Soup Boys Down Under

With the Indian cricket fan screaming from the rooftops of social networks and baying for the blood of the humbled Indian cricketer, the UPA Government finally caved in and formed an expert committee to probe into the pathetic performance of the Men in Blue in Australia. Disrupting the monthly aestivation period of the MPs, an emergency session of the Parliament was called despite threats from Agent Fog and Agent Snow, and it was unanimously agreed through a voice vote that while cricket will take its own course, the Parliament must do what it is expected to do – setup committees.

A four member working group was setup in due haste with Rahul Gandhi as the Chairperson and self-nominated loud mouths Suhel Seth, Asaduddin Owaisi and Arindam Chaudhari as its members. Suhel’s ability to mumble incessantly, when placed in front of a TV camera or a microphone, on sensitive topics like the mating habits of ostriches or the folk dances of Andaman was considered a plus point. Owaisi’s standing as a modern rabid fanatic Muslim who swears by his beard and is inspired by the gentle Taliban provided the secular perspective that Governmental committees needed while Arindam's  reputation which soared after the success of his classic Count Your Chickens Before They Hatch (described by The New Yorker as a work of post-modern surrealistic pastiche existential angst) gave the committee the intellectual celebrity quotient that it needed to make it acceptable to gossip hungry audience, who swore by the Mumbai Mirror.

In response to critics questioning Rahul Gandhi’s cricketing acumen to head this panel, Congress spokeswoman Renuka Chowdary, in her animated petite coquettish style, bloviated that Rahul was a natural leader and had captained the Toddlers United when it toured Guinea-Bissau as part of his granny’s efforts to promote democracy in the mid-70s. Unfortunately, since no statistics were available in Cricinfo to prove this claim, this could not be verified prompting Arun Jaitley to remark that Rahul Gs chequered career as a batsman was only limited to ducking Opposition bouncers and he was as clueless about the sport as Katrina Kaif was about acting.        

Nevertheless, acting with an exaggerated sense of responsibility, the committee (christened Kingfisher India Against Cricket or IAC in short) made a trip to Napier immediately after the Perth debacle. An ocean facing villa was taken on rent with a facility to travel daily to Australia to carry out the investigation; critics who pointed out they were too far away to do any meaningful work were scoffed at by angry Mumbaikars who said that it takes more time to travel from Virar to Churchgate and such an opinion was an insult to the famed resilience of the Marathi Manus.

The month long secret assignment by the IAC was covered extensively by the local news channels and India’s biggest entertainment channel Times Now. Videos of the panel members in various strip bars and pubs were widely circulated on YouTube, demonstrating the serious nature of the trip. The committee went around the length and breadth of Australia, spoke to the Twitterati, fans and the cricketers themselves and finally returned home to a grand welcome. Fearing the ire of the ever vigilant Election Commission, they were immediately frisked away by Home Ministry officials at the Delhi Airport to ensure that no information was leaked to the public.

Nevertheless, uninformed sources Wikileaks revealed that a copy of the slim 700 page report had found its way mysteriously into the lap of Arnab Goswami, the barking powerhouse conscience of the Indian media. We managed to bribe Arnab Sir and get a copy of the glossy looking report titled Soup Boys Down Under with a cover page photo of Dhoni's boys regaling themselves in a drunken stupor (The Hangover?) and Clarke pulling the strings (of his guitar) to the tune of Why this Kolaveri, Mite (sic)?

Tendulkar’s perennial wait for his 100^th ton received wide coverage in the report. The IAC analyzed hundreds of videos of SRT, probed through all the widely trending discussions on Twitter, spoke to Aussie fans high on beer and finally concluded that there was an international conspiracy behind this (specifically not an Italian hand). As a one man entertainment industry who still caused dedicated office goers like 'Kodali' Dasan and 'Kattapurathu' Vilasini to bunk work and watch Test Cricket, there was wide spread fear that the moment, the ton-ton was reached, he would retire, people would switch off TV sets and start living normal lives and even be misled by the senile St. Anna.

