There is a lot in common between the way the little boy who fell in a pit, Prince, became a cause celebre for the media, and the way former finance, defence and foreign minister Jaswant Singh's book has everyone salivating. India's state apparatus failed just days earlier in detecting and preventing train blasts in Mumbai. Indians were looking for some redeeming feature, something that would make them feel good about themselves.
The rescue of Prince was good news, coming after days of bad news from Mumbai. What is more, it made Prince and his parents considerably cash-rich, which is as it should be.
Similarly, Jaswant Singh's book comes after a rash of bad news from the BJP that began principally when the NDA lost the elections.
The public humiliation of party chief L K Advani, unremitting electoral losses and the death of Pramod Mahajan had made a political leader exclaim that the Congress could not get better than this and the BJP could not get worse!
The party seemed to be losing its edge and muffed several opportunities to hold the government accountable "" on the prosecution of 'Q' in the Bofors case, on the issue of division of authority in the government, and on the extent of the government's dependence on the Left.
Singh's book, A Call to Honour, and his revelation that the second time India tried to conduct nuclear tests, someone in the Prime Minister's Office let the US know and the tests were "prevented" under US pressure, is not news for strategic affairs boffins. It is what everyone suspected, but was too embarrassed to say.
Singh's "revelation" is authoritative because it comes from a former minister. It is also important for the BJP because it gives the party a chance to put aside current differences over leadership and ideology and attack the common enemy: the Congress, which has ruled India for so long and (in the nuclear context, because the bomb has proved to be the currency of power) kept it under subjugation.
This route for the BJP's revival makes sense but it does seem as if Jaswant Singh might have bitten off more than he can chew. Who was the mole? How did Singh come by this information? If he has the information, why isn't he telling? Most important, how is this story going to end?
Jaswant Singh could advise reporters to read his book and find out. And like Prince, the cash registers are ringing. What is more, Singh is top-of-the-mind recall. Everyone loves a conspiracy. And as the seer and savant Yogi Berra observed, "It ain't over till it's over."
