CIRCUS MAXIMUS

The Hoot, 27 August, 2004

No, we are not trapped in the ancient times nestled between the Palatine and the Aventine hills. Besides, Christianity is more than two millenniums old. But blood still brews the headiest hangover. Honestly, how many of you have been feeling like some giant exhaust fan that was set on a noisy, nauseating motion inside your bonnet, has been abruptly switched off? Didn’t you feel somewhat similar after the Natwest Trophy final? Or after the Lok Sabha poll results and the subsequent Sonia sainthood episode? Only somewhat. Because the Dhananjoy Chatterjee cliffhanger left us without even any mock-cathartic consolation. For us, Dhananjoy’s execution was simply death of an event. The subsequent void was one of plain exhaustion _ the fatigue that comes after lustily cheering gladiators or wild beasts. And suddenly, the entertainment was over.

"He did not wear his scarlet coat,
For blood and wine are red"

Dhananjoy’s was the closest we got to a televised execution in India. But then, even during the most part of history’s televised wars _ two in Iraq and one in Afghanistan _ we had to contend with peripheral images and sound far from the actual theatres of war. What was surprising though, was the lack of enterprise on part of our overzealous TV channels. None of them tried to obtain access for their camera crew to the gallows. Or did they?

Not so long ago, Oklahoma City bomber Timmothy McVeigh released a statement that his execution should be televised. Some US legislators like Senator Mark Hatfield agreed. Talk show host Phil Donohue pitched in claiming the broadcasting rights. Entertainment Network Inc (ENI) requested the Bureau of Prisons to install a webcam in the execution chamber and pass on the feed. All that the ENI wanted was to have the event on a website, with $1.95 access, payable by credit card (to discourage minors viewing it) and with the proceeds going to bombing victims. How could we miss such an idea to help out Dhananjoy’s impoverished family?

The Bureau of Prisons, however, put its foot down, saying there was an important interest in "not sensationalising the event…and respecting the privacy of the condemned”. The district court, too, denied permission, citing security concerns _ inmates would watch the execution, see it as sport, feel devalued and riot.

A recent poll conducted by liveDaily claimed two-thirds of Americans support televised executions. Little wonder that a US federal appeals court had to intervene and uphold the state's right to ban videotaping inside Missouri's execution chamber.

Back home, one wished some of our channels were allowed to cover the execution live. At least, motion pictures couldn’t have done more damage to the viewers’ sensitivity than what creative efforts to compensate for the absence of footage, did. Channels conjured up animation graphics _ something you struggle to keep your kids away from _ recreating the rape and murder and, later, depicting the hanging procedure for hungry eyeballs. News anchors repeatedly asked correspondents, dripping with early morning drizzle outside the prison wall, how Dhananjoy was feeling on his way to the gallows. Some unfazed correspondents even played psychic and legitimised such crudity by attempting dumb guesses. In true Sriharikota style, most channels gave viewers an excited countdown to the scheduled execution. One wonders why we were spared the customary fireworks at the zero hour.

"How does he act then? It must be easy
For him. Anything is easy for a hangman..."

Nata tied himself in knots. Never in his life was he given such a long rope. The media wanted its plot complete. The dignified silence of Hetal Parekh’s family cut short its options. For the revenge tragedy, Dhananjoy’s folks offered the tragic bit all right. But the news sop demanded its instrument of justice. Nata didn’t have a choice. Plunged into shoes too huge to fill in, he was first inflated to an anti-hero, and then invariably morphed into a sad jester.

At one go, Nata was expected to dish out three vital elements for the daily bulletin drama _ the macabre, the comic and the tragic. The last bit Nata had introduced himself. He badly needed a job in the family. But even the greatest of performers would find it more than challenging to juggle successfully with three emotions so distinct as these. Nata was just a hangman.

His ultimate challenge was to dodge the tag of a greedy, soulless villain. In a live phone-in Bengali TV show hosted by Suman Chatterjee (Bengal’s Bob Dylan, for the uninitiated), he literally sang his heart out: (Very loosely translated) What will be, will be... please don’t blame me...

