Punjabi antenna

IIFA awards, officers and scams

By

Randeep Wadehra

Glam quotient of the IIFA Awards function in Toronto was considerably diluted because the Bachchan family was missing. But there were other stars like Shahrukh Khan, Bipasha Basu, Dia Mirza, Anupam Kher, Chunky Pandey to lend éclat to the proceedings. Among other celebrities prominent was Sharmila Tagore (once dubbed as La Tagore by Mumbai’s film journalists, especially the Stardust); the dapper Shashi Tharoor was a surprise presence – or, perhaps, not such a surprise given his eclectic interests. Although the mainstream TV news channels did not show much interest the two main regional channels, PTC News and Day & Night News gave decent coverage to the function. In fact Day and Night News sent a journalist, Misha Bajwa Chaudhary from Chandigarh to Toronto specially to cover the IIFA extravaganza. The result put the channel one up on others. Misha’s exuberance seemed to rub off on Canada’s Bollywood fans who broke into an impromptu Sheela ki jawani song and dance number the moment she pointed the mike in their direction; and celebrity interviewees too – there was Chunky Pandey trying to live up to his reputation as a compulsive ‘pass-maker’, and Anil Kapoor coming up with smart one-liners; and SRK actually blushed when Misha complimented him on his looks! The short interviews on the ‘green carpet’ were interesting and entertaining, and the voiceover-cum-commentary added to the show’s appeal.

Earlier, the Day and Night News had telecast two very interesting interviews (Fair & Square) that could be described as “Tale of Two Officers with Common Indira Effect”. One episode featured Lt. Gen. SK Sinha, and the other had the original super-cop Kiran Bedi. Sinha talked on several issues but focused mainly on his later years as Commander of India’s Western Army that looks after the security of Punjab and its contiguous areas. Those were turbulent times, with the Akalis on warpath and the Congress Governments in the state as well as the centre hell bent upon decimating their influence among Sikhs. This gave rise to the Bhindranwale phenomenon. General Sinha’s interview revealed political ineptness on the part of Indira Gandhi’s regime in handling the fast deteriorating situation in the region. In fact, on more than one occasion he had to stand up to Indira Gandhi in the matter of military being asked to do a job it was not supposed to. No wonder he was superseded.

The interview with Kiran Bedi too revealed the stuff she is made of – tough, uncompromising and clearheaded. Her views on police reforms were forthright and well thought out. Additionally, during the interview, one learnt how her positive attitude helped her to excel even in those postings that were supposed to be mere punishment/doghouse transfers where the “inconvenient” officers are sent to make way for the more “pliable” ones; for example, her exemplary reforms in the Tihar. She had shot into fame when, as in-charge of Delhi’s traffic police, she had towed away Indira Gandhi’s car which was wrongly parked. No wonder she was superseded, too! Not that Sinha and Bedi are the only two upright officers in our armed forces and bureaucracy. The story of sidelining the straight-spined officials is a long and continuing one.

Scandals have been hitting the media headlines quite regularly of late. While the arms scam involving several army officers got attention on DD Jalandhar’s Khaas Khabar Ek Nazar the doping scandal has become a major issue with most Punjabi news channels, which discussed its various aspects. Unfortunately, what we got was a skein of explanations and righteous verbiage when what one expected was a ray of enlightenment. OK, so the scandal happened. What can be done to prevent its repetition? What loopholes need to be plugged? Surely, we have enough laws, rules and regulations to prevent such scams/scandals? The problem lies in practicalities? Systemic analyses are seriously required.

First published in The Tribune dated 23 July, 2011

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