Fixing a fixer

You have to hand it to Harbhajan Singh. The man’s in-built sneakometer is absolutely out of this world. Half a decade before the entire world realized it, Bhajji had already figured out the sneak that was Sreesanth. Slapgate my friends, was not simply a case of a hot headed man losing his shirt after a game. In a move, strangely reminiscent of Minority Report, it was just a case of Harbhajan doing then, what the entire country feels like doing to Sreesanth right now. One tight resounding slap. For this. And for every other time he decided his job was not to give his all on the field, but to try and outdo Hrithik Roshan. Sure he got under the skin of the Aussies. Sure he took the catch which won us the T20 World Cup. But deliberately sabotaging a cricket match to earn 40 lakhs when you are already earning crores from the IPL, sponsorships and endorsements? You have to be a fool of a special kind to do something like that.

Unless he is the smartest of the lot. In today’s world of intrigue, there is hardly anything outside the realm of possibility. So while I was sitting here pondering his motives, I was suddenly granted a fly on the wall view of what was going through his brain when he got convinced to do his bit of spot-fixing. And before you scoff, it has happened to me before. With David Beckham nonetheless.

Sreesanth: F**k*n s**t. My international career is going nowhere. Srini and the BCCI are never going to give me a new contract unless I pick up my form. Where does my money come from? What do I even do? Hmm..let me call up the guy who I know will get me a nice fat payday.

Picks up a phone and dials a number with one swinging hand movement all in one go. Breaks into a little jig out of happiness while the phone rings.

Sreesanth: Hello?

On the line: Bh@#@#*d kaun?

Sreesanth: Hello? Virat bhai? Sree here.

Virat Kohli: Ma#@$*&&*d!! Mallya’s party isn’t until tonight! And for the last time ever mother#*$@r!!! You aren’t invited to dance at the RCB party. Attend as a bloody fu#$*ng guest if you want to. And get some hot one along with you, if you can manage it. Now leave me fu*&$%#ng alone and let me get my 5 day stubble to perfection. C*#t!!

BANG!! Silence for a couple of mins as Sreesanth adjusts his multiple wrist bands touches his temple twice and sends out a quick prayer before exhaling.

Sreesanth: Oh dear! That didn’t go too well. There goes my plan to be the Prabhu Deva of today’s generation. Pretty sure if I had made Vijay Mallya look at my moves, he would have called up Arindam Chaudhri and Planman would have offered me a film role on the spot. Hmm maybe I can go to the Gulf like all my other friends and try my luck. But I can’t even play for UAE having represented India. And who will want to look at me if they can look at actual belly dancers. Hmm let me call up a lawyer and see what he can come up with.

Picks up a phone and a phone directory, sweeps through it and dials a number with one swinging hand movement all in one go. Breaks into another little jig out of happiness while the phone rings.

On the line: Hello! Former Ajmal Kasab lawyer, Abbas Kazmi here. I also appeared on Bigg Boss. Who is this?

Sreesanth: Hello Abbas sir! My name is Sreesanth. My money is running out and I want to earn some more money quickly sir. I know you make the impossible happen sir. Like defending Kasab. Something which no sane person would do. Can you do your magic for me also sir?

Abbas Kazmi: Of course Sree. Now we are friends. So I’ll call you Sree. OK? So I made a friend during my Bigg Boss days. He routinely helps cricketers when they need to make more money. Very charming guy. His name? Vindoo Dara Singh. I will get you in touch with him. OK? And I will take 5% of what you make OK? Good! You can forget cricket. Get into reality TV. Enter a few shows. You will be famous in India and the world. Look at Kim Kardashian. See what reality TV can do for you. Cricket is fine. That is done. You can do a little on the side if you want to.

Sreesanth: OK Abbas. I will call up this Mr. Vindoo.

And the rest is pretty well known.

Dumb you thought? Absolute genius I tell you.

CIAO CIAO!!

Well a couple of goodbyes to hand out this week.

Manchester United fans the world over were saying goodbye after the retirement of one of their greatest ever managers in Sir Alex Ferguson. 27 years of managing one of the biggest football teams in the world and chewing his way through 2700 kg of chewing gum in the process. It has been a remarkably successful career. Even without the chewing gum. To be honest, the man never gave me much joy as an Arsenal fan. The only joy I have ever had at his expense was a recreation of the 2004 Battle of the Buffet in my head. The image of a pizza slice thrown by Cesc Fabregas hitting him square in the face and sliding on to his suit puts me into guffaws even today.

