Disclaimer: All names, characters and incidents mentioned in this column, however believable, are entirely satirical. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, organisations and products is intended or should be inferred
India’s safest state (for corruption) has passed a historic bill for women’s safety, whose most important clause calls for protecting the state’s most important woman, by detaining everyone who demands her resignation in public. To heighten awareness about the bill, the government has rolled out blue-and-white ‘Aparajita’ badges that outraged citizens can attach around their Facebook and WhatsApp DPs.
Meanwhile, as preparation for Durga Puja queues, thousands across Kolkata line up to form human chains along prominent roads in the city, gradually realising that standing in front of slowly moving traffic is better than sitting in front of laptops. In some places, protesters leave despondent after quietly accepting that the chains looked far more photogenic in their heads.
Elsewhere, select Bengali intellectuals, whose favourite toys (in bed) are hammers and sickles, get excited for the first time in years at the sight of youngsters in rallies carrying copies of The Communist Manifesto.
Wondering what else happened as you skipped yet another Zoom call to demand justice? Here’s presenting the top stories from the week that should have been.
September 2
“For the last time, Russia didn’t interfere in the 2016 elections because the Kremlin never replied to emails sent by my team,” reveals Donald Trump TT archives
- In a bid to prove that he is better at giving interviews than Kamala Harris, Donald Trump, speaking to 138 journalists and podcasters in the space of a week, reiterates how he would solve the Ukraine-Russia crisis: “Peace? It’s simple. I’d give [Vladimir] Putin whatever the CIA has on his most powerful enemies inside the Kremlin. He wants that much more than he wants Ukraine.”
- Following intense, week-long negotiations with NASA, Netflix has been successful in getting Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore to document their adventures in space through radio waves, just in case they do not make it back to the Earth.
September 3
“The first lesson I have learnt at Arsenal is that every player should know the other players in the squad,” shares Raheem Sterling TT archives
- Reports from The Tattler at the Bridge suggest that Chelsea have agreed to pay Raheem Sterling’s astronomical wages as part of his loan move to Arsenal to spy on how Mikel Arteta is able to get young players to keep winning Premier League matches.
- The British tabloid press is optimistic that the reunion of the Gallagher brothers as part of Oasis will encourage Prince William and Prince Harry to bury the hatchet in the interest of their fans and a massive payday. Scores of venues in London are already interested in hosting a fireside chat between the princes for an entry fee of £500.
September 4
Yogendra Yadav is shocked to discover that the largest audience for his political commentary is on YouTube Shorts TT archives
- Yogendra Yadav, India’s foremost political expert at predicting things in hindsight, apologises for writing a column on how the country lacks effective political thinkers. “It took me a long time to figure out that our sharpest political minds no longer share their thoughts through op-eds or research papers, but on Instagram stories,” clarifies Yadav.
- After evaluating the disappointing engagement metrics for content shared by India’s prime well-wisher, the PMO has informed the Indian contingent at the Paralympic Games that they will no longer receive any hour-long phone calls from Delhi on winning medals.
September 5
Social media influencers can receive up to Rs 8 lakhs per month for promoting content on arranged marriages in India’s most cultured state TT archives
- The government of India’s most populist (or is it populous?) state has passed a draconian social media law that forbids girls and boys from different faiths from liking or commenting on each other’s social media posts. Moreover, same-faith, opposite-sex couples in the state (the government does not recognise any other kind of pairings) must now seek permission from the Digital Intimacy Regulation Committee before sharing any “lovey-dovey pics” online.
- A pan-India survey conducted by Literacy Isn’t Education finds that 87 per cent of teachers in government schools love their job because it allows them to work from home during class days and call their partners in a silent room on exam days.
September 6
Ananya Panday denies speculation that her new show was originally shot as a series of Instagram reels TT archives
- Talking about her “struggles” during the shooting of her new show, Call Me Bae-wakoof, Ananya Panday recounts her most traumatic experiences — “going without avocado for two months, sitting in a non-AC auto rickshaw, staring at Mumbai’s middle-class men staring at me, enduring repeated shoe bites, and sweating so profusely that I couldn’t even take a snap on being sun-kissed.”
- Alia Bhatt rejects more lucrative endorsement offers from Chanel and Revlon to become a global ambassador for L’Oreal, since “the texture of L’Oreal’s shampoo most closely resembles that of Ranbir’s.”