Moments of truth

Mumbai is confused why Delhi is hyperventilating about some television programmes.

Moments of truth

Mumbai is confused why Delhi is hyperventilating about some television programmes. Apparently it has to do with the truth. Mumbaikars are comfortable in the make-believe world of Bollywood. As far as baring the truth is concerned, this is not something that Delhi is comfortable with. Notoriously parsimonious with truth and economical with facts, the truth issue is very worrying to powerful denizens of the capital. So, to shut up the prospect of truth, it has quickly been converted into a matter of obscenity and sleaze.

Ah, now this begins to make sense, to those who understand Dilli well. After all, truth in Delhi, shorn of the veneer of routine obfuscation, is almost always obscene. By attempting to scream in Parliament about it, a much larger objective is being met. If the TRP-fueled masses believe that a truth machine out there can uncover more and more of the truth, then you never know where the public's enthusiasm will end.

Some worthies shiver at this prospect.

Trembling at the truth? 'In some future 20th Lok Sabha,
the seats they (politicians) currently adorn may well
become polygraph mounted,' writes the authoru00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0
file pic

Don't forget that matters have been made much worse by comics and analysts who have been, in the meantime, suggesting that polygraph seats be installed in Parliament causing as much consternation to our beloved MPs as the television program 'Sach Ka Samna' based on 'Moment of Truth' that they are currently hounding. They are concerned that in some future 20th Lok Sabha, the seats they currently adorn may well become polygraph mounted!

In this surreal world of power-laden Delhi, the only treatment for truth that must out, is delay. Long comforting delay, when all but the truth is dead. Indeed Dilli laps this up. Otherwise why would the Liberhan committee take 17 years to figure out Babri Masjid, or why are the 1984 Sikh riots still unresolved? Ah, but the truth must out u2013 only holey-holey as they say in the land of the choley-bhature.