Complicated descriptor

The 570-page Supreme Court judgment that dashed V K Sasikala’s hopes of becoming chief minister included a seven-page supplement. “A few disquieting thoughts that have lingered and languished in distressed silence in mentation demand expression at the parting with a pulpit touch. Hence, this supplement,” wrote judge Amitava Roy. The supplement lashed out at corruption, but went viral for the phrases it used. To add to “pulpit touch”, it used phrases like,”the variegated cancerous concoctions of corruption”, “octopoid stranglehold of this malaise with helpless awe”, “malignant materialism”, “asphyxiating snare of this escalating venality” to describe corruption and its ill effects on society. “A collective, committed and courageous turnaround is thus the present-day imperative to free the civil order from the suffocative throttle of this deadly affliction,” the judgement concluded.