Legend has it that it is the greatest of the Indian conjuring tricks. And till now none has been able to decipher fully the secret of the great magic trick.
The Great Indian Rope Trick is the ultimate illusion, the conjuror's magnum opus.
In the simpler version, the magician, playing on his pipe like a snakecharmer does, 'charms' a stout rope to rise into the air , and when it is high in the air, a little boy climbs it. In other fancier versions the rope is thrown into the air and then it is persuaded to rise and rise until it disappears into the clouds. The little boy climbing the rope soon vanishes from sight. Soon the magician would climb after him with a sword and he too vanishes. Then dismembered organs start raining upon the ground. Moments later the magician reappears and with an "abracadabra" or equally powerful incantations, "re-assembles" the little boy. And all ends well. Applause. Clink of money.
Within the last hundred years or so only a couple of people have managed staging the simpler version of the rope trick before audiences. But hurry not dear, gentle reader if you were on the verge of mourning the passing of our position as masters of illusions. The stage is now set for perhaps the greatest magic 'trick' of the century. And like every good conjuring trick, this too is more 'trick' than treat.
It is The Great Indian Hope Trick.
To the Indian languishing in the doldrums of helplessness and hopelessness in the "Kali kaal" of mega-scams, serious diversions like the GIHT offer a much-needed relief, and perhaps a safety valve for their pent up tensions. After the great Parliamentary Kururkshetra battles, the hard-won 'JPC victory' is indeed heady wine that fills one with equally heady hope.
Enter the illusionist, doing his best to look dapper in the customary blue turban, mumbling mumbo-jumbo, and throws the 2G JPC hope/rope into the air. The people are charged with hope. Yes, this is going to be the real thing, and they jostle for ringside seats. This JPC stuff will go all the way into the rarefied regions of corruption and reveal everything. Surely magicians, we forget easily, are adroit entertainers with their fingers on the pulse of the audience. The "abracadabra" and the mumbo-jumbo and other loud incantations fill the air, all the while many climb up and down, appear and disappear. Then the fun part will begin with swords being brandished left and right, and body parts raining down and making the whole scene bloodier than an abattoir on Christmas eve or the guillottine platform at the peak of the French Revolution. The audience, brought up in the grand traditions of Bollywood and the Indian television, loves all that gore and the loudmouthed dialogue, and go ga-ga over the whole tamasha. After the requisite number of 'scenes' to classify it as "serious entertainment", the show will come to a close and the magician will put everything/everyone back together again, to great applause. All would have forgotten what the whole tamasha was about and go their respective ways --happily entertained. None knows this better than the conjuror and his cronies.
I dont think one needs to be an astrologer of repute with a laser vision to pierce the darkness of the murky future and make such a prediction. It is the natural outcome of any conjuring trick. All ends well and the magician goes home pocketing your money. How does every magic trick work? There is nothing great about it. While your attention is focussed on the trivial and you are hoping for something 'miraculous' to happen, the magician is pulling his strings behind the scarf, and with sleight of hand, deceiving you. Illusion? Deceit? Yes Sir!
Simply put, it is grand deceit! And very convincingly and entertainingly done too! The Great Indian Hope Trick is not going to be any different ... hand on heart!
If you are keen, you can dig a bit deeper into the history of all the earlier JPC 'hope tricks'. How many were there? I would rather emulate our PM and say, I dont know because I was not told. Bliss!! (Gautama Buddha was in all probability not familiar with the bliss of ignorance; else he wouldn't have searched long for the ultimate bliss.) How many JPCs were boycotted "for political reasons"? As if politicians need any a-political reasons! Every reason they come up with is political! What were the findings of the various JPCs constituted since the first R-day? Has a single politician been punished or at least inconvenienced upon the findings of any JPC? Forget about the culprits being decapitated or their limbs cut into pieces--though that would have been their fate if our Founding Fathers had the wisdom to borrow the strict Sharia laws instead of implementing a tame civil code in our country! Ask away any more JPC questions that come into your mind. The answer, I can assure you in every case, would be that nothing 'untoward' happened and that it ALL ended well.
What more do you need? You had your JPC, your high hopes, and you were entertained grandly at your own expense for quite a while, when you had been in a state of "willing suspension of disbelief". Now you can all go home; the trick is over. The conjuror is confident of the outcome. Otherwise how could he still harp on the fact that he is putting on the show as a result of the strong persuasion/coersion of the opposition, and not because he feels there is a real need for one! What more indication do we need for concluding that this is going to be another stage-managed show? If the recent well-rehearsed "media interaction" is any pointer, surely the man with the bag of tricks knows how to pull off the "hope trick" too!
So the conjuror is all set and he is playing the pipe and coaxing the rope, and along with it the hopes of the public, his audience, into the blue yonder. As we stand transfixed at the sleight of hand that would bring us entertainment of a rare nature (for which we have already paid in advance with hefty taxes), remember to administer a strategic pinch to one's own person once in a while and maybe one to your immediate neighbour too, if only to prove to yourself that you are awake and not under any spell.
Remember how fond we are all of magic tricks. Forgotten those days in school when the street magician put in an appearance? The child in us still loves those tricks. But let us also not forget that this is not the time for frivolous entertainment. Hope is a serious state of mind and it is perhaps the only thing that propels you along through a life of vexations. And guess what, hope is ALWAYS positive. Tricks have no place where hope reigns.
And be sure to the tell the conjuror that if he knows the rope trick, to get on with it--fast. And make no mistake about it, the one trick we would ALL love to see would be the one where the guy "charms" the heavy rope into a magical noose that would fly to the necks of the guilty.
No less --if he is serious about the applause at the end, and his 'salarium'.
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