http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Editorial/Sting_is_king/articleshow/3322038.cms
Sting is king 4 Aug 2008, 0000 hrs IST, Chitra Padmanabhan Have you heard the clamour on the street, especially after the recent trust vote on the Indo-US nuclear deal? Aping a popular song it goes, 'Sting is king, sting is king, sting is king'. For, the political class, which was getting stung till the other day by the fourth estate, and protesting vociferously, is now stinging and singing with evident relish. Consider the sting that left Lok Sabha representatives red-faced for a variety of reasons during the recent trust vote debate. Interrupting a largely desultory proceeding, three members of Parliament (MPs) from the BJP sprung into the well of the House brandishing bags full of cash to show they had been bribed to go against their party line and vote in favour of the United Progressive Alliance government. With the elan of a P C Sorcar, pulling out notes as if from an 'akshay patra', the MPs told the world — much in the spirit of rebels who capture radio stations to broadcast, 'this is a revolution, we have taken over the government' — that this was a sting operation in progress. A sting operation which would unfold on television screens shortly. But this was a sting in reverse motion! The players in the frame had upstaged the media by alerting the world to a sting in the typically spectacular fashion of the electronic media. The players had become the media; the news channel was a shadowy presence yet. Those who debated and anguished over yet another new low in the life of the House caused by the cash-for-votes allegation missed this delicious irony altogether. It goes without saying that the BJP took this unconventional step driven by an unselfish aim — to expose the venal practices hardwired into a system the Indian political class as a whole has nurtured so lovingly. If that is not courage, what is? Consider the mental blocks the party must have had to overcome to accomplish this feat. For one, its acute dislike for the sting as an investigative journalism tool having been at the receiving end all these years. Remember Tehelka's Operation Westend which probed the propriety of NDA's defence deals or the then BJP party president Bangaru Laxman being caught on tape receiving money? Or the Tehelka tapes of 2007 which had MLAs and senior party functionaries across the saffron fold enumerating how they killed individuals in the Gujarat 2002 violence? No one realises that the BJP questioned these stings because they lacked an ISI (Indian Standards Institute) mark of quality — that purity of purpose that the party's cash-for-trust-votes sting was animated by. How could the nation not believe it? Secondly, think of the churn the experienced leader of the opposition, L K Advani, must have gone through in giving the go-by to parliamentary procedures by springing the sting without a by-your-leave to the Speaker. Obviously, for Advani — who served as home minister and deputy prime minister during NDA's tenure in power at the Centre — the scales of justice must have tipped in favour of preserving the principles of parliamentary democracy. What use of House procedures if the House itself is in danger? For that matter, to be part of the sting must have been a 'prayashchit' for one of the three MPs who had earlier been embroiled in a scandal of taking cash from lobbies to raise questions on their behalf in Parliament. He must have known his past would be raked thin, yet in the larger interests of democracy he agreed to picking up the gauntlet. So, here they were, the three sting players in Parliament, their job done, awaiting the channel's telecast of the sting, as was master 'sutradhar' Advaniji. The sting quartet had put in a marvellous performance. Except, the TV channel did not oblige. Instead it decided to hand over the tapes to the Speaker of the Lok Sabha. The non-telecast, thus, became an impromptu sting on the original sting. Stung by this development, the three MPs seemed like characters in search of an author who would validate them. But the question still remains — who stung whom and, ultimately, who was stung? Was it the political parties, the Parliament, the news channel — or you and me? (The writer is a Delhi-based freelance journalist) ------------------------------------ -- INFORMATION OVERLOAD? Get all ZESTMedia mails sent out in a span of 24 hours in a single mail. Subscribe to the daily digest version by sending a blank mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], OR, if you have a Yahoo! 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