You want to take out Lalit Modi, you sweat it out. Keep the equity.

This ugly fight is not about cleaning up cricket, but covering it up completely

bvrao

BV Rao | April 21, 2010


IPL commissioner Lalit Modi
IPL commissioner Lalit Modi

You have to give it to the Congress. This party knows how to turn personal vendetta into a pious national mission. 

Look at Mission Modi, for example. The whole party, many ministers and almost all the government's scary alphabets--IT, ED, DRI, IB, CLB, RAW--are out to get him, and the way things are going, get him they will.

I have no equity in IPL, neither do I know a branding beau from Dubai for Modi to sweat about me. So, I don't break a sweat over him either. Just like Modi couldn't care less how tough it is for me to sell a governance magazine to an IPL nation, I couldn't care less if, for his next assignment, he is sent to the Antarctic and asked to launch a version of the IPL there (which I suspect he will welcome considering how he loves to change/shift venues). 

But when this Congress government makes it look like it's taking this Bad Boy down on my behalf, I have serious reservations. For one, I do not know how really bad this boy is, if he is indeed. For another I do not know if he is any, pardon the grammar, badder than the rest of the gang. For a third, I do not know the bossman, Sharad Pawar, is not as involved in all the murky stuff that Modi is supposed to be sitting on top of. 

All I know is this: Modi got one of theirs (Shashi Tharoor), so they have to get Modi. That is fair game as long as they don't fire from the nation's shoulder. If national interest was at the the centre of all this frenetic activity, all the generous leaks about all the slush funds in IPL would have happened six months ago when the IT department is supposed to have prepared a dossier on IPL. Perhaps then a certain very morally and ethically correct minister would not have dared gift Rs 70 crore of other people's money to his friend.

I also know something else that will stop me from celebrating the fall of Modi as the ultimate clean up of the Augean stables of Indian cricket. That fall will not be the clean up that we want, it will be the cover-up that all the politicians of all the parties who are on the BCCI, want and will get.

I don't want to lend my shoulder for this fight. You want to take out Modi, you sweat it out. And, yes, keep the equity.

Comments

 

Other News

How social media is reshaping elections

Since Brazil’s return to direct presidential elections in 1985, no candidate who finished second in the first round of polling had ever won the presidency. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, now 81, has just done it. What explains the comeback, and what changed in Brazilian politics to make it possi

Cabinet approves Dearness Allowance, Dearness Relief

The union cabinet chaired by prime minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday approved the release of an additional instalment of Dearness Allowance (DA) to central government employees and Dearness Relief (DR) to pensioners with effect from 01.07.2026 representing an increase of 3% over the existing rates of 6

Cyclone Arnab strikes Andhra as warming oceans amplify storm risks

Cyclone Arnab made landfall along the Andhra Pradesh and Yanam coasts in the early hours of Wednesday as a very severe cyclonic storm, with maximum sustained wind speeds of 125–135 kmph and gusts reaching 150 kmph. Its rapid intensification has raised concerns about how warmer oceans, global warmin

Counting matters but which ones?

The first instinct of public policy is to count. Its harder task is to count what counts. We have become remarkably good at measuring the reach of the welfare state vis-à-vis beneficiaries covered, rupees transferred, houses built, connections installed and services delivered. But some of the most

Inching closer to a trade deal with America

The cooperation between India and the United States goes back quite a time. We need to relegate that era to the backburner when Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru visited US in the times of president Dwight Eisenhower and called the American let-off of 10 million dollars in defence aid to Pakistan as a “gun w

Manch vs Musk: Forty people and a foreign billionaire

About forty people walked the roundabout on Teen Murti Marg to the gate of Chanakyapuri police station, a distance you could cover in under a minute, on Friday to protest against Elon Musk’s Starlink. The walk was called by the Swadeshi Jagaran Manch. Nobody joined them on the way, and nobody seeme

Upcoming Conferences



-->

Archives

Current Issue

Opinion

Facebook Twitter Google Plus Linkedin Subscribe Newsletter

Twitter