‘Let the games begin!’ The words that Pratibha Patil spoke had a strange and endearing quality about them. The words were not different from what had been spoken tens of times earlier, but the way she uttered, the way the emphasis lay on the word ‘beginnnnn’, the way her hand went up as if not to miss out on any action… but the point of this article is not this at all. The point is that this sentence with the third word replaced has been the most often used in recent times. Let me tell you what I mean.
Last evening, as I watched the closing the ceremony of the Commonwealth games in Delhi from the confines of my home, I couldn’t help but think of all the analysis, comments, and tweets that will fill up the social networking, blogging, and micro-blogging worlds. And then suddenly there was S Kalmadi with his speech that appeared to have simply and mercilessly left Sheila Dixit in a faded, jaded little half-sentence, a speech that powerfully made its way through the jeers and boos, a speech that said little else than; ‘Let the battle begin!’
Let me straightway recount a few such sentences that may have existed in the months that preceded the CWG in Delhi.
‘Let the file-movement begin!’ Someone somewhere in the ministry of sports must have said and have been silenced immediately by the then minister!
With the change of the minister, things might have begun in a more energized way:
‘Let the planning begin!’
‘Let the tendering begin!’
‘Let the laundering begin!’
‘Let the construction begin!’
‘Let the postings begin!’
‘Let the transfers begin!’
‘Let the tours begin!’
‘Let the foreign junkets begin!’
‘Let the…’ do you think there is any end to what all must have begun and what may have actually never begun at all! The list can really be endless… though it will be much more disciplined if the listing is done under three headings:
What the netas must have begun!
What the engineers must have begun!
What the babus must have begun!
The only sentence that will probably remain constant to all the three categories will be: ‘Let the racket begin!’ The reason for this is simple enough. The more is the noise that is created, the less are the possibilities of any sensible person daring to step forward to investigate. Who will want to be mauled by these ‘sheras’ of the great Indian democracy!
All this would’ve gone on with absolute abandon had the press not intervened. They thought of adding their own little sentences, like:
‘Let the TRPs begin!’ This is obvious because the TV journalist works and exists with the sole aim of helping news discover that it is indeed news! Sometimes they make sure that even non-news struts around as top news. Whatever, their incursion into the cwg melee at this stage gave birth to a new breed of the ‘Let the – begin!’ phase. And we saw:
‘Let the stings begin!’
‘Let the expose begin!’
‘Let the collapse begin!’
‘Let the hounding begin!’
…and so the press too marched on with their contribution to the games. But then, everything wasn’t all about doomsday and forebodings. There were phases of:
‘Let the whitewash begin!’
And
‘Let the positive thoughts begin!’
You remember how Sheila Dixit famously said: ‘Let patriotism begin!’ though without using the same words in the same sequence.
Now that the games are at last over, it isn’t as if the ‘Let the…’ phase is dead and gone. The battle to get exonerated, the battle to implicate, the battle to prove the unproved, the battle to say I’m the best, the battle to say you’re the worst, the battle to one-upmanship… The latest battle-cry is:
‘Let the battle begin!’
An article by:
Arvind Passey
15 October 2010
