Ashish Kumar from Tekriti Software

What’s with all these sting operations? Ever since Tehelka came up with a sting operation exposing the corruption in the Defence Department way back in late 2000, there have been numerous sting operations carried out in the country. Some of the popular ones apart from Tehelka exposure are the ‘Casting Couch’ operation carried out on the actors Shakthi Kapoor and AmanVerma and the more recent one where the MPs were paid money to raise questions in the Parliament.

An excerpt on the recent sting operation:

NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 12: Parliament was stumped today when a sting operation caught 11 MPs—six of BJP, one Congress, one RJD, three from BSP—accepting money for raising in the House questions they were provided. Two of the “stung” MPs are former Union Ministers.

Red in the face, political parties reacted by suspending their MPs while Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha issued show-cause notices and gave the MPs concerned 48 hours to reply. They were caught on camera, in an operation conducted by website Cobrapost.com along with Aaj Tak TV channel

Now, I think that these operations are good as long as they don’t interfere in the private lives of somebody. So, the operations carried out by Tehelka and the recent one by Cobrapost.com and Aaj Tak TV channel makes sense to me. I am not sure how successful will these be in reducing the corruption at the higher levels - but will definitely introduce an element of fear amongst the wrongdoers. Of course, these ‘operators’ needs to be severely punished if they are found tampering with the evidences. But we should guard against the ‘cheap publicity’ by these operators - like the ‘Casting Couch’ operation. Honestly speaking - there are a very few people who will not agree to the consentual sex if the other person keeps insisting on that - particulary males. Shakti Kapoor and Aman Verma - victims of Casting Couch operation - were no exceptions.

Reminds me of an idea that my maternal uncle gave me months back - when I had just returned back to India - to come up with a website where people could upload their sting operations. I rubbished the idea by saying that I don’t want to be sent to jail for promoting pornography. But may be this is not that bad a idea - as long as you moderate the content.