I disagree with Carl Sandburg. It was not easy for Nata Mullik _ not as easy as pulling the lever _ to handle so much of media attention.

"I feel the chaos, nourishing and expelling me from myself..."

"I didn't rejoice in his death but for the first time I did feel safe..." No one can miss the point Debbie Morris _ rape victim on whose case Sean Penn (Robert Lee Willie) and Susan Sarandon movie Dead Man Walking was based _ made after Willie was convicted. Elizabeth Harvey, mother of Faith Colleen Hathaway _ the other rape victim in the movie _ passionately advocates death penalty: "If you don't want to be executed then don't commit the crime. It's that simple. You can decide whether you commit that crime or not but a victim can never decide whether they are a victim or not."

Ever since she met Robert Willie, Sister Prejean (Susan Sarandon in the movie) has been campaigning against capital punishment: "When people are given alternatives to the death penalty _ where they are assured that a person will stay in prison for life _ support for the death penalty radically drops. I know that the desire for safety and being protected from real dangerous people is something that drives really good decent people about the death penalty. It's not that people want to be vengeful or to kill people. They want to be safe from them."

Whatever stand you take, compelling feelings, all. But the impromptu debate at home involved brute jingoism and two fast-swelling crowds _ barring a handful of sane individuals whose voices got lost in the chaos _ taking up pro and anti-death penalty stances on sentimental grounds. On the one hand, you had elements from the radical Left and the confused intelligentsia _ defanged and frustrated in Buddha’s Bengal _ who easily identified capital punishment as a sexy symbol of establishment that can be opposed for ego satisfaction without risking the ire of the state machinery. Locking horns with them were the pseudo-moral official Left and the custodians of the middle class _ increasingly insecure and unified in the urban ghettos of Kolkata _ who did not mind baying for blood in the name of securing the honour and dignity of bhadramahila. The resulting chaos was deafening but it could still have been worse if Mahashweta Devi had decided to take on Bengal’s first first lady in a public debate. Fortunately, she was probably too disgusted and tired to care.

"...Forgot if we ourselves had done
A great or little thing,
And watched with gaze of dull amaze
The man who had to swing."

Given half a chance, I won’t read Oscar Wilde. Not anymore. But a young poet from Calcutta reminded me of The Ballad of Reading Goal. Granted, he asked me over phone, Dhananjoy had raped and killed, but how can we so casually judge him without ever bothering to look at ourselves? This was a day before the man had to swing.

Dhananjoy waited for 14 years. Mumia Abu-Jamal waited for 18 years for execution after killing a Philadelphia police officer. He wrote two books _ Live From Death Row (1995) and Death Blossoms (1997) _ from behind the bars to tell his side of the story. Dhananjoy only repeated three words _ I am innocent _ for 14 years. Was he really innocent? We will never know. But each of us passed our judgments on him long before the Supreme Court or the President of India did. Worst, we wrote his last days the way each of us liked.

A week back, I had called up my cousin only to discover how Victor Hugo was suddenly in demand and how erudite Bengalis were busy mugging up arguments from The Last Days Of A Condemned Man. A colleague in a Bengali news channel went hysterical describing how he was summoned by his neighbourhood kids to settle their debate over which Bhagat Singh movie had the most authentic execution scene. My old aunt, who misses me round the year, called up to ask why I was not flying down to Calcutta to cover such a momentous event.

Last weekend, walking out the newsroom, I wasn’t too keen to look through the noose. "Done," the cops said. "Filed," the correspondent mailed. "Splash," the editor decreed. The desk sized it up, cribbed a bit for its length, and slapped it on page. I glanced at the headline and fired the page to the press. I was getting impatient for a smoke.

The man wouldn’t make news anymore. I lit up. Let Hugo be damned. I smoke. They killed a dead man.

"Ah! nevertheless, it is horrible!"

FINE LEGS AND SILLY POINTS

The Indian Express, 7 Aug, 2004

Unlike most good things in life, cricket doesn’t need to conform to any prescribed dose in India. For a game that is the ecstasy (with apologies to Herr Marx, opium is too soporific to convey the frenzy of this religion) of the people, it is strange that cricketing merchants need to spice up the fare with dollops of distraction. We understand corporate interest and ‘Toss ka Boss’. But the ‘Shaz and Waz’ show only highlights the insecurity of the broadcasters.