The report suggested a cartel comprising democratic governments and media channels had paid off cricket boards across countries to prevent this catastrophe from happening in the cricket world. The IAC, however, recommended that SRT must be given an honorary ton, his name changed to Ton-dulkar and gifted a Bharat Ratna so that he can ride to the sunset gracefully.

It branded the seniors of the team as the Axis of Discontent who were determined not to contribute in Australia due to jealousy in the team over the share of brand endorsements that the captain had captured which was totally disproportionate to his abject dismal performances. Plotting a bewildering assortment of graphs and curves that would put even Vidya 'Entertainment' Balan to shame, the report showed how the seniors spent more time planning their post-retirement financial strategy than the actual playing strategy. The IAC also lambasted the selectors for modeling the team on a Brahmin Bania party like the BJP with minimum minority representation and suggested that they follow the England model which had a global all inclusive multi-racial line up.

The IAC absolved the team of its inability to face the rising ball, saying that that if the Finance Minister had no clue on how to handle rising interest rates, how could you single out the Indian team for a similar folly? The report attributed the lethargy shown by the team on the field to poor dietary practices and suggested that the solution to this may lie in Arindam Chaudhari's forthcoming book Count Your Wickets Before They Fall. The book advocates an Arindam diet comprising Beef and Toad Legs Soup, concocted with  aphrodisiacs from China (can't just ignore those bu****s) and sprinkled with cow urine to help cricketers to rise to the occasion and deliver; this delicacy is reportedly being served in IIPM canteens (except in Madhya Pradesh) to encourage students to dream beyond the IIMs. 

The report also underlined the importance of following the stars in the sky than in the team while deciding on cricket schedules. Quoting renowned astrologer Attukal Radhakrishnan, it said that the tour had been played when the Saturn was in retrograde in the 7th House – an inauspicious time to travel abroad. It recommended that a full time astrologer should be part of the Board so that such mistakes do not happen again. Additionally, it was pointed out that playing an important Test Series in the midst of the World Go Karting Championship was a blunder (especially with some of the cricketers having stakes in it) and the Board had not done its homework properly while preparing the itinerary.

To improve the team morale, the IAC report made several other recommendations including banning all Indian cricket jokes in the social space, doing away with post-match press conferences when the team loses, inclusion of the cricket team under the Janlokpal to ensure accountability (to placate the real IAC members  miffed at not being nominated to the panel), increasing the team strength to include a PR Manager, an investment adviser and a fashion consultant to take care of the interests of the players and present them in proper light, cross-culture training for youngsters like Kohli and Ishant Sharma (they had assumed that the middle finger salute was a way to cheer crowds in this part of the world) and very importantly, recalling Poonam Pandey as the Brand Ambassador of the team (Fans may recall her inspiring presence in the World Cup but since it is widely believed that she only exists virtually, this may not be possible to implement).

An additional point was added in fine print at the bottom of the report recommending that the IAC be made a Constitutional body and allowed to tag along with the team in all future foreign junkets. Rumours suggest that this may be the only recommendation that will be accepted when the report is tabled in the House since Constitutional bodies are widely accepted as the only Game Changers in this country. Also, the general opinion is that after plummeting to such depths, we can only go up now, as Virat Kohli had indicated so gracefully to the Sydney crowd. 

The report contents are too damaging to reveal and so only selective portions of the report have been leaked here; readers may keep in mind that care is also being taken not to hurt the sentiments of the Loyal Indian Cricket Fan –a species that is rap(b)idly going extinct.  Since most of the report talks about either Owaisi defending Salman Rushdie's right to offend the Prophet or Suhel Seth’s discovery of the promiscuous nature of Australian women or Arindam Chaudhari’s management quotes, we used our discretion and decided to publish only the cricketing facts and be loyal to the oldest profession in the world………. journalism. 


Image Courtesy - http://www.cartoonistsandeep.com/post_detail.php.php?id=MAYAY1303381443MAYA4db005c3cfce9

Corruption Strikes Back with a Vengeance

In a dramatic development that shocked agile Government officials, leading political and social luminaries headed by Maharashtra CEO, Sharad Pawar, started a fast unto death demanding the return of corruption to Indian shores. Since Anna Hazare performed the Houdini act of evaporating corruption from India, there has been widespread unrest across the country with middle class people from all walks of life protesting against this totalitarian approach by the civil society.

