Games Politicians Play

Now that much water, silt and corpses have flowed down the Ganges since June 17 it's now time for our netas to let their hair down and get immersed in political muck. The main motivating factor seems to be the forthcoming 2014 general elections.

The latest I heard was the Twitter war between Congress and BJP over the handling of 'Himalayan Tsunami' - it makes even the verbal duels in Saas Bahu serials look quite dignified. The Twitter savvy among both parties were busy trading hashtag jousts.

The ball was set rolling by 'Rambo' Modi and his clever PR plants, which some of our mediamen lapped up with a willing suspension of journalistic scrutiny. This set social networking sites ablaze. The keyboards of 'internet Hindus' had little respite as they got busy waxing eloquent about the Gujarat strongman's big feat of rescuing 13,000 Gujaratis.

This bubble of hot air kept circulating for a couple of days, but later came crashing down when some started asking basic common sense questions, which the erring journalists should have asked in the first place. Initially Modi and his partymen too kept silent and basked in the glory, but when things turned sour they denied making such a claim. Thus Modi acquired an additional sobriquet - Feku.

This is not to say that the country's grand old party (with its long history of sycophancy and hero worship) was a picture of poise and sobriety. With much fanfare trucks carrying relief materials were flagged off from Delhi by party bigwigs, only to run out of fuel and get stranded at Rishikesh and Dehradun. The drivers were not provided enough money (they were handed over a mere Rs 2,000 per head) to buy fuel.

The latest I hear is that some of the relief packets provided to flood victims have photos of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi on them! Thus political parties are seeing everything through the prism of 2014 elections.

Also Read: Bangalore Beat