Time and again he thwarted Arsenal, sometimes even beating us with bizarre tactics like playing 8 defenders in the starting 11. And in his final year, he lured away our captain and top scorer in a cheeky piece of business which left all of us Arsenal fans infuriated. He made me envious of his team’s success and his haranguing of referees and officials made me absolutely loathe him. No, this man brought me no joy whatsoever. But then, that wasn't his job. It was his job as a rival manager to make me go green with envy at his own success. And that he managed to do very well. He earned my respect and my grudging admiration as a winner and I am really relieved to see the back of him, in the hope that it will make life a little easier for my own team.

So goodbye Sir Alex. You have earned your rest. I will miss watching United play and commenting, ‘Oh of course he bought Howard Webb!’ Your drive to win and your red faced fury at losing will be missed. And I wish you a healthy and a far more peaceful retired life.

There was another sendoff on a smaller scale which I wanted to give this time. To my sanity.

Now just as a backdrop, there have been several corruption scandals in our country over the past few years. The line of scandals which are exposed nearly every couple of days would probably far outstrip the line of people waiting for a ticket to an India- Pakistan cricket match at the Eden Gardens (if there ever would be a line for that). Nearly every part of the government has come under fire for being riddled with corruption scandals. The PM has been chastised as a weak individual with not enough personality or conviction to stamp his authority and clean image on his ministry. Hamstrung by corrupt ministers who would rather pay obeisance to the higher Italian deity than do any good for our nation, he has, quite generously in my opinion, been described as an underachiever.

And so in the backdrop of all that, it has been quite amusing to watch the Congress parading its victory in Karnataka as a victory against corruption. Several of its leaders came out and criticized the previous state government for its corrupt image and claimed that their huge majority was a victory for their clean image. Considering the shenanigans conducted by their own party people in the Central government, they would be well advised to look up irony in the dictionary and then take a nice big slice of humble pie. Thrice a day. And serve some of it to Mr. Yeddyurappa who is apparently pretty miffed at having missed out on his birthday celebrations.

Victory against corruption? Goodbye sanity. It was nice knowing you while you lasted.

Until later!

A Bit of This and a Bit of THAT

Wow! That was quite a busy month! Resulting in a very Manmohan-esque radio silence. I must admit though, that it has not been all work.

The IPL has started and today’s post is like our typical IPL player. I was too intrigued trying out some Jumping Jhapaking followed by some Thumping Thapaking to actually put my brain to some work. Farah Khan is a genius. Even bigger than the late Steve Jobs if I have to be absolutely honest. 10 years back I would have been delighted to have a phone where I could call without it dropping every 10 minutes. Come to think of it, I would be happy for a phone like that even now. But then now when my call acts truant, I can check my email, my calendar and throw in some quality games to kill the time. I never knew I needed those things. But now I do. Anyway, I digress. Back to Farah Khan. 10 years back, dancing at a boundary being hit or a wicket being taken was supposed to be the sole preserve of Billy Bowden. Not anymore. Now I do it. And I am sure in sometime I wouldn’t be able to do without it and would desperately need some backsides to Thumping Thapak when Tendulkar got out.

I love how the IPL has made us de-sensitized to things which would have been unthinkable a decade back. DLF Yes Bank Maximums. The Zoozoos. The Double Ds. Danny Morrison. The MRF Blimp (sniff! Where art thou?). A bellowing RAVI SHASTRI!!!! Sanjay Manjrekar calling a run rate of 8 runs per over slow. They have all seeped into our consciousness and as much as the Englishmen deny it, into test cricket as well. We no longer think it is a big deal to score 400 runs in a day of cricket. Geoff Boycott and Aakash Chopra are appalled at the run rates we see in Test cricket these days. And Chris Gayle is the ultimate Anti Christ for them.