We could act naive and try to explain Mandira Bedi as an ambitious attempt to discover our own Kass Naidoo (South African commentator, if memory fails you). But this time, the channelwallahs didn’t even feign justification. Their theory seemed simple: "Only cricket, when there is so much of cricket, may not be enough to keep eyeballs glued, unless PYTs (pretty young things, for the uninitiated) are introduced to sex up the show."

Nobody, mind you, is arguing the purist’s case. Nobody objected to BBC’s Christopher Martin-Jenkins and his inspired observation: "The bowler’s Holding, the batsman’s Willey." We loved vintage Richie Benaud _ "there was a slight interruption there for athletics" _ when he reflected on a female streaker running across the Lord’s pitch. We appreciated Henry Blofield’s gift of spotting earrings. Why, even Harsha ‘genteel’ Bhogle knocked out ABC’s Kerry ‘chatterbox’ O’Keefe, during the famous Boxing Day match, when the latter doubted Gillespie’s fitness _ "as stiff as three whiskies" _ and Harsha asked just how many stiffs his opposite enjoyed each night.

Cricket is a way of life and such splashes happily find their context in its grand canvas. Like Sydney seagulls, Kotla dogs or Sharjah starlets. Even Gautam Bhimani, so long as he limits himself to sponsored antics and has stunning land/seascapes for background. But not the ‘Shaz and Waz’ show. As Shastri the commentator, Ravi is measured gin and tonic _ equally in command reading Ganguly’s racing mind (or static feet) and complimenting the cameraman, as the lens zooms on a group of bubbly, young girls at Premadasa, for his ability to "spot talents". But as Shastri the Shaz, Ravi is a hopeless punch _ suddenly too distracted for cricketing analysis and too ripe for natural street-smartness. But maybe it’s not entirely his fault.

The very idea of importing femininity to cricket through Jills-in-the-box is as absurd as hiring toothpaste models to popularise Monalisa prints. For a game played among 22 men, cricket is as much feminine as it is masculine. Some of our poster boys and macho cricketers-turned-commentators may take offence. But they will unwittingly concede that, in their fetish for pursuing impressive statistics (vital stats, in case of Shaz and Waz), they have stripped the game of much of its beauty.

Close your eyes, and for every stream of shaggy, raw passion of a Thomo or a Shoaib, you have the alluring mystery of a Bishen or a Murali. For every Richards short arm pull from outside the off stump, no less rugged and nonchalant than a weather-unbeaten Clint Eastwood shooting from the hip, there is a Vishwanath late cut, so late and languid, almost an afterthought, an aside as elegantly subtle as Susan Sarandon wiping cigarette smoke in the air before suddenly looking up with that twinkle between her lashes.

Consider the stumpers. For all their flamboyance and acrobatics, the best keepers are matched in virtues of involvement and patience only by the best homemakers. The ones who are always there to weather it all and around whom great spells or families flourish.

Take speed _ from Formula One to boom-boom Becker, a male prerogative. But in the hand of Kapil or Hadlee, an outswinger, bowled at a lively pace, teases the batsman like a seductress endowed with a kiss of death. Without inhibition, she approaches you straight. As the proximity gets alarming and you are about to offer your straightest face forward, she sways away with a get-me-if-you-can tilt. Instantly, you are torn between the wisdom of letting her go and the desire to check her out. No opening batsman needs any script to play the hero _ or the villain, depending on the day _ in certain fifteenth century English plays. One moral slip and you don’t need to study any yellowed text to imagine why that umbrella of men next to the wicketkeeper was named the slip cordon.

Take an over. The bowler sends six propositions to you. Each comes with a promise of reward. You can’t keep dating without risking ever falling in love. As in life, you gain some to lose some. But if you decide that discretion is indeed the better part of amour, and stay unresponsive to all her six advances, she goes out of your life a maiden. Between you two, it’s over.

