Editorial: Moonshot, Oscars, smokescreens

It’s that time of the year when we engage in an annual exercise of stock-taking, emerging none the wiser. To paraphrase Dickens, it was the best of times, and the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, and of foolishness; a season of light, and of darkness. It was an epoch-making year on the scientific front as ISRO landed the Chandrayaan-3 on the south pole of the moon. Our happiness knew no bounds as this was preceded by another moonshot — Neeraj Chopra’s gold winning javelin throw of 87.58 metres, at the World Athletics Championships.

Our sporting prowess was not limited to athletics. During the Chess World Cup, Chennai’s wunderkind Praggnanandhaa became the world’s youngest player to reach the Chess World Cup final. He is the second Indian after Viswanathan Anand to reach the final in the Cup’s history. While on the subject of cups, don’t remind us of that forgettable cricket World Cup disaster.

Sports aside, India’s gold rush was set into motion when two of our films bagged the coveted Academy Awards. The Elephant Whisperers and RRR enlivened hopes of aspiring filmmakers, as they realised that the democratisation of entertainment, thanks to streaming platforms, had opened up the floodgate of possibilities for anyone with a creative streak.

Things were hotting up politically too, with the BJP-led NDA government steamrolling ahead with one action item after the other. The new Parliament building, constructed as part of the Rs 20,000 crore Central Vista Redevelopment Project, prompted mudslinging matches between the ruling dispensation and the chief opposition, with the better part of north India being introduced to Tamil words like sengol, which came with its own colonial hangover, thanks to its association with the first Prime Minister of India, Pandit Nehru.

The Gandhis, meanwhile got their game faces on, with Congress leader Rahul embarking on a longitudinal padyatra across India, hoping to revive the desi GOP’s fortunes; never mind the drubbing it received in the recent elections in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Rajasthan. The party had spared no expense in its quest to present a formidable challenge to the BJP, even banding together a motley crew of regional parties to come up with the aptly-named INDIA alliance. Unfortunately, that union has been more in the news for shooting itself in the foot, with back to back outbreaks of the foot-in-the-mouth disease — from poorly-worded critiques of Sanatana Dharma to the spectacular self-goals involving the propensity of Hindi speakers to keep restrooms spick and span. Not that the ruling party in Tamil Nadu is devoid of headaches of its own, thanks in no small measure to a bellicose Governor, and two of its ministers being hauled up on account of corruption.

Speaking of which, the Parliament was the nerve centre of all things incendiary, smoke canisters et al. Firebrand MP Mahua Moitra, she of the bark is worse than bite fame, found herself in the crosshairs of her critics, who mouthed ‘hell hath no fury like a spurned ex’, or in this case, a Rottweiler without its harness. There are a few glimmers of resilience on the horizon. Last we checked, we are still the fastest growing major economy globally, we are making giant strides in soft and hard diplomacy — take that Canada. But we still suck at building climate-resilient urban infrastructure. Go figure.