Whose side would Chanakya have been on?
When something like the arrest of Abu Jundal alias Abu Hamza happens,one tends to switch rapidly between Times Now and India TV,ignoring other channels. Except WWF wrestling,maybe,which is thematically related though intrinsically dissimilar,like the olive relates to the martini it swims in. I switched on the box the day Abu Jundal became Exhibit A to find India TV running a band highlighting something called Hamza ke khopdi mein Osama Osama inside Hamzas skull. The mysterious visual running with it showed Salman Khan dancing,fighting,then being inserted into an MRI scanner.
In search of relief,I switched to Times Nows Newshour and the media trial of Arnab Goswami vs. Government of Pakistan. Arnabs case collapsed,though the facts were in his favour. Weep not,stout reader. This is a common feature of court actions. Facts dont stand a chance against old-fashioned table-thumping.
On Newshour,our neighbours demonstrated yet again that Chanakya belongs to them,not us. The ur-strategist of Taxila university would have applauded the good cop bad cop team in Pakistan,which wiped the floor with our side,comprising Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam,former MEA secretary K.C. Singh and the ever-minatory Mahroof Raza.
Pakistani Supreme Court advocate Ahmed Raza Kasuri ranted unstoppably against Pakistan bashing while Rashid Qureshi,Gen. Pervez Musharrafs spokesperson,was cast as Mr Reasonable,assuring the viewer that no one in Pakistan or,at least,neither good cop nor bad cop had any interest in impeding justice. But,Qureshi said,they knew nothing about anyone named Abu Hamza. You get so excited about something about which we know nothing! How do you expect us to comment?
Superb Chanakyan stonewalling. Dont know,dont ask,wont tell. Our Arnab fought back but he was swept away by the flood of injured national pride sweeping in from across the border. The crux of the problem is that across the divide of mutual suspicion,each side believes that the investigative and legal apparatus of the other is unreliable. Each suspects that the others institutions have crossed the line of no control.
The next day,the media joined the ranks of unreliable institutions. On CNN-IBN and Headlines Today,Pakistani Presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar clearly,audibly said that Surjeet Singh was being released from custody but the channels announced it as the long-awaited release of Sarabjit Singh. To be fair,Headlines Today asked Babar to confirm the error and in an inexplicable lapse of reason,he did so.
In the midst of such uncertainties,tangibles offer comfort. And if they live and breathe,so much the better. Throughout Newshour,while his Pakistani guests fobbed him off,Arnab Goswami desperately clung to what he had: A man! We have a living man!
But the lively angst of Kasuris victimhood washed Arnab and his man away. In fact,Kasuri swept himself away,too,demanding to know why Pakistan was being pilloried when it had borne the brunt of an avalanche of Taliban invaders,from Muhammad Ghaznavi and Shahabuddin Ghori to Zahiruddin Babur.
The poor man cant have read the Baburnama,the extraordinary autobiography of an impulsive poet,hard-drinking man,fan of narcotic confections and a general who,on the eve of a crucial battle,had no qualms about visiting the harem not for comfort but for strategic advice.
Tired of ignorance and unreliability on the news,I turned to WWF wrestling,where an obscure hairy man was being dribbled like a basketball by some guy called The Undertaker. The uncomplicated honesty of commercialised violence was such a relief.
pratik.kanjilal@expressindia.com
