The Chatter

It used to be that two world-class heavyweights colliding in the ring was the acme of sporting achievement. In our impoverished age, it's Subramanian Swamy picking targets with the precision of a blunderbuss.

Despite being the petitioner in the case that led to Sasikala's imprisonment, Swamy supported her as CM of Tamil Nadu; Kamal Haasan did not. Squabbling on Twitter since the furore over jallikattu, they upped the ante this week.

Asked about Haasan as a possible Tamil Nadu CM, Swamy called him a "boneless wonder and pompous idiot". Haasan fired back: Swamy "called Tamils porikis (good for nothings). Glad I wont have 2 oppose him (sic). People will." Swamy moved on, taking a wild swing at Karti Chidambaram instead.

While many might have laughed, many more will have cheered at a video doing the rounds of an elderly Pakistani woman reduced to rapidfire swearing when asked her opinion of the government. "Yeh bik gayi hai gormint (The government has sold us out)" was her pithy analysis.

A sentiment that her neighbours across the border, also plagued by poverty, will understand.

The Indian media has long been-rightly-accused of gross insensitivity in its coverage of sexual assault. Reporters appear happy to broadcast salacious details and baseless speculation.

Rima Kallingal, a former Miss Kerala runner-up and actress in Malayalam films, took furious issue with the coverage of the assault on an actress in Kerala last week. "I spit on your third rate yellow journalism", was how her justifiably angry Facebook post ended. Any journalist worth their salt would agree.