Outside The Line

Just Another Little Nug

Now that we're clearly in "Let's Shit on Lalit Modi" Week, here's something else we can add to the pile... he was caught smoking in a public place at one of the IPL games in Mohali. Oh won't someone please think of the children?!

Lalit Modi Is Not The Devil (There's A Criminal Record To Show It)

                                        

 

J Rod asks why we've failed to mention some of the "extra-curricular" activities of IPL chief Lalit Modi so far. (As it turns out, while a student at Duke University, Modi was convicted of drug possession, assault, and kidnapping, and came away with a suspended 2-year sentence. This first became a story in India during the BCCI elections in 2005.)

It might be a sign of a compromised moral sense, or just simple pragmatics, but I believe the thing that bothers me the most about the story is the simple fact that Modi was actually caught. That's not someone I'd want heading a burgeoning cricket empire. I'd prefer someone competent.

As someone whose cousin is in a Spanish prison as we speak, awaiting trial for drug trafficking -- and as someone who remembers playing with said cousin as a little kid and noticing, even back then, what a bumbling, low-wattage dolt the poor guy was -- I can tell you with some confidence: crime ain't for everyone. And good criminals are good because you've never heard of them. They don't fuck up, and they cover their tracks.

Point is: I'm not surprised that a blustering billionaire narcissist who's reached the highest levels of power in his country has done some shady things in the past. I'm surprised that anyone knows about it.

They say the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.

Lalit Modi most definitely exists.