Citizens across cosmopolitan India joined Mr Pawar’s demand to introduce the radical Graft Commission Bill (GCB). This bill has been drafted by a panel comprising Sharad Pawar, Aamir Khan and Baba Ramdev in consultation with prominent pro-corruption activist, Ramalinga Raju, who is currently authoring a paper on Jail Reforms. They also roped in Nude activist Poonam Pandey as their brand ambassador; Poonam, returning after a stint as the Chief Motivation Officer of the Indian cricket team, has received a lot of flak lately for her NPAs (non-performing assets) but she’s promised to give whistle-blowers something to cheer this time.

The panel released the provisions on their flashy website, designed by Five Point Someones from IIT-Delhi who were not offered campus jobs. The bill proposes to legalize corruption and place it under the ambit of a newly formed body called Graft Commission. The Graft Commission would unilaterally define a multi-pricing strategy for bribes based on complex parameters like nature of activity, officer vintage, funds involved etc. Bribes would be treated as over the table income and taxed accordingly but officers have to ensure that attested receipts in triplicate are provided.

Each department would have graft targets and these would be included in the individual KRAs. The Graft Commission would arbitrarily review the bribe pricing strategy every financial year and adjust the rates as per inflationary trends. The all-powerful Graft Commissioner (envisaged as a Charles Bronson meets T N Seshan meets Narendra Modi) would have the power to slap penalties, issue search and arrest warrants and prosecute non-cooperative consumers. Critics have baulked at the prospect of investing so much authority in one body but they have been shooed off citing the success of such tribunals in Afghanistan and Somalia.

Corporates welcomed the protest by staying silent but they believed that the bill gave a raw deal to bribe givers. So, social activists Vijay Mallya and the Ambani scions (in a rare show of universal brotherhood) met the panel within closed doors and made a Power Point presentation explaining their demands. At the end of the meeting, the panel agreed to include variable corporate tax slabs based on bribe turnover, amnesty from audits in core acquisitions like land, spectrum and arms, an annual VDS to fund party treasuries and the right to FICCI to recommend a member of their choice to the Graft Commission. In turn, the business community agreed to provide comp offs to employees to join the fast and fund the campaign through a current account in Liechtenstein (Rumours of Baba Ramdev being given exclusive rights to teach Yoga in offices and corporates producing Aamir Khan’s Cheaply Live were denied).

ADAG bagged the contract to provide communication infrastructure for the crusade – consumers can call up at toll free numbers or send SMSs to designated numbers to register their support. Due to lack of resources to man these calls, it was agreed that missed calls would suffice. Retailers were asked to stack up their godowns with sufficient stocks of revolution memorabilia like Adarsh cement, Kanimozhi poems, corruption badges and stickers, to quench the patriotic thirst of people. 33% of the sales proceeds would be channelized to a trust with a majority stake in an Andhra based micro finance institution, which would in turn invest in hedge funds and Wall Street junk bonds.

These provisions have largely been welcomed by the public who have borne the brunt of the civil society’s draconian Lokpal Bill. The salaried class was hugely upset to see their monthly incomes crashing due to their inability to forge rental receipts and medical bills on one hand and the RBI mercilessly hiking interest rates on the other. The other main factor that has led to this demand to restore corruption was the massive slump in productivity observed in Government offices after the anti-corruption forces took over. PwC, inducted into the Auditing Hall of Fame for its creative work in Satyam, published a report stating that the productivity had fallen from 62.5% to 32% in most states because of officers refusing to work, without any bribes.

  

Economist Jijumon Punnoose, in an article The Anatomy of a Bribe in The Hindu, states that money being paid out through under-the-table channels constituted close to 3% of the GDP and the cost of delay in decision making by the Govt was much higher than that of combating corruption. He also points out that during the last WTO Summit, India had agreed to formulate benign laws to promote intra and inter-regional corruption but the leadership’s U-Turn had isolated India. He laments that while the West has evolved from the era of brokers and agents to subtler forms like lobbyists and sponsored research scholars, we were trying to turn the clock back by criminalizing corruption.  