Speaking of Chris Gayle, the man was on a mission (Yes I regularly read The Ravi Shastri Guidebook to Clichés). He may have congratulated Manchester United on winning their 20th title. But his ego would not allow an innings of his to be out-commented on Facebook by some wee football team. And so he went on a rampage to rid Facebook of all Champ20ns posts. Success. And how! Reports of poor Mitchell Marsh and Aaron Finch being coaxed out of the dressing room with free bottles of Fosters may not be entirely off the mark. As if the willow bashing wasn’t enough, Gayle also returned to do some Gangnam Style by picking a couple of wickets. He literally carried the RCB team on his shoulders. Actually I see now, why he might have wanted to congratulate Manchester United **cough Dutch slimeball cough**.



Aside from all the frivolous stuff, it has not been a particularly happy time for Facebook posts. Rapes and bombings don’t really make for pleasant reading. And I do think people have been taking all the Facebook activism a little too far as well. Post after post blames the government for the rapes. ‘TAKE ACTION, THE ELECTIONS ARE COMING’, they scream. Cut it out folks. Voting out a government isn’t going to stop anything. The government is not responsible for these reprehensible acts. Moral depravity cannot be cured by tougher laws. The laws are in place. Speedy and tougher justice can be demanded for. But demanding a change in government does nothing. Protesting against the government for corruption and red tape is justified. They are responsible for it. How is Manmohan Singh responsible for a random fully grown man thinking it is right to sexually assault a 5 year old girl? A change in mentality is brought about by better education. Not tougher laws. This isn’t North Korea. And even they need education to brainwash their citizens into thinking what is acceptable.

We cannot blame the government for everything. That is what will stop them from acting on issues which they can really do something about. And then who will we blame? Until next time then.

Zip it Markandey

I like Sanjay Dutt as an actor. I have watched his Munnabhai movies several times over and each time I have laughed as hard as I did the first time. I admire the fact that he has managed to clean up his drug addiction issues, conquer his personal demons and at least on the surface of it, has become an ideal hard working family man. Precisely the reason why I feel for him, that he has to spend three and a half years in prison. Away from the life and his family that he has painstakingly built up and had on track over all these years.

But a pardon you say, Markandey Katju? What for? So Sanjay Dutt has had trouble getting bank loans approved and needs permission from the court every time he has to travel abroad to do shooting his films. So what? Half of India has troubles in getting bank loans approved. Getting visas approved to even visit abroad is a big ask for some, let alone getting one to work there. So let’s face it. Had he not been a famous star, as a convicted felon, he probably wouldn’t have been eligible for a bank loan or a visa anyway. Imagine a normal person getting convicted on even a simple crime like cheating. That is effectively the end of his life. Everywhere he went he would be a person marked by his conviction. And let us not forget that Sanjay was convicted under a far more heinous crime of terrorism. The fact that he has managed to rebuild his life after that is as a much a testament to his own will power as it is to the fact that he has had an extremely influential father. Sunil Dutt did a lot of good for the country. And he harvested all the goodwill that he earned for Sanjay. To ask for pardon for Sanjay based on the fact that his father has done a lot of good for this country is utterly ridiculous. The country has given him a lot of leeway in allowing him to rebuild his life and that is as much as a country can do for the father’s good work.

Mr. Katju has also been arguing that Sanjay has been upholding the very ideals India was built on by promoting Gandhigiri in his movies. In fact one can probably argue that he even took it a bit too far when he offered to give Mayawati a Jaadu ki Jhappi when he stood in the elections himself. But cast your mind back to the movie which re-established Sanjay in the Hindi movie industry after his release from prison. The movie which proved that he could be a bankable star again. Vaastav. A movie about and which glorified the Mumbai underworld. Who was responsible for the 1993 terror attacks? The Mumbai underworld. Not exactly trying to atone for his mistakes there was he? Given the fact that he had been convicted for events related to the attacks, it was probably insensitive on his part to star in such a movie. If you want a pardon based on his Gandhigiri in movies, I guess an equal argument can be made to convict him based on his underworld glorification in movies.

Sanjay Dutt may not be a bad person. He may just have been foolish and badly advised. And ended up being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But that is no excuse. He probably understands that himself. Which is probably why he personally isn’t asking for a pardon for himself. However innocently foolish he might have been, he still committed a mistake and if punishment for that is prison, then prison it is.

