Shobha De,
You mocked the Indian athletes in the Rio Olympics thus:
"Why do with bother with the Olympics? Goal of team India at the Olympics: Rio Jao. Selfies lo. Khaali haat wapas aao. What a waste of money and opportunity."
Well, you have been lambasted enough for this singularly crass and insensitive comment. You have dismissed it all as trolling. Let me not go into that domain once again. I just want to compare you with Indian contingent that has gone has gone to the Rio Olympics. Remember that Olympics are not the only world sports contests. There are many more, which are sports specific and equally, if not more, demanding. Some of our Olympians have won medals in such events. Agreed, nothing fires up the imagination and charm like the Olympics. Well, let's see what our boys and girls have done there.
Deepa Karmakar lost the bronze by a whisker and came fourth in the world, yes fourth in the Whole World. She is also the first Indian to have ever qualified for the Olympics in gymnastics. She recently won gold in another world event and has won our hearts.
Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna also came forth in the world by narrowly missing the bronze play off in a tough fight 6-1, 7-5. They have won medals earlier.
The hockey team broke a 36 year jinx and reached the Olympic knock out stage and reached the quarter finals for the first time after 1980.
Badminton players Kidambi Srikanth and PV Sindhu reached pre-quarter finds of badminton coming in the top sixteen in the world.
Abhinav Bindra came a close fourth in shooting and was all grace on his loss in the medal race. That he has earlier won a Gold and has taught Indians to dream is a far bigger story.
And so on .. ..
Now, let's see what you have achieved, Shobha De! In spite of passing off porn and sleaze as literature, or possibly because of it, you have no appeal beyond Page 3, the incestuous "civil society" and it's cocktail parties. Where do your so called bestsellers stand in world rankings? Well, let me examine your pulp on an even smaller yardstick, just the Amazon/Kindle rankings. Some of your popular books are ranked as follows on Amazon India:
SURVIVING MEN: 90,148
SPEEDPOST: 67,400
SOCIALITE EVENINGS: 62,959
They hardly qualify to be bestsellers, eh!
So, next time you shoot your mouth off in the Twitterland, be sure that your feet are clean. You will prevent a foul breath.
