That SRK got into a scuffle with the security and administrative officers has been told and retold. Page 3 population has strongly rallied behind King Khan praising his paternal instincts having overtaken his linguistic instincts in the spur of that moment. Almost every newspaper website has come out with individual stories on how the media is going overboard on such a trivial issue and that SRK's gentlemanly disposition is quite well known. Of course, Shirish Kunder would be the first one to acknowledge that!!!
Given that what has happened has happened and King Khan is now banned from Wankhede stadium for the next 5 years (well isn't it quite a long tenure? even match fixers get lighter sentences)- the article focuses on what all happened as a post facto of this scuffle. The serious ramifications of this moment of fury outburst has cost everyone quite dearly... and how??
Even as the media was trying to play out the entire saga, Maharashtra Cricket Association (MCA) announced a 5 year ban on SRK. BCCI was still trying to skirt the issue by remaining non committal.
Next day in the parliament, it was sheer chaos!!!!
MOMta Banerjee and TMC elected representatives started shouting slogans against the high handedness of the Congress NCP party in Mumbai in relation to the Wankhede brawl. MOMta along with her party members stormed to the well of the house and demanded the resignation of Prithviraj Chawan as the CM. His fault - his government allowed and did not take any action when another state's ambassador was being abused and his children manhandled.
Pronobda was to present the Government's stance on rising Dollar concerns and high inflation but the house had to be adjourned for the day. Hell hath no fury when the Don's cubs were clubbed!!!!
Loss incurred - 200 Crore INR (the cost of running the parliament for a day)
MOMta addressed a press conference in the afternoon announcing the construction of a grand sports stadium in Kolkata (around Singur) aptly named Khankhede.
Cost of construction - 75 Crore INR.
She also announced the creation of a state-of-the-art educational institute Red Chillies Education Society where King Khan's children and the children of his cronies can study. The curriculum would be such that the kids could .... well do anything they wanted.
Cost of construction - 40 crore INR
BCCI officials now went into a frenzy. A flash meeting was convened to discuss this new development. The creation of Khankhede would mean a significant loss to Wankhede and hence a significant loss to BCCI. Also noted was the fact that none of the SRK brigade Bollywood stars would be a part of any match played in Mumbai. This would bring down the eyeballs on TV and hence lower TRPs and hence lesser advertising rights money and hence.... well the point was driven home!!!!
Some decisions were taken.
- First one being - sending Vilasrao Deshmukh to Mannat to pacify SRK. Vilasrao has a penchant for pacifying the disgruntled (remember Anna Hazare and Vilasrao's sweet whisperings into his ear which calmed and ended the famous fast??).
- The BCCI overruled MCA's ban on the actor and promptly issued a press statement that SRK was always welcome at Wankhede and that he should make himself feel at home at the stadium.
- The previous point was taken a bit too seriously by SRK. Red Chillies signed a partnership with BCCI over exclusive use of the stadium for all KKR matches and stage shows starring the King Khan and his buddies.
- A helipad was constructed on one patch of the ground near the VIP boxes so that the doting Daddy can just land in his helicopter to pick up his kids after the match.
- SMOKING NOT PROHIBITED signages were put up all over the stands.
Loss to Cricket - Priceless
There are somethings that your money can buy, for others - there are endorsements, partnerships, wedding dances, political pals......and if this also leaves anything to be desired - there is a Matrix Card!!!!
Just when this report was going to the press, we spotted a small neat packaged kept in front of Mannat. On closer inspection it turned out to be a CD of the first two episodes of Aamir's new show with a small note,"Chill dude, life for kids is much more than being asked to behave at some stadium".
No comments:
Post a Comment