Masks of various political party at a shop in Mumbai’s Lalbaug. (Express photo by Prashant Nadkar/File)Six months ago, for about the twentyteenth time, US president Donald Trump had claimed victory against the Islamic State, in the course of an extensive interview with the Associated Press. The government of Iraq had agreed, having regained territory, but the US forces did not. A spokesman of the task force against IS at the Pentagon had made a distinction between regaining territory and degrading abilities. It appears that the military was right, if an obscure itinerant preacher and internet evangelist, little better than a defrocked priest, has been able to wreak havoc in Sri Lanka.
The most astonishing aspect of the serial bombing in Sri Lanka with an unprecedented death toll was the rapidity with which terrorism in the region became an election issue in India. It did not even have to be co-opted by a party or amplified by the press. WhatsApp uncles and aunties did the needful. On the contrary, the Sri Lankan government and the press were extraordinarily cautious. State minister of defence Ruwan Wijewardene said: “Don’t give extremists a voice. Don’t help to make them martyrs.” At the same time, the Lankan press was debunking fake news, like Muslims named as suspects before any arrests had been made. The government is also unusual in its determination to remove officials for what is clearly an intelligence failure, while here at home, the cult of nationalism obscures demands for accountability.
An agency had run a “candid and non-political” interview of the PM by actor Akshay Kumar. ‘Candid’ and ‘non-political’ are contradictions, of course, smack in the middle of the poll process, just chaff flung up to confuse poll watchdogs. A bit of political content did seep in, though. Referring to friendships across political divides, Narendra Modi spoke of Mamata Banerjee sending him Bengal’s famous sweets every year. The reference may not have been wholly innocent of political intent, since sweets have figured prominently on the campaign trail in West Bengal.
Before the 2016 Assembly elections in the state, Modi had said that its people would have laddoos in both hands with an NDA government at the Centre and a BJP government in the state. It didn’t quite work out that way and on Friday, Banerjee told election meets in Balurghat and Gangarampur that whoever had eaten the “Dilli ka laddoo” had regretted it. More, she had said that in the general election, the BJP would score a “big rosogolla” (signifying zero) in West Bengal. Her just desserts recommendation was reported widely in the local press and TV news, but reached Delhi in dribs and drabs.
Certainly, the BJP will score better in West Bengal, but not as handsomely as Ravish Kumar has scored off Akshay Kumar with his “non-political Prime Time”, which largely concerns mangoes. A topic that, Ravish suggests, would not have made prime time but for Akshay Kumar’s interview. Ravish Kumar picks up the thread: “Bounce a mango, show it’s a mango, cut the mango, your mouth waters, make mango lassi. Non-political Prime Time in the election season. You like it? No one can get mad at it.”
Ravish seems to suggest that Modi’s advisors recommended an interview with Kumar, and the call went to the wrong Kumar. But it was all right, because the right Kumar had now taken up the apolitical thread. “Let us eat mangoes. How do we eat mangoes? We chew and suck Dussehri and Chausa, but for Malda, always use a spoon. Many ask how mangoes are eaten. You never tell the king that you don’t like it. ‘It’ is a safeda mango.”
Ravish kept up this diverting nonsense for 21 minutes and 21 seconds, and concluded that Akshay had beaten Prasoon Joshi: “Akshay knew he was not interviewing a fakeer, but the prime minister.” The reference is to the ‘Bharat ki Baat Sabke Saath’ event in Westminster, where the term ‘fakeeri’ was immortalised. Prasoon Joshi’s diction was fruity as durian, while Akshay was refreshingly relaxed. Even if he asked the stock questions.
“Ask, ‘how long do you sleep’, and go home, everybody does it,” said Ravish. All that Akshay had missed, he said, was a deeper analysis of the Bal Narendra episode where he came home with a crocodile. “Kiran Bedi also had a comic made for her election, like the prime minister,” he digressed, interestingly.
Ravish’s devastating interview of Kiran Bedi in Delhi’s Uday Park during the 2015 assembly elections had set him trending, but it had briefly threatened to end his career in interviewing. An interviewer can’t carry on if prospective guests are fleeing for their lives.
pratik.kanjilal@expressindia.com
