The spectrum scam, the largest ever skulduggery in Independent India -- trust our politicians to make this reputation unsustainable even for a short time -- has enabled us to understand the legerdemain of the likes of A.Raja, to some extent. Suhel Seth of CounselAge, a respected observer of events, understated the obvious when he recently referred to these scamsters as scoundrels and rascals.
Some sections of the media played a remarkable role in uncovering at least partially the bottomless scandal. Ar nab Goswami of Times Now needs special mention. He was unrelenting in pursuit of the covert and not so covert machinations of the political-bureaucratic-business nexus. He richly deserves a Padma award for his efforts. Of course we are living in a fools' paradise if we hope that the government will honour such sincerity of purpose.
The Hindu true to its recently cultivated culture of conflating perversion and partiality was doggedly abstaining from editorially seeking the resignation of the egregious minister. After the minister put in his papers, the newspaper praised that he had done the right thing. The Hindu's representative, one Mr.Radhakrishnan, while participating in a TV panel discussion desperately and dolefully pleaded that the media leak of the CAG report on the scam before it was officially placed in the Parliament must be probed, thus exposing the shameless tilt of the newspaper. A newspaper that is less concerned about the contents of CAG report than about the logistics of its release is a national disgrace and not a national newspaper.
The Congress and the BJP vied with each other in adopting dilatory tactics in order to redirect the attention of the nation away from the sins of politicians. The BJP is equally shameless as the Congress in not addressing the main issue in the Karnataka land scam. These two national parties only take pride in mutual satisfaction that both have serially indulged in scams, cover-ups and recidivism. The Communist parties have behaved much better at least in the recent past.
Manish Tiwari, the irrepressible buffoon of the Congress party has once again proved his limitless capacity to outdo the ostrich in denying the obvious. His incorrigible tendency to disallow co-panelists to express themselves is not helping the Congress party in any meaningful way. Jayanthi Natarajan's repeated references to falsehoods as "the fact of the matter" were eminently avoidable. Her obstinate utterances unsurprisingly invited Subramanian Swamy's plea that she must revisit the law school.
One interesting matter has not received the attention it deserves. DMK claims that A.Raja resigned on the advice of his leader Mr.Karunanidhi whereas Kapil Sibal maintains that the ever-decent prime minister sought his resignation. Manish Tiwari has expressed both these contradictory views at different points of time. Jayanthi Natarajan has insisted that Raja had resigned and was not sacked. Prime Minister's taciturnity engendered and sustained this glaring confusion. The Raja's Rule mentioned in the previous post stands untested as of now.
Kapil Sibal's aggression is patently self-defeating. His sanctimonious dismissal of Subramanian Swamy's attempts to lay open the government's unconcern for good governance as procedurally incorrect , a trick also practised by Jayanthi Natarajan will hopefully not succeed in obfuscating the real issue. It is an old trick to shoot the messenger when the message is unwelcome. The new trick is to shoot the behaviour of the messenger if you can't shoot the messenger.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Lessons from the 2G Spectrum Scam
Labels:
Ethics,
Frauds,
Governance,
Intolerance,
Journalism,
Politics
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6 comments:
2G spectrum scandal - it is independent India's largest and most blatant loot of public money. PM deliberately keeps quiet knowing fully well all that is happening. If he is incapable or unwilling to take action against the corrupt, why do we need such a PM?
The unholy alliance between politicians / police / industrialists / media is very strong. To understand this unholy alliance, please visit these (new) links - the news of which has been totally blacked out by the mainstream media in India (both print & TV) as most of the star journalists are caught on tape doing / agreeing to do things which 'journalists' are not supposed to do -
Radia tapes - All Lines Are Busy
There was not one pie Niira Radia didn’t have her hand in nor any area—media, corporate or government—she didn’t have a contact in
http://www.outlookindia.com...
Radia Tapes… Corporate- Bureaucrat-politician nexus— The N.K.Singh Connection
http://indiasreport.com...
