Christie’s, hammer your head. Or else, employ Lalit Modi as your auction salesman. Before the BCCI’s sell-out of cricket, sorry, of top international cricketers, Christie’s art auctions are small time. Sure, a Picasso, Rembrandt or even a Husain may fetch more than the Rs 6 crore for a Dhoni, but can they command the attention of 20-odd news channels for 24 hours of non-stop coverage barring breaks for the Sensex and weather reports? Nah.

In terms of a television spectacle, this is incredible, even incredulous; what was there to say (or see) after Modi’s periodic pop-outs with the latest sales figures: M.S. Dhoni: $1.5 million; Andrew Symonds: 1.35 million... Who cared what Boria Majumdar, with his heart hammering as strongly as Sunil Gavaskar’s for India, thought of it? Or, Ajay Jadeja? Give us the money, man and begone.

But no, they wouldn’t go away. Endlessly, mercilessly, continuously (!), TV news discussed and waved the price tags in our faces (very colourful, eye-pleasing price tags, it must be said) but once merchandise goes under the hammer, it’s as flat as punctured tyre for the viewer. We want to see how much the next chunk, sorry hunk, goes for. And, since Shah Rukh Khan was wearing a T-shirt over his six packs (does he still have them, or have they gone the way of all flesh?), Preity her hair and cards close to her chest, we didn’t have the pleasure of an eye-ball (as in having a ball?). Frankly, when we want to gaze upon the Khan of Kolkata’s Prince Charming, it’s with the bat swinging the ball for a six, not a trouser-jacket blinking at numbers and names the way he does between facing balls.

... contd.