Of glass houses, stones and other discomforts- part 1

Once the media got tired of Srini, they were quick to latch on to Dhoni- why did he not speak? Why did he not say something against the match fixers? Why did he not admonish the betting community? The real question that everyone was asking without putting it in so many words was - why did Dhoni not renounce his captaincy of the Chennai Super Kings? Well, i'm no mind reader, so i don't presume to know what is going on inside the mind of Captain cool.. but as a cricket fan and a fervent supporter of the men in blue, i hope to God that he is focusing on the Champions Trophy. God knows Indian cricket needs a win now, more than ever before.

But what is curious, is that the media who is screaming the loudest about Dhoni's supposed conflict of interest are those that most need to set their own houses in order.

Let us first explore the self appointed inquisitor for the nation. Mr. Arnab and his company, the Times of India and the Economic Times. The media house that "outed" the story in the first place. The group is no stranger to conflict of interest, and one might argue that owing to their 'expertise' in the matter, they were in a better position to judge this in the first place and share their anguish that Dhoni is not only a Vice President of India Cements but also a part stake holder in Rhiti Sports- the company that manages not just him, but <insert several shocked gasps here> Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja and Saina Nehwal- the last, inconveniently is not a part of the Suepr Kings, thereby messing up the media's story by virtue of her very presence. But i digress... let us get back to why the Times Group is best poised to comment on the conflict of interest in the first place.

Much to the Time's group's surprise, some years ago they found that people want at least a few lines of news per page of advertising and they weren't willing to fork out money only to buy papers filled with colourful ads and sexy models. (there is no accounting for public taste, but that's a sad reality). Once they came to terms with this, they innovated with advertising formats (if this kind of innovation was applied in the fields of particle physics or something, the course of human civilization would have taken a completely different turn, but the Times Group stuck to what they knew best- publishing). The Times Group launched something known as Private Treaties, which was later renamed Brand Capital. Now what it meant was that if you were a company that had something to sell to the public, but couldn't immediately fork out the crores of rupees that it took to run a nation-wide campaign, then you could approach the Times Group and become a Treaty client, whereby, for a stake in your company, not only will the group allow you to run ads across their publications for a heavily discounted rate, they would also support you with positive news stories and good PR ensuring that your brand gets built in the minds of the gullible public who really believe there is a difference between honest journalism and marketing. The client makes a lot of money and so does the Times Group, by virtue of their stake, and what's more, they end up saving a lot of money, because now, instead of having two departments (journalism and marketing), they could now fire all the journos and have the marketing guys write the articles- or simpler yet, just print whatever the client asks them to.
Read more about Private Treaties here:
The Hoot- How private treaties influence reporting

Despite the negative publicity, this master-stroke makes them pioneers in the field of conflict of interest- so they have every reason to comment on MSD's supposed awkward position.

But i have some kutty doubts here

If this is the Times Group approach to journalism, it begs the most obvious question- which client of the Group has vested interests in ensuring that the CSK brand along with the players, owners, team principals etc get tarnished in public opinion? In the previous instances when they have waged an all bets off battle against some, there was always an agenda. Read more here
 TOI and the Commonwealth Games

The second is in terms of Dhoni's stake in Rhiti sports. Now tell me, if you make 26.5 Million USD a year (according to Forbes), why on earth will you jeopardize all that for a few lakhs that you may potentially earn if a Suresh Raina or Jadeja get selected to the national team and then by virtue of their outstanding performance get several brand endorsements when then results in earnings for Rhiti- which then comes to you as a piddly 15%? For a man who is not even discerning about the brands he chooses to endorse (Orient PSPO, Maxx Mobiles etc- really MSD, that's the best you could do) it seems like a super complicated income plan that is unlikely to be his first investment choice. Also lets not forget that both Raina and Jadeja are impressive players who aren't really in need of this kind of a leg up in the first place.

Thirdly, lets get back to Dhoni's Vice Presidency at our old punching bag- India Cements. Now India Cements has had cricketeers on their roles since 1965 (or that's what's been reported in the press). S, Venkatraghavan, Rahul Dravid, V.B Chandrashekar, Dinesh Karthik, several state players, Ranji players etc have been on their roles since long before the IPL was even a figment of anyone's wild imagination. Now, no matter how much i wrack my brain, i'm not able to see what "benefit" the company gets out of any of their players being on their roles except as a gesture of good will. Now again, do you honestly believe that for a man who earns over USD 26 Million, this vice presidency in the company is going to signify anything other than that? Dhoni also has an honorary position in the Indian Army- does that mean he is going to support players from the Army in terms of team selection? Or is he going to run out and fight the next Chinese incursion at our borders? No. As someone that the entire nation looks up to, he has just been given an honorary position in both the Indian Army and in India Cements. This is not going to make the army stronger or help sell more cement (As the owners of team CSK, they anyway use the Super Kings players in their ads- they didn't need to make Dhoni a VP for that).

Next up: Who owns the media?

