Opinion Something about Sandy

After the tsunami in Japan,Superstorm Sandy is the most terrifying reality show to go live on the tube. More so,because we are watching an iconic city like New York,where many have friends and relatives,being buffeted and bruised by the forces of nature. In India,we’re accustomed to going without electricity,but powerless in New York? Oh my god.

So Manmohan Singh reshuffled his cabinet and shuffled the portfolios while he was at it. On Sunday morning,all the prime minister’s new women and men sat in neat rows in the Ashoka Hall of Rashtrapati Bhavan and Pranab Mukherjee administered his first oath of office. Since the media had announced the winners and losers well in advance,the only reason to watch the swearing in ceremony that morning was to study everyone’s expressions and read what they might be thinking.

The president appeared neither impressed nor unimpressed by the new team members,maintaining a serious but otherwise blank expression for the TV cameras. Was he recalling the many occasions when he had taken the oath of office?

The new ministers looked rather sombre,barring Shashi Tharoor,as though they were depressed rather than delighted by their elevation. Given the predictions of its imminent collapse and the hammering the government is receiving on poor performance,they may well have been thinking,Oh god,why me?

Singh didn’t look very pleased with his own handiwork either. Indeed,he looked neither here nor there but straight ahead,as if he was staring at a bleak future. Sonia Gandhi,seated to his right, looked here,there and everywhere with tired eyes,occasionally shared her feelings with A.K. Antony next to her and then with her elbow on the chair stared glumly at everyone and no one in particular. When the new ministers greeted her at the end of the ceremony,she seemed to admonish them,“have fun — while it lasts!” Rahul Gandhi,however,was smiling and joking throughout,perhaps happy to have stayed out of the cabinet once again.

The Airtel Indian Grand Prix was up next on Sunday,and but for the race being held in Greater Noida and the Indian national anthem playing at the start,it was as Indian as the champagne the winners opened at the end of the race. Buddh International is a beautiful circuit but similar to elsewhere — the commentary team was the same as it is for every Formula One event and there were nothing ethnic about it. So it was just another Formula One race. But because it was taking place in our country,there was reason to watch it. So we watched it. Frankly? The commentators talk too much,their tongues trying feebly to keep up with the momentum,if not the speed,of the cars,the race was virtually over before it began since the guy in the pole position normally ends up winning,as did Sebastian Vettel. So while it was fun to watch the cars whizzing round and round and round,what’s the point of spending an hour watching a sports event where the result is known already?

shailaja.bajpai@expressindia.com