{"id":2142,"date":"2016-06-23T23:16:28","date_gmt":"2016-06-23T17:46:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/nirav-modi-pnb-scam-kuch-ho-sakta-hai\/"},"modified":"2016-06-23T23:16:28","modified_gmt":"2016-06-23T17:46:28","slug":"nirav-modi-pnb-scam-kuch-ho-sakta-hai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=2142","title":{"rendered":"\u201cKuch Ho Sakta Hai Kya?\u201d: How Every Scam Begins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Y<\/span>esterday, I realised that there was a crackdown on <\/p>rolling papers<\/span><\/a>, the kind you use to roll umm\u2026 tobacco. Cops were swooping in on local panwaaris, checking if they stocked it and confiscating whatever they could find. My first instinct was to ask the shopkeeper, \u201cKuch ho sakta hai kya?\u201d convinced that he must have a stash hidden somewhere. <\/span>\n\n\u201cKuch ho sakta hai kya?\u201d The phrase that every Indian trots out when the rulebook is thrown at us. <\/span>\n\nWe say it when we are met with a door that is closed, a deadline is missed, or a product that is banned. When we are met with a firm \u201cNo\u201d, we promptly follow it up with a beseeching \u201cDekho na, please.\u201d These two statements together are a desperate plea to find a way to get away when we have entered a one-way street, broken a signal, travelled ticketless, evaded a small tax, avoided depositing <\/span>demonetised notes<\/span><\/a> in time, or cheated on an exam. <\/span>\n\nNo for us never means no; it almost always means there is room for negotiation, that there is a possibility that it will eventually convert into a \u201cyes\u201d. We will try our luck even if we know the result is guaranteed failure, like a pack of footballers arguing with referees when they pull out a card. It\u2019s futile, but they still do it. \u00a0<\/span>\n\nThe fear of getting caught doesn\u2019t exist because chances are that the person who catches you has also asked the same question when up against a wall. The \u201cDekho Na Kuch Ho Sakta Hai Kya\u201d Syndrome is acceptable currency in the conversation of rule-breaking. It is the conversation that gets your foot inside a fast-closing door. I\u2019m betting <\/span>Nirav Modi<\/span><\/a> must have used it to get his first LoU underway. It starts with a plea and spirals to notoriety. \u00a0<\/span>\n\nWhy do we do it? So many of us, whether we are Nirav Modi or Nandu Mirchi? <\/span>\n\nIn a country where you have very little going for you, we live by looking for small victories to celebrate. This feeling of \u201cHey, I got away with it\u201d is a strong one. It\u2019s why we bought train tickets with old notes and cancelled them and got repaid in new ones. It\u2019s something that commands respect in our society. It\u2019s probably only in our country that a person can proudly claim that they evaded tax and be met with respect for having scammed the system. It is always Us vs The System. <\/span>\n

Beating the system feels like a small victory, and it doesn\u2019t matter what the system is<\/blockquote>\nWe don\u2019t not pay taxes because we don\u2019t believe in them or because taxes don\u2019t give us anything. We don\u2019t pay them because we simply can. We are classic Loophole-Spotters, and we admire that trait in others. In fact, we worship those who can. We wish we could do it too. When we bemoan Harshad Mehta or Nirav Modi or Vijay Mallya getting away with it, there is also a tiny part of us that says \u201cwow\u201d. Deep down, in the eternal fight of Us vs The System, we want the system to lose. <\/span>\n\nThis is not to say we are dishonest people. But just knowing that a loophole exists and can be exploited gives us great hope, and makes us warm inside. What separates us from the Modis and the Mallyas is just scale. For businessmen like Mallya it is 9,000 crore. For politicians like <\/span>A Raja<\/span><\/a>, it is 2L crore. For you and me, it is avoiding a \u20b9200 fine. Beating the system feels like a small victory, and it doesn\u2019t matter what the system is.<\/span>\n\nThis fight against The System is not taught to us. Our parents didn\u2019t rear us like this. In fact, I doubt it can be taught. It\u2019s just inherent \u2013 acquired through years of just having to function in this country.<\/span>\n\nWe have been reared with stories of people always getting cornered by The System. The man who is harassed by the government, the relative who has no fees to fight the legal system, the hospital that won\u2019t admit a sick patient. All of these stories are inside us and have built an Us vs Them narrative. <\/span>\n\nThe rebels are those who defy governments, systems, rules, or teachers \u2013 they become people we look up to. You know an uncle who does this, a chacha who has taken a punt and gotten away with it. Anyone who has dared to ask \u201cKuch ho sakta hai kya\u201d is a small-scale hero.<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While we publicly bemoan Harshad Mehta or Nirav Modi or Vijay Mallya getting away by scamming the country, a tiny part of us also says \u201cwow\u201d. Only in India can a person be met with respect for being a large-scale racketeer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":187,"featured_media":2143,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[3596,19,4341,4252,4255,4270],"class_list":["post-2142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pov","tag-banks","tag-india","tag-loans","tag-nirav-modi","tag-pnb","tag-scams"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cKuch Ho Sakta Hai Kya?\u201d: How Every Scam Begins<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"While we publicly bemoan Harshad Mehta or Nirav Modi or Vijay Mallya getting away by scamming the country, a tiny part of us also says \u201cwow\u201d. 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