And dear Justice Katju, if you are so interested in getting pardon for reformed characters, maybe you can start with the thousands of under trial prisoners who are locked up for years in our prisons awaiting the movement of our painfully slow legal system. You can probably make better use of your judicial skills and affect many more lives that way.

Tech Twister!

It has given me a headache this last week. Trying to understand what age we are in. On one hand, we have a new pope. Communicated to us by the oldest form of communication known to man. No not the Maine Pyar Kiya version of pigeons delivering love letters to Salman Khan. Try further back. Smoke signals. Can you believe that? There is hope that the new pope will be more progressive in matters of women ordainment, contraception and gay marriage. Yes. Remind me how they informed us of his election in the first place. Yes. Smoke signals. In this world of constant 24 hour breaking updates from people who inform us ‘What a beautiful day! Good Morning friends!’ (5 people like this), we had to rely on smoke signals. And we are thinking of progressiveness. I will give the Pope some credit though. After ages and ages of people choosing the same names over and over again, to the extent that the last one had to be XVI, there is a ring of originality to Francis I. A step in the right direction then. Now to wait another 2000 years for Snoop Dogg I.

A couple of days after our history lesson in communications, came the Koreans. Nope, not the bloody thirsty horde led by His Supreme Fatness from the north. This was Samsung threatening to devour Apple right down to the core and spit it out with disdain. Developing a phone which senses when you are looking at it, we apparently don’t even have to touch the phone to scroll through items. In the mornings it even sprouts arms to pick us up from the bed and dump us into the shower. All the while uploading a ‘What a beautiful day! Good Morning friends!’ status to Facebook. Now that, is communication!

Speaking of Facebook, they are apparently are looking to copy Twitter and bringing hash tagging to Facebook. A little too late aren’t we, Mr. Zuckerberg? Haven’t you noticed the growing number of people determined to annoy the rest of the world by hash tagging their posts? Dumbing it down for the rest of us common folk so that we understand the context of their smart joke or the origin of their exotic food. Just a couple of annoying examples which have presented themselves (#smh)

1. What a ball Ravindra Jadeja! #Respect
2. Ah! Delicious Maitales Alfajores! #LatinAmericanFood
3. Japan is unbelievable! #Believe (This is an actual one)

So there you have it Facebook. The twitter gravy train has long hit you and run you over, spilling gravy all over the spotless blue and white logo of yours. You have long missed the bus. Good luck coming up with something more innovative! Like a new app to block Criminal Investigation or something. That would definitely have a market.

So then. Have a wonderful evening. Happy weekend friends! (0 likes) #Logging off

Yahoo-ing to work

So the internet has been up in arms about Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer’s diktat to her employees to report to office for work or presumably quit their jobs if they couldn't do so. Working from home is no longer an option. Given how Yahoo has been doing the past few years, it is pretty obvious that ‘work’ isn't the only thing happening at home. But dear Yahoo employees. Worry not! As you grumble your way to work on a Monday morning, here are a few things to look forward to which you probably wouldn't get sitting at home:

1.The free coffee
Cups and cups of it. Considering that coffee is almost half the monthly budget as a student, free coffee is second only to free food. Additionally, the 3 feet between the coffee machine and the sugar stack has probably replaced the water cooler as the best place to swap gossip about your boss. Which when you have a boss like Marissa Mayer, might not necessarily be a bad thing!

2.The joy of the best parking spot
Big companies, lots of people (duh!). Lots of people, lots of cars. And what can be a better start to the day, than to find a parking spot right next to the door. The joyous realization that you don’t have to negotiate 10 minutes through the ice (or heat) to that damned entrance which seems to be at the other end of the world otherwise. Surely a day can’t get too bad when the first omens in the morning are so encouraging. The feeling is second only to the one when you head out for lunch and then come back and grab someone else’s ‘prime location’. Accomplishment!

3.Switching off and still working
The overly long staff and status meetings. You stand up, do your 5 minutes and then for the remaining 55, you try to fight off drowsiness as you listen to people who you would have no interaction with otherwise, trying to peacock their way into the boss’s good books. Aided by that ubiquitous cup of coffee of course. But here is the best part. Those 55 minutes when you sit and contemplate your plans for world domination if you weren’t encumbered by the trappings of office, still count towards the 8 hours of work!

