Yeddyurappa, Deve Gowda and Kumaraswamy, among others, shed tears every now and then. No, not in private, but in front of supporters, enemies, TV cameras. Sometimes delicately, sometimes not so delicately. Bikki bikki, as they say in Kannada. They sob, whine, whimper. And then wipe their noses. Poor things.
Okay, this is a bit complicated. You see, MBA types now constitute their election backrooms. And these sorts punch at laptops loaded with graphs and pie charts. (Arre, not Mohandas Pai charts. Don’t you understand simple pie charts?).
So what happens is, they use their awesome analytical skills and tell our leaders what to do, say, in this Tier 1 city and that Tier 2 city.
Our leaders understand the jargon a bit differently: “Hey, pony tail! You only said, no? Tear one here and tear two there?”
Lord of Gods vs
God Almighty
You must have heard about the spat between H D Deve Gowda (Heavy Duty Lord of Gods) and G Parameshwara (Great Lord Almighty).
Over the last two days, they have thrown poisoned barbs at each other. Uh, but ‘poisoned barb’ here is not just a figure of speech.
“Deve Gowdru said last time he would drink poison if his party didn’t come to power. I’ve been waiting, but no luck,” an inspired Parameshwara said at a campaign rally. Laughter and applause.
And then came another barb.
“Gowdru also said he wanted to be reborn as a Muslim.
Why wait so long? Roshan Baig is waiting to convert him,” he said.
In return, Gowdru called Parameshwara an idiot, it seems.
The media guys weren’t amused. Cheap language and new low, anchors and deskies editorialised. And would you believe it, a remorseful Lord Almighty was soon thanking them for “opening his eyes.” Poison became payasam.
He said, “May Gowdru live for a hundred years.” (That’s not very generous, considering Gowdru is already 80, but hogli bidi, paapa).
One takeaway from all this is: “Our leaders speak gently, like Ramakrishna Paramahamsa and Ramana Maharishi, but sometimes lapse into mildly offensive language.”
So innocent our media people are, no? Whether they are sane or not we don’t know, but they sure act sanitised.
Most ordinary folks, after listening to politicians in full flow, go home and rinse their ears with Dettol.
And then play a suprabhatam CD.
But for the record, as our dignitaries routinely throw barbs (and clutch at Barbies), the great Indian public is persuaded it is just a momentary laps. Chee, make that ‘lapse’.
(Your daily dose of satire)