The Jazba of Corruption?

So yeah, I think we're all pretty psyched now for the Mother Of All Battles to take place in Mohali next Wednesday (March 30). An India - Pakistan World Cup semi-final is really the true final as far as both cricketing rivals are concerned (for one it will be a final, of course, even technically speaking). There can be nothing bigger at this World Cup. Nothing. And even as India completed its thrashing of Australia in the quarter-final today, the excitement at what is to come was already easily palpable. People on Twitter and Facebook were already sharing inspirational songs, hopes and cricketing assessments, expressing fears and neuroses, trash-talking to their digital brethren across the border and hoping to reverse-jinx the other side by talking up its strengths. And there's still five days of an agonizing wait ahead.

But more on that, perhaps, later. What I wanted to share with all of you today was this television advertisement which began airing (I think) on March 23rd. A long time ago, I did a post on the semantics of another mobile phone ad (also coincindentally of the same company) and I thought it's probably a good time to deconstruct another. You almost surely have seen the ad, since it runs repeatedly between the cricket (if you are watching in Pakistan), but have you really seen it? If you haven't, I suggest you take a look, particularly from 0:20 onwards (thanks to @shahidsaeed and @KhizM for helping locate the clip):





I hope you're already thinking what I'm about to say. Which of course is: Really Mobilink??? Did you really think the best way to promote your new product was to reference spot-fixing??? I mean, look at the evidence:

1. Mazhar Majeed character sitting outside tells batsman what shot to play next (0:20-0:25)

2. Side-kick character (the go-between?) reminds batsman not to get run-out without settling monetary compensation first (0:26-0:28). "Don't get run out, for free," he says.

3. Bowler gets his instructions to bowl bouncer also from outside the ground and shares the information with the batsman (0:28-0:30)

4. Batsman acknowledges the receipt of the information (0:31-0:34)

5. Bowler gives knowing smile and signals to batsman to seal deal (0:35-0:36)

6. The entire spot-fixing network is summarized involving the players, the bookie and the go-between (0:39-0:45)

7. The non-involved players represent the wide-eyed, clueless fans who cannot believe anything like this could happen (0:45-0:47). "Such?" [Really?] they exclaim.

8. The agreed deal is executed, with a lollipop bouncer being dispatched for a six (0:47-0:48)

9. Mazhar Majeed character displays his quiet triumph in managing another fix (0:49-0:50). Notice that he is not wildly excited like the other fans rushing on to the ground, his real 'interests' lie somewhere else.


After our recent shame with Messrs Butt, Amir and Asif, did Mobilink really want something like this to seem cool? And during the effing World Cup of all times??? When, for once, we've managed to forget all this and rise above it as a team??

And in the off-off-chance that nobody in Mobilink or the advertising agency actually thought about all this in quite these terms (which I am sure would be the line of convenient defence though everyone and their nanny knows that mobile phones have been banned by the International Cricket Council (ICC) even in team's dressing rooms for precisely these reasons), wouldn't you say that there's a sorry bunch of incompetents right there?

"Such."

How To Plant Idiotic Stories and Those Who Let Them

Imagine my shock and surprise when I saw 'Breaking News' on Express TV just before 7pm tonight that the entire sordid cricket spot-fixing saga had been one big fraud engineered by the Indian intelligence agency RAW in collusion with the Indian International Cricket Council (ICC) President Sharad Pawar, the News Of The World newspaper, and RAW's paid agent Mazhar Majeed, who according to this report, received 50,000 pounds from the intelligence agency to enact the drama.

This was just before the three blasts in Lahore today which have killed some 28 people so far, so the story sort of got buried for a little while. But it was repeated again in the 8 o' clock and 9 o' clock news and even sort of referenced in Mubasher Lucman's programme at 8 o' clock, where some unknown "analyst" (identified as one of Daily Express' editors) claimed he had been saying from the start what everyone now knows, that the whole scandal had been manufactured to ruin Pakistan cricket. I was later told that Aaj TV had also run the same story aggressively.