The butchery of swordsmanship has drastically reduced the frequency of maiden overs in one-day cricket. But that is hardly any excuse for the channelwalahs to compensate by picking up maidens _ even starlets _ from the stand. If they are feeling insecure about the cricketing overdose, they can always let the ICC go easy on the calendar. Otherwise, they must either correct the gender bias or, better still, junk the show altogether. Most viewers don’t miss those vanishing maiden overs. Trust me, they won’t miss those unsuspecting PYTs whose prime contribution to the break-time farce is to make their two awkward hosts make their silly points.

FEE-GOOD IS ALSO FEEL-GOOD

When Dr Joshi arm-twists the IIMs, the institutes that are behind India Shining, doesn’t he dent his party’s constituency? Why is the party letting him get away with what is clearly an attack on all those who are feeling good? I found the answer in Tarak.

I bump into him at the Kolkata Book Fair. Tarak is no intellectual in search of brain fodder. He is just an ordinary Bengali out there, on a ritualistic visit to the carnival to pick up something inexpensive for his students. If one must survive on private tuition, one must adopt some retention policy.

Tarak is pleased to see me, the Dilliwallah, and demands a treat. On a vacation, I have been foolish enough to look for old friends in the afternoon crowd. Happy to find an acquaintance, I decide to walk down to a Park Street pub with him. He flinches a bit as I order prawn with our drinks. ‘‘We could do with some roasted peanuts,’’ he suggests. ‘‘These joints just rob you.’’

Tarak hasn’t changed much. His family used to stay in a small, rented flat in my neighbourhood till they moved out to the suburbs. Now he and his younger, married brother, a small-time broker, look after the family of soon-to-be six. Tarak’s ailing parents finally have something to look forward to — his sister-in-law is expecting.

Tarak had joined a courier company after graduation. He was retrenched and won’t talk about it. Now he teaches secondary students in batches of four. After our first drinks, we realise our stock of nostalgia is running out. He just nibbles at the delicious Waldorf snacks — his bhadralok ego making him conscious that he won’t contribute much, if at all, towards footing the bill.

After a ‘‘now what’’ pause, Tarak asks me what every journalist is supposed to have an answer for: How’s the country doing? Feel-good and all? Before I can think of some rigmarole to keep the conversation going, Tarak butts in: ‘‘Maybe it’s shining in Delhi and Mumbai. Kolkata, and these Marxists, are doomed.’’ I follow his fingers twitching. I wait for him and he blurts out: ‘‘Anyway, this IIM fee cut was good. What do they think? They will take the best jobs just because they have money?’’

His anger is not without reason. Between the two brothers, without job security or a roof of their own, no one’s asked how they run a family of six in about Rs 8-9,000 a month. Surely, the BJP can’t ignore the whining multitude before the elections. In fact, it doesn’t. That’s what explains the IIM fee cut.

In a democracy, the majority _ shining or not _ always matters most. If the BJP must win, it must also give the whining India something to feel good about. And when the whining India of the likes of Tarak sees the Shining India compromised _ IITs threatened, IIMs cornered and sundry other technical and B-schools’ fate hanging fire _ it gets a kind of a pleasure. Vicarious? The BJP won’t mind. It is much easier to engineer than to positively impress the whining India by, say, setting the primary education system right.

Don’t insult the BJP leadership’s collective PQ. The party isn’t just pampering Joshi’s ego by letting him carry on with an agenda. It must have found the method in the HRD madness handy.

Tarak, for one, has no soft corner for any party and he doesn’t relate to the official feel-good. But fee-good appeals to him. Not because he had ever fancied joining an IIM or IIT. He was never that sharp; and his immediate concern will anyway be to ensure good basic education for his soon-to-be-born nephew.

Nevertheless, Tarak relishes fee-good as kind of poetic justice: Good it doesn’t shine so bright when millions like me are left out of the ‘‘shining’’ party. Of course, it’s negative. But so is the very existence of the whining India. Trust Joshi, and the BJP leadership, to know how two negatives make a positive. Now only if that holds good in the election lab, too.