Sunday, according to DD News, was ‘martiers day’. Wasn’t sure if we were celebrating martians or martyrs. Either way, violence was done to the English language and somebody should take up the matter in Parliament, forthwith!

It was remembrance of things past as TV news recalled the Kargil war. Watched three types of coverage: sharp-shooter discussions on the Indian armed forces and their preparedness for combat or the lack thereof — a CNN-IBN report lamented the lack of new gunpower since the Bofors gun used during Kargil; soft-focus with those who lost family and friends ten years earlier, still missing them today — NDTV’s Kargil 10 year later with Barkha Dutt, travelled back with a brother who lost a brother (Vishal Batra) and soldiers who lost soldiers (Col. Joshi). It was touching; and we were touched — none more so than Dutt (too much the focus) or the IBN-7 anchor on Sunday morning who looked in closer to tears than the father whose son had died in the conflict.

Lastly, live coverage of the Drass function where the hills were alive with the sound of music from the military bands which you couldn’t hear on Times Now because an otherwise informative Mahroof Raza spoke throughout.

Abhishek Bachchan, dressed in military fatigues to remind us he once acted as a jawan in LOC, was let loose on the soldiers serving in Kargil (Jai Jawan, NDTV). Everyone enjoyed the encounter: never seen so many men smiling together for so long when the joke was on them. Also, many questions including rather risqué ones: what was it like for you and your father, two men, to dance together with Aishwarya, how did you kiss John Abraham in Dostana? The replies, alas, were blander than water: nice dancing, no kissing, only acting.

... contd.