4.The co-worker who can always be heard
Now there are several people who have become used to the home space and might have difficulty finding their way around the big office in their first few days. So if you get lost sometimes, there is a quick fix. There will always be one person who can be heard from any corner of the office. Locate that voice, set your bearings and home in on that location. And voila! You are in familiar territory again. If you are particularly poor at negotiating directions, there is tremendous satisfaction to be gained from finding your seat without losing yourself atleast twice in a big office!

5.The quirky co-worker
Mayer might have touched on this when she said, that working from home doesn’t encourage collaborations with other co-workers. But there is more to it than meets the eye. More than collaborating, the quirky co-workers will make the workplace a really fun place to be. The chatty one who will always want to know what you did on the weekend till Wednesday and then grill you on your plans for the weekend on Thursday and Friday. The one who exists to eat and will drag you to every restaurant within a 15 minute radius for lunch. The sleepy one who can be found taking a snooze behind his screen once a day. The flustered one who is permanently busy and is forever running around complaining that 24 hours are not enough in a day. They make work a fun place to be! Even the weary one who has been waiting to quit for a lucrative job for the last 20 years.

So all you Yahoo-ites or Yahoo-ers or whatever you call yourselves, get out of that house and head back to office. There is much to look forward to!

The Excuse Conundrum

Poor old Manmohan Singh. His government had just started the week in an absolute ballsy manner by (finally!) hanging Afzal Guru. He was looking forward to a quiet evening curled up against the Delhi winter, under his blanket and reading his favorite economics textbook. But when was the last time his ministers ever left him in peace do his net present value calculations. No sooner had he crunched his first numbers into his calculator, there came a rude interrupting call informing him that another scandal was brewing in his ministry. The VVIP chopper controversy they called it. Again he was called in to firefight something he had nothing to do with. Damn these people! When was the last time he had managed to put a value on his own assets? As the night wore long, he thought of stepping down due to old age and health reasons. “Let them get a younger guy. Make Rahul Gandhi the PM for all I care! Leave me in peace with my numbers”, he thought. Until by the time he decided to act on it, he was beaten to that reason by the Pope. “Oh lord these Italians! (Conveniently forgetting the fact that the Pope was actually German, but hey he lives and works in Rome. Practically Italian.) One of them listened to her inner voice and left me holding the can. The other just beat me to the best excuse I had ever dreamed up! That does it! What this country needs, is a big, healthy, fat dose of Kim Jong un!”

Not that the Supreme Leader is having everything his own way. A low grade earthquake in his country was apparently a result of his clandestine attempt at losing some weight by attempting to do the Gangnam Style moves in the middle of the night. He was able to explain it away as yet another ‘underground nuclear test’ conducted by his country, but his explanations are starting to run a bit thin now. After explaining away his first attempt as a rocket launch and the second as a nuclear test, there are only so many times he can give similar reasons to distract from his real motives. Maybe he can talk to Pakistan and figure out how they get away with infiltrations and cease fire violations on the border, giving the same ‘Who me? No way that was me!’ response every single time.

Speaking of Pakistan, someone has finally decided to play cricket with them. No it wasn’t India. The South Africans agreed to showcase and train the Pakistanis in their finely honed choking talents on the cricket field. True to form, the Pakistanis unveiled another mysterious fast bowler picked up from the backwaters of the country. What is so mysterious about Mohammad Irfan is that on Cricinfo, he has been described as the tallest cricketer ever and ‘the PCB has variously measured him at 6'8", 6'10" and 7'1"’. No he isn’t in his growing stage. The guy is 30 years old for heaven’s sake! How difficult is to measure someone’s height if he hasn’t grown in the last 12 years? Though in that same vein I ask, how difficult is to determine Shahid Afridi’s actual age? The guy seems to have a younger age reported every year I read about him. Going by that analogy, I can say with some surety that Irfan will probably be measured at about 9'10" by the time he ends his career. Safely giving the title of the tallest cricketer ever to Pakistan. Why can't they just get up on a step ladder and put a scale on his head?

Sigh! Expecting people in three countries to get their reasons and excuses straight. I would have a better chance of success, if I wanted to see Mallika Sherawat fully covered up for a movie role.



You have got to be kidding me! Now bring on the excuses!