Opinion It’s a Girl!

But it was CNN-IBN that quite exploded with enthusiasm. They discovered Khar’s profile on Facebook,found she has only 69 friends listed,and announced that “obviously,she has no problem with popularity,so she must be quite a private person”. Following that deep analysis of publicly available data,they also ran an in-depth look at international relations through an examination of the wardrobe choices during their visits here of Khar,Michelle Obama,Hillary Clinton. Obama “wowed us with her classy look”; Clinton “played it suitably safe”; but Khar is “making news for not only her political,but her style statements as well”. (At that point,the background music changed to something soft and romantic.) She landed in “a classic blue kurta”,we were told,but “the US-educated foreign minister paired the kurta with pants”. Clearly a decision impossible to take without a foreign education. And perhaps it reveals a new US-friendly policy? Hopefully; otherwise,why should we care? Yes,clothes could be newsworthy,but not if they’re as incredibly boring as a blue kurta and pants.

And then there was a long disquisition on her Roberto Cavalli sunglasses,her jewellery and her Birkin (“rumoured to be about Rs 17 lakh”),complete with giant dotted arrows pointing out the accessory in question even when it occupied 70 per cent of the screen in close-up. Where’s your investigative spirit? If you really want to make this into news,send someone to find out whether it’s genuine,or something from Lahore’s equivalent of Colaba Causeway or Azad Maidan. Don’t make assumptions.

There must be some way to link all this nonsense up to real news,right? Well,IBN has the answer. “Pakistan’s foreign minister spoke of her ‘positive outlook’ — and so did her all-white outfit.” What,really? White outfits are inherently positive? Tell those who play for draws in Test matches. “The 34-year old also spoke about ‘the burden of responsibility’ with her head covered at all times,” which is fortunate,because nothing says “irresponsible” like a haircut. “Khar,” we were assured,“does make Pakistan look good.”

NDTV,too,reporting on Krishna and Khar’s meeting,chose to have as the second sentence of the report: “Now a lot has been said about the age difference between the two… 44 years.” True enough: NDTV was saying it endlessly. Nidhi Razdan had hammered in the age difference the previous evening on Left,Right and Centre,claiming it was “a new dynamic to the relationship,” a claim which she didn’t then bother to substantiate at all. Presumably the moment a 34-year-old walks into a room everything changes in obvious ways. She brought up the “45 years” repeatedly during the show — four times in the 10 minutes I saw. It was just dropped in; no context,no reason,no explanation. Apparently,it should shock us that some people are older than others.

This led to an entire conversation with the usual suspects about whether she’s a “lightweight” and “just follows orders” — a conversation which started by people agreeing that GHQ makes foreign policy anyway,which meant that the remaining discussion was rendered quite irrelevant. At one point Razdan asked if the foreign ministers’ relative ages would make a difference during the talks,and Jay Panda smacked her down quite effectively: “You know,they’re both foreign ministers,so protocol-wise they’re at the same level.”

Times Now’s News Hour,thankfully,had no patience for this sort of nonsense. Outrage was to be found elsewhere! Khar had the temerity to meet the Hurriyat! Of course,every single Pakistani foreign minister and foreign secretary meets Kashmiri separatist leaders,but Times Now was outraged over something else at the time,no doubt,and didn’t notice. Arnab Goswami was furious: “Pakistan seems absolutely keen to provoke India as much as possible,” he began. But even he couldn’t keep Khar out of it: “Maybe it is a way to prove her nationalistic credentials.” Because,you know,she’s a girl.

mihir.sharma@expressindia.com>