No, Minister!

Not quite sure what, but something is causing Ministers in India to go crazy with power in the last couple of days. First, a Union Minister tries to "influence" a Madras High Court judge to grant anticipatory bail to a student in a forged mark sheet case. Then, an MP from AP (not playing with acronyms here, though it is tempting) gets pissed off with a bank manager and slaps him on the face a couple of times. The first case is a bit hush-hush - nobody has been named and there isn't much coverage on the TV news channels except for a mug-shot of the judge and a few quotes.

The second case, however, is hilarious in its WTFness. Video clips of the MP slapping the bank manager - not just once but multiple times, have been on the air since last night, while the MP's responses are quoted on the ticker at the bottom of the screen. I can't reproduce it verbatim, but this is the overall logic and flow of what he had to say at various times over last night and this morning:

1. I did not slap him at all, I did nothing.

2. I did not slap him, I only held him by the shoulder.

3. I did not slap him, I was trying to hold him and my hand slipped.

4. My hand accidentally touched his face

5. OK I slapped him lightly, just once, but he provoked me

6. OK I slapped him - he was being rude to me because I'm from a lower caste

7. "Can he speak to me in the language which he did? He was drunk heavily" (sic)

8. He's the one who should be punished.

So you can imagine watching the MP slap the manager again and again ad infinitum (which is what new channels do when all they have is just a short clip of the live action - gets bloody irritating after a while!) while his explanation of the moment appears at the bottom of the screen. Reminds me of my sons playing the "he started it" blame game when I catch them beating each other up, though I must say they're both far more imaginative and come up with some very bizarre but realistic-sounding explanations.

No, this won't do. This is not why I voted for Congress, and this is what I was worried about when the right and the left both started crumbling due to their respective internal hemorrhage. If we don't keep these guys in check, there will be slaps on the face of the electorate on far more critical issues. Are you listening, Ms Gandhi?

Posted via email from HyperActiveX's (Pre)Posterous Posts