The reason why Lalit Modi appears to have captured the imagination of India's chattering classes is because he's so difficult to slot. Day after day, the founder-architect of the Indian Premier League (IPL) launches salvos against the high and mighty from his London refuge. One day it's Vasundhara Raje, the other it's Sushma Swaraj and the third it's Priyanka and Robert Vadra.
Does what he reveals compromise these public figures in the minds of those who regard him as an economic offender and a fugitive from Indian law?
However, the basic Modi conundrum is this: what credibility do the disclosures of a man privy to god-alone-knows how many misdemeanors of the rich and powerful have, when he is desperately fighting with his back against the wall?
The IPL has been one big circus of expedient deals and unregulated aggrandisement; that Modi, as its chief ringmaster, possesses a ledger of shady transactions of mythical proportions is a foregone conclusion. But the beneficiaries cut across all political parties and business interests.
The nation's top film stars, businessmen, media houses and politicians have been involved in some way or the other in its labyrinths, but the fact that Modi is himself the archetypical "bad boy" puts traditional Indian morals in a quandary.
A conspicuous consumer, a self-confessed hedonist, an unapologetic economic offender and a brash and brazen dealmaker is now at the centre of our political narrative calling the shots.
Night after night, the nation watches as utterly confused anchors, party spokespersons and political commentators grapple with the ethical fault lines of the Modi issue: is he the victim of what looks like a political vendetta or an unscrupulous self aggrandiser and law breaker?
The Modi issue calls for a nuanced response, one that has no easy answers and one that could be the first spark that could light India's cozy bonfire of the Vanities - that incestuous club of behind-the-scenes expediency and mutual appeasement, the club that exists for the sideways wink, the unspoken favour, the late-night call, the collateral gain and the hidden threat. Where there is no black and white, no saint or sinner, no good guys or bad guys and where everyone's guilty in some way or the other and no one emerges smelling of roses.
In many ways the Modi case is a watershed moment in India's moral compass; where there exist no ideologies, ethics, moralities or principles. It has finally made the Indian middle-class realise that there are no heroes or villains amongst its leadership. Only deals and schemes and conspiracies and arrangements, which throw up winners and losers.
And their winning or losing has nothing to do with what has been so far regarded as the Indian concept of "good" and "bad".
It has finally put a stake through the heart of hypocrisy and humbug.
A party that was elected to power on an anti-corruption mandate has been shown up to be just as craven as its predecessor. Lofty leaders have been revealed with feet of clay. A prime minister on his way to becoming the world statesman he had hoped to be has been caught on the wrong foot.
And the man responsible for exposing it all is himself a bounder of epic scale.
The Modi case reminds me of Rumi's famous words: "Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right doing, there is a field. I'll meet you there."
Who would have thought that it would be a cricket field and the speaker would be Lalit Modi?
Malavika Sangghvi is a Mumbai-based writer malavikasmumbai@gmail.com
