with the SC petition by Kalia’s father. Yeah, the UPA govt that doesn’t observe Kargil Diwas. The same UPA whose prince charming, Rahul Gandhi, claimed on November 4 that the Congress had generously supported the BJP during the Kargil war. We are just past another anniversary of 26/11. I remember during the 26/11 attacks TimesNow and Arnab had screamed “We will never forget”. And yet within a couple of months TOI was running a crap campaign called “Aman Ki Asha”. So much for never forgetting dead people and soldiers! And Barkha Dutt? Oh yes; the one who reported breathlessly from Mumbai during 26/11. In less than 48 hours, even before the blood on the streets and the targeted buildings had dried and were washed she was doing an episode of “We the people” right from Mumbai on November 30, 2008. This episode was angrily titled “Enough is enough”.

In a tweet on 26/11 this year Barkha called it an “act of war”. I suppose same as Kargil. She also states privilege offers no protection and terrorism is an awful leveller. If you decide to watch the video of that program you will find that except for one Shameem Khan, who lost 4 members of his family, all the rest could be categorized as the “privileged”. Of course, the panellists on the program were poor people who had experienced terror themselves – Ness Wadia, Simi Garewal, Bachi Karkaria, Ratna Pathak, Kunal Kohli, Luke Kenny etc. and one former police officer M.N. Singh. Barkha’s outrage over the act of war and her histrionics were on full display that night. After a heated exchange between Simi and a guy from the audience she even told everyone: “Will you all do what I ask? Can we have dignified silence please?”. Such was the outrage. Here are some quotes from her (in blue) at the beginning of the program:

Home Minister (Maharashtra) and many more heads are expected to roll. Oh yes. RR Patil, then HM did roll. He even said somewhere that such attacks happen in many cities. Well, what do you know; he’s back and is still the HM of Maharashtra. 

We are going to tell our politicians that we don’t necessarily trust them. And the politician she had on the program? Oh, that was Abhishek Singhvi. Yes, the same guy who was suspended for his physical escapades and is now back on all channels again as Congress spokesman. She also had Milind Deora, who is currently a minister.

Justice for this, justice for that! These are frequent campaigns run by our media. And in the run up to 26/11 what are some of the great deeds our politicians were busy with? 2G, Cash for votes, CWG scam, Hasan Ali and his black money which has ended nowhere, Adarsh scam, Aircel-Maxis. Within hours of 26/11 ending Vilasrao Deshmukh his son Riteish and Ramgopal Verma were on a terror tour inside the Taj hotel. At an all-party meeting the PM announced there would be four more hubs of NSG. That would mean more Saurabh Kalias and Unnikrishnans will be happy to serve. What happens once the war is over and all the patriotic screaming is over in the media? They get back to their games of hosting our enemies. Especially, the architect of Kargil – Parvez Musharraf.

Politicians and our media seem to have a strange love affair with those who plot the destruction of our nation. Even when Musharraf has ceased to hold any official position our media seems to believe he is the one with the wisdom on leadership and future of India. So you have the Kargil heroine running everywhere to interview him. You have the India Today Conclave hosting him, you have HT Summit hosting him. And he’s a frequent guest on both NDTV and CNN-IBN. These channels are often hyper-patriotic and even have special songs composed for some special occasions. A report from The Hindu in May 2012 describes certain incidents that the guys in the army seem to routinely experience. This was after a ‘Sahayak’, someone who’s like a valet, was beaten up. It talks about simmering class-tensions and feudal mindset in the army too. Musharraf comes to our land tells us he doesn’t regret Kargil, he tells us Muslims in India need a better deal and cracks jokes that make our media celebs laugh. During the India Today Conclave in 2009 Maulana Madani, an MP, gave a stinging response to Musharraf’s concerns about Indian Muslims and asked him politely not to worry. (See video) The host, Arun Poorie of India Today, was left dumb and speechless.

If not that Musharraf guy there’s always that other one. Yes, the other national pastime of our media folks, especially Barkha Dutt, is none other than Imran Khan. Our media seems to campaign for him as PM as much as they do for, say, Rahul Gandhi. He was here again this month and had reassuring words for India: If the Kashmir issue is not resolved there may be more 26/11s. And since we talk about “levellers” what levels everything better than Cricket, eh? Playing cricket with Pakistan with top politicians watching levels everything. In the 2011 world cup match at Chandigarh the Pakistan and Indian PM with their entourage were there cheering the players. After the match NDTV even put up banner with the jubilant Indian team and their lucky mascot Rahul Gandhi. And now the GOI has decided to honour Saurabh Kalia, Sandeep Unnikrishnan and many other fallen soldiers of Kargil and 26/11 by hosting another Indo-Pak series in December 2012. Idiots who scream patriotism every other day will, of course, turn out to watch the matches and the media will make another neat pile. It’s now called ‘Cricket Diplomacy’. Saurabh Kalia is dead while his father has been fighting a lot more battles. He’s taken the latest one to the Supreme Court.

If Saurabh Kalia had returned alive with his limbs broken or blinded he would have lived a miserable life running from pillar to post fighting for pensions and dues from the GOI. Fighting in Kargil was probably easier for our soldiers. If there’s anything left our politicians will make sure they will screw it up with an Adarsh scam over land supposedly allotted for Kargil heroes. Oh yes, how can we forget? There’s LK Advani, Dy. PM during Kargil, who went to Pakistan-Yatra to certify Jinnah was secular. Our Laloos and Bollywood celebs frequently go on a pilgrimage to that holy country. Lately, even the very secular Nitish Kumar was on a ‘Tirth yatra’ in Pakistan. A wag once commented Tamils in Sri Lanka don’t matter because they aren’t vote-banks but Pakistan matters because of Muslim vote-banks in India. I wouldn’t disagree. Pakistan is a vote-bank for our ‘secular’ forces.

What about our Cricketers? Aren’t they somewhat similar to soldiers? They wear India colours; often display patriotism covering themselves with the Indian flag. There’s a little guy who turns up at every match painted in the tri-colour just to support Tendulkar. Some of these cricketing celebs live under high security. The same security provided by the likes of those who die in Kargil or on the streets of Mumbai, like Tukaram Omble. People protesting is one thing, it is time these Cricketers stood up, showed some spine and said NO to playing Pakistan in a bilateral series. This is no world cup or international tournament where we don’t have a say. This is our own choice.

“The greatest patriotism is to tell your country when it is behaving dishonourably, foolishly, viciously.”― Julian Barnes, Flaubert's Parrot.

Our policy towards Pakistan is not and never has been driven by a National Compass. It has always been driven by personal opinions, situations and stupidity. The cricketers now have a chance to stand up and do the right thing by the Kalias, Unnikrishnans, Ombles and many of our fallen men and women. They have the chance to show they not only have brains but also a spine independent of the BCCI and the GOI. They can imagine the plight and suffering of the families of those who died and imagine twenty two yards of dead bodies and not necessarily a cricket pitch.