To understand the idea better, we caught up with one of the brains behind the bill- ex-CVC Ananthan Nambiar, who now runs an ice-cream parlour in Ottapalam. As he licked his fingers after helping himself to the sumptuous avial prepared by his wife, the unassuming bureaucrat told us-‘10% of the people will always be corrupt, 10% always honest while the remaining 80% will follow the group that is rewarded. So we just need to target the 10% and the rest will follow. The beauty of the process lies in its simplicity - assets are transferred seamlessly at low cost among people without any governmental intervention; it is a zero sum game with proven results. I agree that a fasting protest is blackmail but then desperate situations require despite measures, eh?’ Delicious insight!!!

Meanwhile, in local news: Addressing a group of party workers who were rejoicing after drawing level 2-2 with RSS in Koothuparamba, CPI (M) State Secretary and Director (Kimbalam Vikasana Kendra) Pinrayi Vijayan, inaugurated the Malabar Gold Citizens’ Hartal Charter. Among other things, the Charter provides the annual hartal schedule across the state against the anti-proletariat approach of the Government to eradicate corruption. Vijayan also declared that he would personally lead a delegation to visit Eastern Europe to understand how corruption had been ingrained successfully there without any protest. Insider information revealed that the delegation also included a Minister who planned to visit Germany to get his dental surgery done but the name cannot be revealed here due to a personal conflict of interest that the author of this blog has.

  

The sweet smell of a Revolution has invigorated the Nation and its people; Moonlight Candle lit protest parties have become the new rage. Drastic methods of supporting the protest have emerged – some people decided to stop playing Solitaire in offices, some agreed to skip reading Chetan Bhagat comics while a few even promised to stop watching Rajinikanth movies!!! A Times Now sponsored survey of the protestors gathered at Bhindi Bazaar threw interesting results –32% were relieved to bunk office, 17% felt it was a romantic idea, 21% hoped to be seen on TV, 18% desperately wanted to get away from their spouses while the rest were too drunk to answer.

While these demonstrations have led to an increasing momentum for change, these have largely been overshadowed by the record number of tweets and Facebook comments by Netizens. Facebook servers crashed twice in the last week due to the large number of ‘Like’ buttons being clicked on pro-corruption links. After an intense brainstorming session, Facebook engineers operating from Hyderabad replaced the ‘Like’ button with the ‘Dislike’ button calming the charged Netosphere and abruptly putting brakes on the bloodless Revolution.

  

Breaking news – After 96 hrs of relentless marketing pressure, the Government succumbed to the protest and agreed to set up a committee to look into the demands of the pro-corruption gang; Sharad Pawar broke his triumphant fast sipping a peg of McDowell’s single malt whisky, followed by a noisy belch. But in the midst of the IPL and the tax payer sponsored UK royal vaudeville, this news was relegated to the sidelines. The masses too celebrated the triumph by bunking the next phase of Bengal elections to be a part of this spectacle. Nevertheless, middle class democracy in India rocks!!!  

In an unrelated story, the IPO of India’s leading candle manufacturer Flames & Roses has been oversubscribed 35 times; leading analysts believe that given Indians’ obsession with candle lit demos, it is an attractive business to invest.


Image Courtesy - http://webmalayalee.com/

In Pursuit of Poonam Pandey

Is she a model? A super woman? India’s National Asset? Gary Kirsten’s secret weapon? Friends, please put your hands together (clap, you idiot) and welcome the most popular Pandey in India today – who’s more popular than the likes of Mangal Pandey, Chunkey Pandey and Chulbul Pandey put together.

The moment Dhoni slammed a six to clinch the trophy, frantic efforts have been made to trace India’s secret damsel weapon who won the team the Cup for them. All news channels have sent out teams to hunt for Ms Poonam Pandey who has enthralled the patriotic Indian public by claiming to go Full Monty on winning the trophy.

