The aggs effect

As a former British colony, India has co-opted the English language and made it its own but pronunciations still vary widely across regions, the butt of much stand-up comedy. Recently, however, faulty pronunciation forced an embarrassing correction from a newswire. Under perpetual pressure to be the first with breaking news, it flashed a take saying the accused in the recent rape case in Mumbai were attacked with someone wielding an axe when they were produced in court. How did someone with an axe get past the huge security cordon in court? There was no time to check this small but vital fact so the item went out as heard and taken down by the sub-editor. When the news spread like wildfire, the newswire realised it had been the victim of the reporter's pronunciation: the accused had been attacked with eggs and not an axe.