It is becoming a tiring spectacle. Every few days some famous person decides s/he is a citizen of the country and has the right to speak out. Little do they realise that this luxury is reserved only for them.

It has become a gallery of vogue. Tread carefully, for they have left the ground slippery…

The celebrity as predator

Aamir Khan swooped down like a peace dove to help save the Narmada. This was more a vulture going for the pickings. If he was all that concerned, then why did the whole Rang de Basanti team land up at the agitation site as though they were on a promotional tour? I protest against this abuse of a cause, for not only is it frightfully gimmicky, it is also counter-productive. In Gujarat people started burning his film posters.

What has it done for the movement? “I want the nation to watch this very carefully. These (netas) are the people who promise to look after us, to take us ahead, to look after our poor and needy. They are using force, they are trying to bully (me),” he complained.

So now it is about him? And this is what the nation is supposed to watch very carefully? TV channels were relaying the scene from Mangal Pandey, trying to bolster him as a latter-day freedom fighter. The man has the gall. One report said, “Drawing comparisons to Mahatma Gandhi’s steadfastness to causes, the actor said he would not be intimidated and would continue to lend support to the project-affected people.”

This nonsense must stop. He is being intimidated?

Medha Patkar had been on hunger strike since March 29 (she gave up the fast after 20 days but is still in hospital); she has given her life to the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) for the past 21 years. Where was Aamir Khan all this while? He does not even know the nature of the problem. “I lived in Kutch for more than six months when I was shooting Lagaan. I have seen the water problem that the people of Kutch faced and I am extremely sympathetic to their cause. I want water to reach to all these four states and the people who need this water,” he said. When was Lagaan made? Did he join any agitation to get water for those people then and in the intervening years?

As an afterthought, he realised that the NBA is about a dam, so he had added, “We have to see who are getting affected; and the people who are affected are poor, they are farmers, they feed us, their villages are getting submerged. They are losing their mandirs, their schools, their entire villages.”

Gotcha. He may deny being politically savvy, but where was the need to bring in mandirs? Has Medha Patkar in all these years talked about trying to save mandirs? He is just too smart. He is not fighting for any cause but pitting himself in a very heroic role. When the Gujarat CM, Narendra Modi, decided to go on a 51-hour fast, the media played it up as a counter-measure to the film star. Utter rubbish.

Now that the Supreme Court has given the go-ahead for increasing the height of the dam, making Modi a happy man, and to review the issue after three months, Mr. Khan says, “I am happy with the judgment …Now, the core issue of rehabilitation is back in focus.”

Who does he think he is? The core issue has remained the same. This is what Medha Patkar said, “The Supreme Court has not stayed the on-going construction of the dam. The people of the Narmada valley will fight to the finish for life to expose the barbaric game that is playing itself out across the country at the cost of the oustees.” She also said it is “not a big victory”.

Arundhati Roy had earlier asked Aamir to first stop endorsing Coke, but now she has been talking about how “wonderfully aggressive” he is, going contrary to the satyagraha philosophy that Medha is espousing.

It is time that the concept of celebrity justice is made answerable.

The celebrity as conscience-keeper

In India these days everyone is applauding ‘fast-track’ courts. Who are the beneficiaries of such quick justice? Will the common man/woman get anything out of it?

Famous cases are being re-opened.

News channels are behaving like nautch girls. They have the same favourite patrons. The nawabs of vigilance. They speak on behalf of us.

Who are ‘they’?

They are the social butterflies.

Case: Jessica Lal was a model. She was shot dead seven years ago. Her killers are free. We want justice, scream the arrivistes. Suddenly, they have discovered that a crime had been committed. Where were they all these years?

There is no doubt that people in power get away with murder, but how many cases of regular murders come to the courts?

Why is Zahira Sheikh used as an example and the model witness who turned hostile in the Jessica case giving interviews about his career? He may be, quite rightly, afraid of the consequences. What about Zahira?