We decided to do our own investigation and snoop around for the various people involved in the manhunt. When BCCI was contacted regarding Poonam’s intent to go nude if permitted, Vice-President K Srinivasan refused to comment citing personal conflict of interest but agreed that Lalit Modi was to blame for this mess. Meanwhile, erstwhile IPL Chairman Lalit Modi tweeted that a he had signed a contract with Set Max giving the channel full rights to broadcast the Poonam night. However, the ICC president cum Agriculture Minister cum sugar baron cum real estate baron Sharad Pawar said that equal opportunity sealed tenders would be called to stage the Poonam night and the highest bidder would be given the rights in case India Cements opts out of the race.

The IB has indicated that Interpol has been alerted to locate Poonam; the bright sleuths have confirmed that they have intensified their search on Facebook, Twitter, Google and intelligence partner Wikipedia to locate her. There was a suspicion that the Pakistanis had kidnapped her as an exchange offer for Kashmir but since the source of this news was Times Now, this angle was dropped. The Home Minister has opined that she may have been kidnapped by Maoists and said that since this is a matter regarding internal security, the army would start a search operation in this regard; typically the Defence Minister A K Antony’s opinion was not sought.

The Finance Minister opined that the Poonam night was a taxable event and 35% fun tax should be paid to the tax exchequer, once she is found. Immediately, BJP’s Chief Sting Officer Arun Jaitley questioned the Government’s intentions  to impose this fun tax in these inflationary times; he said that the law was not very clear on the actual definition of fun and that as and when there is a quorum in the House, this point should be discussed. The PM refused to be drawn into this discussion and said that keeping in light the CVC controversy, until all the facts are presented to him, he will not venture any opinion – this surprised bloggers who were ready to swear by the PMs lack of opinion on every issue.

Most Congressmen were unable to take any decision and looked to 10 Janpath to decide on the party strategy but Sonia Madam was too busy celebrating the Indian Victory to respond. The Frog, sorry, Crown Prince Rahul Gandhi was seen checking the Tata Yellow Pages for her address to spend a night with her and understand the problems of the youth better. Congress spokesman Manish Tewari immediately released a statement saying that the Government should consider declaring Poonam’s assets as national monuments to protect them from the likes of communal forces like Narendra Modi. This spurred the BJP to launch a Poonam Yathra to counter the Govt propaganda but this was cancelled at the last minute stating traffic constraints in Mumbai (insiders claim that this was abandoned due to differences in opinion between Perpetual PM In Waiting Advani and the RSS but this info could not be verified). 

All main Indian channels carried exclusive stories of a Wikileak emanating from Wikipedia which said that Poonam was photographed bathing in a canal in Venice, raising speculation of an Italian hand to this entire conspiracy. The BJP immediately demanded Sonia Gandhi’s resignation saying that Poonam was part of the Bofors kickback offered through Quattrocchi. However, reading the fine print of Wikipedia suggested that Poonam may have been part of the entourage of models who had entertained Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi, thus explaining the Italian sojourn. This led to the BJP immediately retracting from their official media recorded statement claiming that they were misquoted by the press. Silvio laughed off the accusation that he was too old to be involved in such amorous escapades but the ever forgiving Italian public was nevertheless impressed by his latest strategic foreign policy thrust.

Times Now claimed to have found a copy of the World Cup Winning Dossier created by honorary Indian citizen, Gary Kirsten with the help of unemployed IIM grads, lying in its Mumbai office. The document typed in Comic Sans Font size 12 is named as Operation Poonam Reloaded and provided incriminating evidence of the underhand (leg) means used by the team to reclaim the Cup which traditionally belonged to the Indian team but had been lent to the Aussie team on a long term lease. While the details of the report were never published, sources close to Arnab Goswami claim that it contained the minutes of the meetings of the Indian Think Tank listing the various positions that Poonam was identified to play to ensure that we won the Cup.

NDTV also indicated that they had carried out a sting on the Tatas which indicated that Ratan Tata, in cahoots with Niira Radia, may have used Poonam as bait to bring about changes in the 4G policy and buy spectrum. While no one has any idea what 4G stands for, it was universally agreed that Poonam is definitely more valuable than spectrum and the phone scripts must be exposed. While this was being debated, CNN-IBN published a photo of Barkha Dutt sharing a drink with somebody who mysteriously looked like Poonam; this was vehemently denied but the spectrum story died a sudden death immediately after this expose.