There was one little problem with this expose, however: it cited no sources. In the 'Breaking News' just before 8pm, Express TV claimed the source to be "a British newspaper" without naming it. In the 8 o'clock and 9 o'clock news, the source had become "media reports." This vagueness (if there is such a earth-shattering story, wouldn't it make sense to tell viewers who managed the scoop?) and the fact that neither Geo nor any other channel had run the report (as far as I know) of course immediately set the bullshit alarm off. So I decided to follow up and see where this news had originated from.

Not quite "a British newspaper"

It didn't take much to be honest. A simple Google search revealed the only source: the rag known as The Daily Mail. No, not the right-wing mainstream UK newspaper (no great repository of truth itself), but the purveyor of all conspiracy theories headquartered in Islamabad which pretends to be a global paper and which is a favourite of Zaid Hamid acolytes like Ahmed Quraishi. Although fronted by a man known as Makhdoom Babar Sultan, here's a hint to what it's actually about: most of its op-ed writers are retired faujis and its focus seems plainly to be crude propaganda about India. No points for guessing who's probably behind it.

The funniest part of the whole episode is that apparently Aaj TV even ran the logo of the actual UK Daily Mail along with its story and Express TV were so taken in by the name of the source (as well as probably its ambiguous logo that has two upright lions in it that make it look vaguely British empire) that they just assumed the source was "a British newspaper." So much for fact checking at Aaj or Express TV!

The two lions are a nice touch

But more troubling is the fact that once Express TV figured out that the sensational news was not coming from the UK's established media, it continued carrying the story as something credible and simply started calling its source "media reports." Which of course means jack-all, especially considering the background of this rag. Here is the actual story in the paper which you can read and judge for yourself. One word to the wise: don't believe any of the bylines. I doubt any of these people actually exist.

This set me off wondering if this push for planted and obviously libelous stories was some new game by 'the boys'. Although why they should be interested in something as petty as saving the arses of Pakistani cricketers is quite beyond me. Perhaps some of 'the boys' believe it to be part of the 'national interest'? This led me to this story, which was printed in The Nation today as well as in the Urdu daily Express and apparently a number of other papers, although not in Dawn, the Express Tribune or The News (at least not in Karachi, I am not certain about the Islamabad or Lahore editions).

The story in The Nation printed as a box on the front page under the teasing headline "Is there an Indian connection?" claims to be from a reporter called Ashraf Javed. My sources have confirmed that the story actually arrived fully written directly from 'the boys' themselves. (So not only are some papers willing to publish planted stories verbatim, some like The Nation will also provide their own bylines for pre-written pieces.)

If there were any doubt before, we now know for sure how much credibility Express TV and Aaj TV and Express and The Nation have. But what in God's name are our psy-ops warriors up to?

Gutted!

Long-time readers of this blog would know that it's been a while since I last posted anything about cricket. In fact, my last cricket-related post was all the way back in May, which was right after the leakage of the inquiry committee hearings into our humiliating tour of Australia, and even that was about the alleged hygiene of the cricketers. Simply, I saw no point in endlessly moaning and whining about their abysmal failures as sportsmen and the even more abysmal state of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB)'s management.

But how on earth could I possibly ignore what has now happened? It has shaken most of Pakistan, and perhaps the entire cricketing world, to its core.

(Just in case, highly unlikely, that you are reading this from a different planet, here is what happened. And here. And here. And here. I don't have the stomach to repeat it.)

Mazhar Majeed: Mr Fix-it-All (source: NOTW)

But what can one really say any more that has not already been said? Two of the most comprehensive and well-written Pakistani responses by Five Rupees and Dawn blogger Farooq Nomani have probably said it all. Nomani's piece's title actually says it all: "How Low?" Seriously, the only response I really want to make, is the response I made when I first became aware of the story as it broke: Fuck them, fuck them all. Apologies for the crudeness, but there is simply no other way to convey the feeling one has having once again placed one's hopes and faith in someone, after having been burnt and let down before, only to again see the futility of it all. This was supposed to be the side that one was supporting through its dark times because it was in the process of rebuilding with young blood!

