This was a scandal waiting to be unwrapped. That in IPL more sensational games were played off the field was obvious from the start. Transparency in deals, running to billions that were ultimately picked from the public’s pocket by exploiting a public fad, has always been elusive. It’s now official that BCCI insiders privy to critical info as well as rank outsiders who can’t tell a team captain from a cheer leader, all have their hands deep in the honey pot and little wonder media bees too are attracted no end.
But the ‘fix’ture’s eventual fate or ‘Commission’er Modi’s alleged frauds are the least of our concerns. What the heck is our external affairs minister doing in IPL? This is no cross-border cricket concerning India-Pak for him to be dabbling in. Yet he is neck deep and sinking fast in the quagmire. Not that Shashi Tharoor is a precious political gem, indispensable to the survival of India’s multitudes, and therefore to be mourned, but the impropriety of his acts stares at you. The damage is less to the person and more to the polity. The minister has blatantly misused his official position, converted it into an office of profit, nay, office of fortune and worse, has the temerity to brazen it out.
But that’s typical Tharoor for you. His political avatar itself was an aberration, a danger really, and that’s not because he was a virtuous paragon unfit for the wily ways of a political player. Rather, the smooth exterior and snooty talk were camouflage for shady agendas that are unfolding now. I am not propounding a kind of inverted racism here, but a soiled Shibu Soren or a rustic Lalu, stand out to be branded whereas ‘white collar’ scamsters like Tharoor easily evade initial scrutiny. And when they do get stuck at some other checkpost, they turn articulate advocates and adjudicators as well of their own cause that the primetime pundits are only too glad to project and promote. Even Congmen were apprehensive at his entry into their fold and his subsequent elevation to a top post for precisely this prospect. While they have to feel lucky to just get the ears, Tharoors will get both ears and eyes!
But let’s take Tharoor’s polemics head on. And instead make a case for why he must be given the boot from the cabinet forthwith. First, it is an open and shut case of abuse of office as the minister himself makes no bones about using his influence in clinching the Cochin team deal for, not Kerala Tourism Development Corporation, but Rendevouz consortium, a private player with a dubious Dubai connection to Tharoor’s past life. Surely, that’s not a public service and certainly does not fall in the category of official MEA business. Second, to add a lofty flavour to a rank commercial favour, the man now plays the ‘Malayalee Manoos’ card to make it sound as if he was fighting for Kerala’s rights … for a cricket team, of all things. I never thought Kerala was much of a cricketing State. Again I don’t remember reading any assurance of an IPL cricketing team to Kerala voters in Tharoor’s electoral manifesto. There are many needs that an average Kerala, or Trivandrum voter would want addressed but a cricket team is surely not one of them. Also, Tharoor’s list itself contains many priority commitments that are languishing. But none of this is surprising because the self-styled batsman for Kerala’s rights, till he successively became a candidate, MP, Minister and a cricket team champion, had hardly found time to set foot on Kerala soil before, not at least for the State’s causes. Strange indeed that this suave, sophisticated, globe-trotting internationalist should suddenly sound like a parochial regionalist that we are all so familiar with, and tired of.
Now that we know Tharoor’s role let us look at his locus standi. In what capacity has the Minister of State (not just Kerala State) found himself eligible to engage in the deal? And has he received any consideration or been compensated in any other way for that capacity? Tharoor’s answer is couched in diplomatic jargon that he, as a UN officer, is quite adept at. He calls himself ‘Mentor’. For whom? Not for Kerala, for sure. Not Trivandrum, from where he was elected or the town from where he claims to hail. Not Cochin because the people of Cochin do not own the Cochin team. In any case Cochiniites prefer fishing in the seas to watching their batsmen fishing outside the off-stump. Also for instance, Big Brother fame sob-sister Shilpa Shetty who owns the Rajasthan Royals does not call herself mentor. So ‘Mentor’ is a new idea no doubt. Clearly, the only thing Tharoor has mentored is a done deal in favour of a ‘public-spirited platonic’ partnership of profiteering private persons and corporates whose names he wanted kept secret, even from the Keralites for whom he secured this supreme pride and privilege! The mentor’s quarrel with his tormentor Modi is purely because the latter, for his own unholy reasons, spilled the names of the secret owners, one of whom happened to be Tharoor’s prospective bride, another Dubai legacy. But she did not pay for her stake either and probably got it as a wedding gift in advance in anticipation of becoming Mrs Mentor! And this is not corruption in high places but just a private affair, says Tharoor! Didn’t we say the likes of Lalu are less dangerous? The cowboy at least had the guts and, er, honesty to foist his wife openly and feed fodder from the State barn to family, clan and cattle, in full public view and not on the sly, Shashi style!
The minister has been missing from the ministry he heads for almost a month now. PM MSingh, in Washington for a summit, had to do without the services of his colleague, for whatever they are worth. As he discussed nuclear issues with Obama and the unclear Pak peace with Gilani, the Sardar must have been a worried man with no clue on when and from where the next Tharoor bouncer would come. Parliament would doubtless remain paralysed over the issue, once lip service has been paid to jawans killed by Maoists. The nation, for its part, is glued to the idiot box, idiot panel now, for the latest action on and off the IPL fields. Indeed, Shashi Tharoor already has a big haul of wickets at great expense. We need a break and so it is time the external affairs minister is packed off to the dug-outs to first sort and settle his own internal affairs! And it will be a nice free-hit if he takes Sharad Pawar, the farming minister sighted more at cricket fields, too with him.
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