Leading feminists in India led by animal lover Celina Jaitley held a candle light demonstration in broad daylight asking to bring Poonam back home since she represented the true Indian woman, who was willing to sacrifice everything for the love of her country. However, peace loving groups like Ram Sena and Shiv Sena have demanded that Poonam be banned from entering the country since she was an insult to Indian women. The progressive MNS party however took a step further and mentioned that as a Bihari, she should also no longer be allowed to step into their sacred Maratha land.

India’s Human Rights Activists led by the redoubtable Arundhati Roy demanded that Poonam must be given full protection and the Right to Strip be made a fundamental right since there was the truest form of self-expression. Since there was a long list of groups in queue whose sentiments had been hurt by Poonam’s actions, the Government constituted a panel of self-proclaimed intellectuals which included among those Aamir Khan, Chetan Bhagat and Subramanian Swamy, to understand the true impact of this loss of sentiments.

India’s Flying Sikh the full-nonsense Sardar Navjot Singh Sidhu responded crisply on TV saying in no uncertain terms - My dear friend, adversity is the true test of one’s character. The camaraderie and bonhomie unleashed by this damsel in distress would go a long way in revitalizing, soothing and elevating the battered spirit of the poor Indian common man, who has long found himself traumatized by the multiplier effect of the hyper galloping inflation, coupled with the double whammy created by the myriad scandals of the populist Indian polity. This was reported the next day exclusively as a major headline by the Times of India followed by a detailed 24 hr panel discussion chaired on Times Now by Arnab Goswami to understand what the Sardar said.

Madhur Bhandarkar has said that he plans to direct a movie called CRICKET-The expose which would expose the soft,dark underbelly of the dealings between cricketers, models and bookies and everyone else watching the movie. There would be an item number Poonam Ki Jawani with guest appearance by the subject herself; this story has miffed Katrina Kaif who plans to sue Bhandarkar for violating her copyright on jawani. Reports say that Mallika Sherawat has been approached to play the leading character; rumours abound that she may turn down the role because she is busy laying good word for her Oscar winning performance in the movie HISS. Large hearted Pakistani cricketers were also roped in to give the movie a realistic feel but everyday infighting among the players has delayed the shooting schedule.

Not to be left out, renowned Malayalam filmmaker Paambu Vasu who has directed avante garde classics like Yavanam Oru Shaapam, Avalude Thazhvarathinte Thanalil and Nabhikalkkappuram  announced that his new movie Pournami Raathrikal will be loosely based on Poonam's struggles in life. However, the movie has run into repeated hartals across the state for unknown reasons; senior hartal analyst Fijin Baby, writing in the national daily Manjadi, believes that the protests may have been triggered by Shakeela Chechi's fans upset at director Priyadarshan's reported attempt to remake her mega hit movie Kinnara Thumbikal with Akshay Kumar in double role to fill screen space.

Latest update – India’s Opposition has dismissed the existence of Poonam Pandey dubbing the entire plan as Poonamgate and has claimed that no such woman exists and this was a strategy by the Congress to deflect attention from the various scams plaguing the government. Pranab Mukherjee has said that that a PAC would look into this while the Opposition has demanded a JPC investigation but eventually all main parties walked out of the House.  In the midst of this entire conundrum, the Common Male waits with bated breath and a clenched fist...

In an unrelated story, the Malayalam newspaper Matrubhumi Malayala Manorama ran a front page cover story suggesting that the fact that there was a place called Dhoni in Palakkad indicated that Dhoni had his roots in Kerala; the report by local correspondent Minnal Babu proudly claimed to have identified the hotel where Dhoni’s parents had spent time during their honeymoon, thus firmly establishing his Kerala connection and giving the State something to cheer about in the midst of the election season and Sreesanth's sparkling bowling display in the World Cup. This story also sparked off huge celebrations leading to the Kerala State Beverage Corporation meeting its annual sales target within 2 days..