Green with Greed: (L-R) Asif, Butt, Amir, Akmal (source: NOTW)

I mean, if the worst flood devastation in our history were not bad enough, if millions of people without shelter and food and clothing were not bad enough, if the prospect of the country going economically under were not bad enough, if the barbaric mob violence and apathy in Sialkot were not bad enough, if the continued brutal 'target killing' of poor labourers and political activists in Karachi were not bad enough, if the continuing alienation of the Baloch were not bad enough, if the Taliban atrocities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the global war being fought in the Tribal Areas were not bad enough, if the terrorist attacks all over Pakistan were not bad enough, if the abuse and massacre of our religious minorities were not bad enough, if the apathy of our elite and establishment were not bad enough, we have to contend with this petty and shameless greed rubbed in our face as well?

Can we get a fucking break?

Incidentally, for those who are spinning this as a concocted ploy by the English press always out to 'get us' or holding out hope that there is no conclusive legal proof to convict 'our boys', I have just one thing to say to you: get your heads out of your asses. People in the know and even sports journalists were talking about Kamran Akmal and others being on the take for quite a while now - hell, during the Edgbaston Test one former cricketer even made similarly correct predictions about upcoming overs as detailed in the sting operation by The News of the World now, based, he said, on 'rumours' he had heard - the only difference was nobody had this kind of proof. And nobody was willing to bell the cat.

You know the old saying about chickens coming home to roost? That's what has happened to us. In every single awful thing that has happened to Pakistan recently that I have mentioned above. In this particular case, as Five Rupees puts it:

"I would argue that one of the main reasons we find ourselves in this mess is that we didn’t take care of business when we should have, in the mid and late 1990s. Everybody else did. The Saffies banned Cronje, and took stern action against everyone else (Herschelle Gibbs was banned temporarily for the mere fact of not disclosing that his captain had asked him to partake). The Aussies punished Shane Warne and Mark Waugh for disclosing weather information. The Indians banned Azharuddin and Jadeja. What did we do? We swept everything under the carpet. Only Salim Malik was banned, and really, his career was over anyway. Everyone else involved, including guys like Wasim Akram, were given light punishments, mere slaps on the wrist, despite overwhelming evidence against them (Ata-ur-Rehman wrote a sworn affidavit in which he alleged that Wasim asked him to bowl badly). Why did we do this? Simple, because we were afraid of what it would do to our cricket team. Rightfully so, I might add, since everyone from Wasim to Waqar to Inzi to Mushie was involved, in some way. But we took the shortcut then, and are paying for it now, because by not punishing it, we encouraged it."

Catch Them Young: Fixer Majeed hands over jacket with cash to Wahab Riaz, left, while Umar Amin looks on (source: NOTW)

There are bound to be questions raised about how the team selection may also have been manipulated to ensure the 'right kinds' of people in the team. Why for example had the Pakistan team become mainly a Central Punjab XI, why were certain undeserving players like Wahab Riaz (also implicated in this scandal) brought into the team above more deserving bowlers, why Afridi actually walked out of the captaincy (according to the alleged fixer Majeed, most of the players "wanted to f*** up Afridi because he's trying to f*** up things for them"), why there was such a haste to send the new wicketkeeper Zulqarnain Haider home (a report today in Jang claims that not only was he not given the customary 'test cap' he was handed a ticket back as soon as he came out of the clinic even though he had he had been hopeful he would be all right in a few days), why perennial keeper-in-reserve Sarfaraz Ahmed was not called up even if Haider had to be sent home, and why certain players like Fawad Alam continued to be kept out of the playing eleven.

But let's not kid ourselves that the current sorry lot at the PCB would ever be willing to tackle these questions or take the drastic structural actions required. They are part of the problem, not the solution. And no change can come about unless you recognize how deep the rot runs.

The worst part is not even that all of this shit is happening to Pakistan. The worst part is we steadfastly refuse to learn from our own history.