How top Journalists have turned handmaidens of Ambani Brothers
Part 1 - http://indiasreport.com...
Part 2 - http://indiasreport.com...
Mid Day publishes “Barkha Dutt” tapes story! Finally, one news media had the guts!! - http://bit.ly/bEHqYo
Some Telephone Conversations - Inside the networks of lobbyists and power brokers that dictate how this country is run.
http://openthemagazine.com...
While politicians from Tamil Nadu disgraced themselves and the entire nation by their actions, Sri J Gopikrishnan a simple stringer (from Thiruvananthapuram) was doing India(ns) proud by his relentless expose of the telecom scam (over a 2 year period). His was the only effort of consequence which kept the scandal from going away from public memory - the TV channels chased politicians (till their own names came up).
Read this story on how Gopikrishnan followed up the spectrum scam - "The man who felled a king" by Chandan Mitra.
http://www.dailypioneer.com/296854/The-man-who-felled-a-king.html
The mainstream media which has severely compromised itself has maintained deafening silence on their own involvement. Two more links which I came across on this topic are appended below.
On Saboteur General and a Postscript - A tribute to J. Gopikrishnan and Dr. Swamy - V. Sundaram
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.politics/browse_thread/thread/e8527cfefa30359c
Subramanian Swamy's letter to PM dt 24-11-2010
http://ennapadampanchajanya.blogspot.com/
2G spectrum scandal - it is independent India's largest and most blatant loot of public money. PM deliberately keeps quiet knowing fully well all that is happening. If he is incapable or unwilling to take action against the corrupt, why do we need such a PM?
The unholy alliance between politicians / police / industrialists / media is very strong. To understand this unholy alliance, please visit these (new) links - the news of which has been totally blacked out by the mainstream media in India (both print & TV) as most of the star journalists are caught on tape doing / agreeing to do things which 'journalists' are not supposed to do -
Radia tapes - All Lines Are Busy
There was not one pie Niira Radia didn’t have her hand in nor any area—media, corporate or government—she didn’t have a contact in
http://www.outlookindia.com...
Radia Tapes… Corporate- Bureaucrat-politician nexus— The N.K.Singh Connection
http://indiasreport.com...
How top Journalists have turned handmaidens of Ambani Brothers
Part 1 - http://indiasreport.com...
Part 2 - http://indiasreport.com...
Mid Day publishes “Barkha Dutt” tapes story! Finally, one news media had the guts!! - http://bit.ly/bEHqYo
Some Telephone Conversations - Inside the networks of lobbyists and power brokers that dictate how this country is run.
http://openthemagazine.com...
I'm sorry - the comment got posted twice. Regards.
Dear Hummingbird,
Thanks for the links. The more we read about the scams, the more dispirited we become.
It appears that the once clean PM has now been become compromised. I fear that he is getting blackmailed over a momentary indiscretion he might have committed. He is perhaps unable to escape from the clutches of a ruthlessly amoral person.
Regards,
Srivarahan
The erstwhile telecom minister has said he has resigned in order to "allow smooth functioning of the parliament" . It logically follows that the PM did not seek his resignation and if at all he did it was only to "allow smooth functiong of parliament". We have a CAG report and an ongoing CBI enquiry. Are we as citizens of the republic to understand that there has been no scam as such and the resignation, the enquiry, the subsequent detention are all only procedures to prove the innocence of the tainted minister ?
Dear Anonymous,
Today's Press Conference by the Prime Minister looked like answers to your query.
1) MM Singh clarified that in a coalition, choice of ministers (and by extension, their resignation or continuance) rests with the respective coalition partners. So the prime minister would not have asked for the minister's resignation.
2) Is it all a sham? The prime minister seemed to ask "was there a scam at all?" He audaciously compared the loss to the exchequer arising from the 2G episode (I have learnt enough not to call it a scam) to subsidies extended for food, fertilisers, diesel etc.!
When an economist, apparently ethical prime minister starts speaking like this, one becomes more pessimistic about country's future.
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