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Varsha Bhosle

THE HOT AIR AWARDS, 1997

Being well aware of the interest with which readers await various annual honours, your humble columnist has instituted the Hot Air Awards to venerate the worthiest celebrities/organisations star- billed in the previous year. It was a daunting task: Believe me, it's no joke to choose between Laloo Yadav and Sitaram Kesri... Therefore, my think-tank decreed that to glamourise the ceremony and avoid personal blame, the privilege of selecting and extolling the winners should be given to other luminaries. The brief was that they choose only those with whose merits/efforts/predicaments they most identified. And so:

THE Chakravyuha Award

Presented by Veer Abhimanyu to multinationals.

Abhimanyu uvaach: O MNCs, every atma is forced to act helplessly according to the qualities and habits he has acquired from maya and prakriti, from the modes of material nature. Therefore no one can refrain from karma, not even in a land far across the seas from one's karmabhumi. Perform your prescribed duty and follow your dharma, for doing so is better than not monopolising.

Just as I had raised my bow and penetrated the chakravyuha, so had you elevated your spirits in the hope of permeating and demystifying the maze of Bharatvarsh's consumer trends. And just as Krishna had willed that I were not to know the exit-route from the epicentre of battle, so also has Kubera deemed that the road to shakti in Aryavarta will be a devious one. You are the modern yoddhas, O MNCs, and, perhaps, a little dhyaan and bhakti-yog will lead you to your desired goals.

The "Et Tu?" Award

Presented by Julius Caesar to the BJP's supporters

Would L K Advani were fatter! But the fundie fears him not.

Yet, I do not know the woman

Advani should avoid so soon as the foxy Jayalalitha

Who acts much, is a great litigater,

And looks quite through the title-deeds of kinsmen.

She loves no Ayodhya, wears no khakis, as dost the fundie

Who loves all things saffron and bloody, and

Chants 'Hindutva' with such honour and virtue.

Such men as Advani be never at heart's ease

While they behold a greater fundie than themselves,

And therefore are very dangerous.

The ides of November are come and gone,

But Advani is still as constant as the northern star.

How foolish do the fears of friends and RSS-men now seem.

Yet, what can be avoided, whose end is purpos'd by Ram?

And yet, the fundie shall go forth;

For these predictions are to India in general as to Caesar.

Fastest-Withdraw-In-The-East Award

Presented by Billy the Kid to Sitaram Kesri

Hey pardner, that wus quick! Honest Injun, this ol' Billy never dreamed he be givin' his silver spurs to an Injun. You'se an Injun chief, ain'chu? Ya don' wear no pants, have a headdress, and paint yur face when you'se on the warpath. (Mr the Kid could be referring to the dunce-cap and facial egg worn by Mr Kesri at the Congress party's internal affairs meetings -- Ed)

Anyhow, I gotta giv' ol' Sit-a-ram my surest shooter in honour of the fastest withdraw, after all his ravin' and rantin' aginst the right-winging posse. Greased lightning, pardner! Ol' Billy don' talk much, but he'll say this: He'll be mighty glad to hunt a desert bandicoot with ya anyday.

The Missing Links Award

Presented by Dr Watson to The Jain Commission

To Sherlock Holmes it will always be *the* commission. I have seldom heard him mention it under any other name. In his eyes, it eclipses and predominates the whole of its kind. For the trained reasoner to admit such inclusions into his own finely honed craft is to introduce a factor which throws a light upon the nature of this perfect observing and investigating machine. As Holmes himself says, "The commission can free the world of all its malfeasance if it could beat that Dr Moriarty of society: politicians."

This day will forever be associated in our minds with the swiftness and alacrity with which the formidable 'Case of the Missing Torso' was brought to its natural conclusion, the most remarkable factor being that it is so faithful to the fictionalised reconstruction of the events leading up to Rajiv Gandhi's killing in the book entitled The Assassination, published a few months after the dastardly deed.

The Fists of Fury Award

Presented by Bruce Lee to Pramod Tiwari, the BSP and the Samajwadi Party

Owwwoooo... Hoo! Ha! Ah! Sssssss... (Mr Lee is prefacing his speech with customary martial actions -- Ed). I cannot terr you how happy it make me to plesent the Fists of Fuly Awald to the honoulabur pelsons who put up a demonstlation in the UP Assembry. We of the cerestiar kingdom pay homage to the stlong and dynamic Heavenry Dlagons of India. Seeing the many kowtowing people in Derhi (we banished our eunuchs with the rast Empelor), it makes me grad to see walliors who lefuse to take any clap, be it even from unarmed speakers of assembries.

I'm sure that the Dlagons and I must share the same honoulabur ancestols... Which leminds me, Zhou En Lai once said, "All dipromacy is a continuation of war by othel means". But the Dlagons chop that down, saying by their august shower of miclophones and shoes that dipromacy is nurr and void in any kind of war. Owwwooo... sssss...

The Communications Award

Presented by employees of the Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd. to Sonia Gandhi

Honourable Shri Editorji, Smt. Soniaji Gandhi (pause - Ed), and bandhus and bhaginis (long pause - Ed). I have been requested by all the union shaakhas of the Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd, to present Smt Soniaji Gandhi, wife of our late prime minister Shri Rajivji Gandhiji, with this beautiful bronze balloon as our token of heart-felt appreciation.

Though many Chanakyas have come and gone, this is the first time that the bandhus and bhaginis of the MTNL have shown their reverence with an award. It must be noted that, till now, there has never been a Bharat-bhaagya-vidhaata who so upheld the work traditions and identified with the ideals of the MTNL staff. There is not a single telephone operator in the world who can keep the president of the Congress party on hold for as long as Smt Gandhiji has done. And just as she shows faith in... (this speech is terminated -- Ed)

The Endangered Species Award

Presented by Salman Rushdie to the Marx-wadi press

Mine is the story of the fall from grace: me, Salman Rushdie, called 'Satan' for most of my present life. When you're running out of steam, when the puff that blows you onward is almost gone, it's time to make a contribution... Now, therefore, it is meet to sing of what is, and what may no longer be, a last sigh for a lost world, a tear for its probable passing -- for the last hurrah of the pinko press in bloody mother India, Bharat-mata, Hindustan- hamara.

Here I sit, in this lonely spot, and continue to wheeze in the high affairs of state: of Jyoti's treasury scam scum, of the passing of JNU to teeny-fundies, of the row over the Private Universities Bill, all spewn by the bleddy soup of the Hindutva Pantheon -- Arun Shourie, Sudheendra Kulkarni, M V Kamath, Swapan Dasgupta... useless art-johnny clever-dicks, hungry to hang up the Left like a stuffed doll. I get a feeling of deja vu... how tawdry it is, how thin, to have mimsy scriveners out for your skin. And I say to you, Patience is mine, Marxism will live.

The "Who, Me?" Award

Sponsored by OJ Simpson and presented to Congress spokesman V N Gadgil

(Mr Simpson did not attend the ceremony as the organisers were unable to meet the financial terms set by his business manager. Mr Gadgil's selection rests on his reasons given for India's mid-term elections - "The UF forced elections on the country by rejecting the Congress's reasonable suggestions" -- Ed)

The "Why Me?" Award

Earmarked by Varsha Bhosle for the Indian electorate

(Ms Bhosle was unable to attend the function since she suffered a nervous breakdown after reading her hate-mail in Arena -- Ed)

Varsha Bhosle