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I have this horrible habit of trying to defend people who are pilloried by all and sundry, including those who were once his closest. The reason is simple. I believe every case has a defence and justice lies in first listening to both sides of the story even if one side is reticent to talk in a hostile public forum. That is exactly why I am suspicious when I see a desperate witch hunt going on because it appears to me that when evidence fails or the case against someone is not strong enough, we tend to exaggerate our anger with an even more self righteous edge.The current President of theis currently facing bouncers from every side, every day. The TV channels are screaming for his head. TheMinistry, which has rarely done any good for any Indian sport, wants him to step down. The bigwigs who run cricket or have run cricket in the past (, Jagmohan Dalmia, and Rajiv Shukla) have suddenly broken rank with their own and joined(currently in London, a fugitive from justice, who keeps spitting bile at the BCCI) and want N Srinivasan to go. Even the pink papers that never report sporting controversy have now decided to analyse the performance of India Cements, the Company that Srinivasan heads, and come to the conclusion that he runs it very poorly, which is butaway from asking him to resign from there too.Curiously, cricketers of any eminence are not yet saying anything against Srinivasan. As a result, some of them are already in the sights of media assassins who are calling them fools, cowards, hoodlums, beneficiaries of Srinivasan’s largesse, and worse. Only Sachin who, too, has also not commented on the entire controversy has got away scot free. Like he always does. But fervid attempts have been made to drag Dhoni into the controversy simply because he has refused to comment on it. There are repeat images being telecast of Dhoni’s wife sitting in the stadium and talking to one Vindoo, who allegedly bets on cricket matches and (if the police are to be believed) could have also tried fixing a match or two. Singh has confessed to the former (betting) and denied the latter (match fixing) but I think not many people have understood the difference between the two.Three small time cricketers have been picked up by the police and are currently in custody but no furtherhas emerged since then. Rumours however continue to do the rounds. Every morning I wake up to stories that more cricketers, including some of the big fish, are going to be arrested. Every night I go to bed hearing people railing against Srinivasan and match fixing (and sometimes even betting) but no further evidence is revealed. Only the custodial interrogations continue and I see the tragic faces of Sreesanth’s mother and Vindoo Dara Singh’s wife. Incidentally, the charges against these cricketers are all bailable. I am not even sure how many of them are sustainable in a court of law.But the rumour mills churn nonstop. We heard that the police were waiting to stop the IPL semis. On the day of the finals, some news channel claimed that policemen from all over India had arrived at Eden Gardens and were preparing to pick up seven more cricketers after the match was over, some of them foreign players. Rumours were also rife that Srinivasan would never turn up to give away the trophy; he would be sacked before that. Not one of these turned out to be true.was played, and won by Mumbai Indians. The awards were given away. And, Srinivasan was there and he handed over the trophy to the winning team, albeit to some jeers from the 67,000 strong crowd. A record viewership watched the event despite stories that the entire IPL was a fraud on the nation.At this stage perhaps I should make clear that I do not know Srinivasan or his son-in-law, never met them in my life. I do not know Sreesanth either; nor Chandila and Chavan. My only concern is that witch hunts do not resolve issues. They further obfuscate them. Years later when we look at the incident with less rage and greater objectivity, we often realise that perhaps we destroyed far too many lives for far too little gain. More often than not, the cases do not even stand up in a court of law where facts have a greater role to play than hyperventilation. We destroyedif you remember, one of our greatest cricketing, by levelling all sorts of charges against him, again on the basis of hearsay. Azharuddin’s career died at the brink of his playing his 100th test match andwent into a long hibernation before returning in a dance reality show and now, thank god, as a cricket commentator. I would like to believe there is a case against judging sports people too quickly too easily. We almost did that to Vijender Singh, our Olympic boxer, on the basis of his sparring partner’s accusation of using drugs.Envy. Envy is a great factor in every accusation. And, heaven knows, we Indians love to envy each other. We envy each other for our jobs, money, success, thewe date, the planes we fly, the yachts we own, the homes we build. Envy provokes suspicion. Suspicion provokes controversy. Controversies often lead to witch hunts. Witch hunts fail the cause of justice. They destroy reason, faith, fairplay.It is possible some of these people are guilty of some misdemeanour. Srinivasan and the three idiots and Vindoo Dara Singh, though no one seems to know exactly what. Srinivasan’s son-in-law is clearly guilty of lying and misrepresentation but I seriously doubt if a person can be hung or quartered for claiming to be the Team Principal of a private cricket franchise and I also doubt if you can sack Srinivasan for having a boastful liar for a son-in-law. People often make fancy claims. Like I do not believe that IPL betting is a Rs 10,000 crore industry. It’s pure imagination at play. We love to overstate everything and, I, it comes from our admiration forwhere every actor overstates his fee and every producer exaggerates his budget.Justice is the key to a civilized society. If we keep taking calls like this every day, either provoked by the media or the State, without first allowing evidence to be garnered and facts to be put together, all we will do is destroy more and more reputations. Not meet the ends of justice. Anger is fine. But do not confuse it with justice. The role of justice is only fulfilled when both sides have had an equal opportunity to put out their story. Not when the State and the media cuddle up to each other and the other side is in custody or bludgeoned into silence.Liked /hated this column? Write to him at