Also here's that has documented TOI's fight against N Srinivasan is here:
How-the-times-of-india-went-after-n-srinivasan

   

Some things aren't making sense

In this whole IPL betting/fixing fiasco, somethings aren't adding up for me. Here they are

#1: What is worse? Betting or Fixing? Both are terrible, but in my view, fixing is worse. Because it has the potential to alter the outcome of a game. Betting, while also illegal should be a lesser offence because you are not actually cheating someone out of their hard earned money or earning money to do something that goes against what you have been hired to do in the first place (get runs/wickets for your franchise and help them win matches). Now against Gurunath, there are only allegations of betting not fixing. I say this based on media reports and the fact that no one else from the CSK team has been called in for questioning. Admittedly he has confessed to trading some insider info about line up etc but still, but even that doesn't constitute as "fixing" unless he deliberately asked for the line up to be changed expressly for the purpose of his betting etc. Considering the amount of money generated by IPL in terms of brand valuations, sponsorships, ticket sales etc, where he would be a beneficiary (as someone whose wife and father-in-law are shareholders of India Cements) he would have to be out of his mind to jeopardize victory for the team- and even if he was, the fact that we came up to the finals means that he didn't enjoy any measure of success.

So while he must be punished for his offences, why on earth is every former BCCI president, politician, local tea kadai guy, and anyone else looking for their 10 seconds of fame on national television saying CSK should be scrapped?

What am i missing here?

#2: If he really was so much of a betting super star who was privy to all info, then how come he lost nearly Rs.1 Crore? It seems to me like he really wans't privy to as much insider info as he thought he was.And also, whoever are the people who won the Rs.1 Cr that this guy lost? Is anyone even looking for them?

#3: Everyone is focusing on getting N Srinivasan kicked out of the BCCI/resign. If ensuring that betting / fixing  does not happen is indeed the sole/primary objective of that body and they have been given adequate powers to stop that, then certainly he must step down. But what about the perpetrators of the crime? What about all the bookies? All the players involved not just in IPL but in other tournaments too ? So far they have arrested a handful of bookies and  3 players (all of whom are no-consequence players in any case). If that's all there is to find in this entire issue, its a shame to waste so much of the public's time on it no? In the meanwhile, everyone is acting as if victory is at hand, because tomorrow N. Srinivasan is supposed to step down/step aside.. do step step dance.. whatever. This is like arresting a traffic commissioner sitting in his office for everyone (including his son-in-law) jumping the red light and then saying that justice has been restored and that there will be no more road accidents in the country!

#4: What also amazes me is that the press is making the BCCI out to be some super murky Freemason type institution shrouded in secrecy with not even an attempt at democracy, and therefore needs to be brought into RTI etc. Now tell me, if they can get info about how many people attended which meetings, how many people went to the bathroom, who winked at whom etc, why try for RTI, it is far more bureaucratic than this mysterious source. Also, is someone investigating who this source is? It should be against intitutional rules no? To keep leaking confidential info on a regular basis? And aren't the press breaking any rules by abetting such a crime?  

I have many more doubts, including why the human race even considers the Brinjal to be a vegetable, when it looks like goo, tastes like goo and has the same nutritional value as goo. But we will save them for a later post okay?

What's with the CSK Hatewave?

As a diehard CSK fan i am hugely disappointed by all these allegations of betting that have been leveled on CSK and the other teams in the IPL. Particularly when all these things happened on the eve of our 4th final (third consequtive even). But it is also disappointing to see people who earlier claimed to be rabid CSK fans now desert the ship and pretend as if they never liked the team and what's more, also claim that they always knew that all of the teams achievements were ill-gotten!

Really you guys? That's how fickle you are? (you know who you are, and yes, i am super disappointed in you.. so deal with it)

Should I also pretend to be a great investigative journalist like those in the media houses that this country is blessed with and flash your timelines from less than a month ago just the way that CNN IBN, Times Now, NDTV and their ilk kept showing Gurunath Meyappan's 'altered' twitter profile - (for the amount of air time that the screen-shot enjoyed, i was cursing Gurunath for not putting up some sexy model photos on his twitter coer atleast... konjam more entertaining it would have been).

Guys, i totally understand and empathize with all those who are heartbroken and disappointed with this betting thing.. really, so am I.  This is not what the team stands for in my mind.. but to forget, and worse to belittle all of the team's past victories and achievements is in very bad form. Sportsmanship is not a virtue limited to the players alone... the fans need to display that same virtue if they claim to be true lovers of sport.

I am possibly not going to win any popularity votes for doing this, but i don't care. I am dedicating this blog to trying to understand what the real situation is and share my understanding and perspectives. You are welcome to join me, let us try and make sense of it all. If you are a true CSK fan who is disappointed, then let us join together and console ourselves, but if you are a fair weather fan who suddenly wants to preach morality to the entire planet, then i might as well tell you, you are going to find this blog a colossal waste of time, you are better off going to any of the so-called "news" sites or switching on SUN TV to catch the latest Chitthi serial equivalent - i heard that it's not as melodramatic as the IPL scam coverage, but hey, atleast you know that it will go on forever!