Case: Dance bars were shut down; now they have re-opened with some conditions. An idiotic adman tells us that if the wives knew how to keep the men at home then they would not go to such places. Who is he to talk? Why is he called upon to give his views on subjects he will never be affected by?

Case: A 52-year-old woman is raped by the scion of an industrialist family; his green-coloured Mercedes Benz, for some reason, becomes the emblem. He is not shown any mercy. On the face of it this looks like tough cops, but there is something rotten.

A friend of the rape victim was given the celebrity treatment. Her photograph where she was wearing a strange-looking pink headgear took up three-quarters of a tabloid’s front page. She lives in a downmarket area, but she is considered chic enough.

Stephanie Jordan was experiencing Page 3 justice. You may wonder why. Why does a woman who comes forward to report against the son of a big corporate honcho get this kind of treatment? It is as convoluted as the latest fad

You see, she ‘doped’ with Abhishek Kasliwal, the culprit; she knew his buddies.

The same goes for Deepak Shetty who claims to have been sexually assaulted by the rapist and his friends. Suddenly, all those who are quiet about and even abusive towards gays are not making a noise.

Do remember that this is a common occurrence. By publicly sympathising with the plight and making one man into an example, the others will save their skin.

Case: The cop who raped a teenager on Mumbai’s Marine Drive has got 12 years’ imprisonment. Good. They are demanding more. Who are they? Mostly, the residents of the posh locality where the police chowkie was located. Have they done anything for the girl? Isn’t that more important?

Do they even know about what happens to women prisoners? Do they know what happens when girls go to the police station to lodge a complaint? Do they know about boys who are exploited by the cops?

Would they be as devastated as Shubhavati was when she saw her 11-year-old daughter with marks all over her body? This was in the slums. And the mother realised the immensity, “She does not know what rape means but she told me the horror she had been through…she was raped not once but every few hours for ten days at a stretch.” And this woman had to file a claim to get back her child from a remand home.

This is the dark underbelly.

‘They’ are not interested.

The celebrity as prey

I have used the word ‘prey’ studiedly to draw attention to the flipside.

Salman Khan has killed endangered animals. He was been sentenced for it. He is out on bail. The problem is the high moral ground being adopted.

“It will set an example,” they say.

Are guinea pigs the solution? If the System has the nerve, then it ought to flex its muscles on a regular basis.

The Bishnois, a tribal group, are being feted as heroes against the ‘powerful’ Salman. I would like to know how many other cases these ‘nature-loving’ Bishnois have fought? Who is backing them?

“We are poor farmers. Though these animals often enter our farms and damage crops, we never even hit them with as much as a stick. We worship nature and these animals and trees are our god’s reincarnation. What Salman did was out outrageous. He defiled my god. We wanted him punished,” said one of the tribal women.

Let us cut out this crap about protecting the environment and love for animals. Those guys who go around with monkeys – what happens to them? At the Ranthambore Tiger Reserve, where I met the then director Fatehsingh Rathore, there was a move to create a boundary wall and renovate fences to protect the Park from villagers illegally grazing their cattle, destroying the habitat and poaching.

The problem is environmentalists target the group they know they can make the most of. Even though less that half the available land is put to use – the rest being wasteland – the rural areas are spared the spiel. They are seen as natural protectors. But, who chops trees for firewood? Who enters forest areas for grazing cattle? Who wastes water for new-fangled irrigation? Who pokes a stick into the cow’s uterus and wiggles it around in the belief that this will produce more milk? For every tribe that worships the black buck, there are several others for whom a feast is the relentless killing of several species.

What if the Bishnois were not animal worshippers and it did not have the status of a cult?

How many poor tribals/commoners are even aware of the concept of justice, leave alone fighting for it?

Real citizen’s awareness is dying. ‘Vox pop’ is now the voice of crystal consciences. We now have to listen to how the judiciary should function as seen through the Swarovski prism.