Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Varun Gandhi: Too Old to be Playing Doctor

"Those are not my words, this is not my voice. The CD has been doctored. I've been a victim of political conspiracy. This is a malicious attempt to brand me communal." That was Varun Gandhi's defence against the charge of delivering anti-Muslim speeches. Since then, he and his party, the BJP, have been doing a strange shuffle between denial and justification. After the Election Commission held him guilty, the party line is that the tape ought to have been sent for forensic analysis before any such decision was taken.
That's hogwash, and more TV presenters ought to be saying so. An impression has been created in the public's mind that video can be manipulated to turn any image into anything else. This is simply not the case. It is true that composite images can be put together with relative ease, but the superimpositions are usually easy to spot. In Varun Gandhi's case, though, it wasn't a matter of a flag or some other element being added to the frame. We saw the candidate in close-up, and the words we heard synchronised perfectly with his lip movements. That's something which is almost impossible to simulate. At the very least it would require dozens of people working for weeks with a budget of tens of lakhs to animate each frame (there are twenty five per second in the format used in India). Even after this, a careful viewing by producers of television news programmes would reveal the fakery.
I'm glad the Election Commission has assumed the video recording faithfully renders what was said in Pilibhit, and put the burden of disproof on the accused. The BJP complains this is unfair, but, had the footage been fake, would it be difficult to prove its inauthenticity? There were thousands of people at those meetings in Pilibhit. Why has no one come forward with a statement like, "I was at the rally, and Varun Gandhi said nothing against Muslims. In fact, he spoke only about the importance of peace and harmony being maintained between communities, which, in any case, is the principle that animates our party." The BJP counts among its ranks a number of gifted techies. Not a single one has attempted to reveal what has been tampered with in those images and how.
It is easy to see why the candidate and his party did nothing to back up their assertions. Such cases usually come up for hearing in court rather than before an election tribunal. After months of procedural delays, the evidence is sent for analysis to one of our forensic laboratories. These labs, as I've shown before, favour voodoo science over proper enquiry. They produce a result that convinces nobody and takes the case nowhere. A fine example of this was the Anara Gupta trial. A woman, said to be Gupta, had been filmed having sex with her boyfriend. Once the footage was leaked, the police charged Gupta with creating and distributing pornography. The victim, in other words, became the accused. Luckily, the inefficiency of the forensic investigators eventually crossed out the insensitivity of the cops. A lab in Hyderabad concluded the woman on tape was not Gupta, while another facility in Chandigarh came to the opposite conclusion.
It wouldn't surprise me if our forensic investigators, having examined the Varun Gandhi tapes, decided the the man in the frame was not Gandhi at all, but an impostor.

26 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sorry,I goofed up.

How hard is it for any Indian neta or babu to utter those 4 words ?

Obama did - AFTER he became President.

Just for this reason, I desperately want VG to stand for elections and then lose his deposit. Exemplary behaviour needs exemplary punishment !
S ANAND

shivani said...

It is amazing how like their fathers these 2 cousins are, one an idiot and one a nutter.

Jabeen said...

People think it's difficult to tell when a video is doctored, but actually it's very apparent. Just compare Varun Gandhi's speech to the videos on the Jay Leno show.

Support Varun said...

I am not saying Varun is innocent, but I believe parts of the videos are tempered with. He has said some things and has accepted saying them, but there are other things that even a foolish politician wouldn't say. It is not hard to put words where there are long shots taken of him. See the video on this post and how easy it is to put any words towards the end of the video (watch at 1:57 time marker). Moreover, isn't it for the law enforcement to do a forensic analysis? Why isn't it being done and released?

Girish Shahane said...

Why do you believe parts of the video are tampered with? There is no evidence for this whatsoever, and what Varun Gandhi is saying in the long shots is in exactly the same mode as the close-ups. We have become used to people claiming footage is tampered with whenever something embarrassing appears, but there has not been a single instance in the entire world when such visual doctoring of close-up video has actually managed to pass for the truth. Can you name one example? If not, why should we give any credence to such claims?
I know it is easy to tamper with the audio on tapes, but one can lip-read most of what Varun says. Even in long shots, his jibes about 'Karimullah' and Osama bin Laden are apparent. In close up, he is speaking about Hindus staying in India and the rest being shoved into Pakistan. Really awful stuff.
As for 'forensics', you clearly have not read my paragraph about that. Calling for forensic examination is just an excuse to delay proceedings and get a vague answer at the end. If Varun didn't say what he is accused of saying, why has nobody come forward to state this as an eye witness, under oath?
I find the "I'm not saying.... but" mode of argument rather hypocritical. You say he has accepted saying some things, but in fact he's been far from clear about what exactly he did say and what he did not. I also think you are wrong in assuming what politicians will and won't say. The likes of Thackeray, Advani and Modi have got away with saying much worse. It's just that video cameras are now ubiquitous, so what is said in election meetings travels beyond in a way that didn't happen even five years ago.

Support Varun said...

Calling for forensic examination is just an excuse to delay proceedings and get a vague answer at the end.

I wonder how long such an examination takes? Can't be more than a few days! And why would the answer be vague? Even if it proves he is guilty, which you are sure he is, why don't they just do it to put things to rest. Is it possible that they (the government and the accusers) have something to hide? Even though such an investigation can be fudged, I will shup up when I see the government reporting such an investigation was done and all the sound bites were definitely his. In the meantime, there is no fear of delaying proceedings, because he is already jailed without trial.

If Varun didn't say what he is accused of saying, why has nobody come forward to state this as an eye witness, under oath?

Let me ask you the same thing. Why has nobody come forward to state under oath that he was there and heard each of those things being said. On the other hand I have seen on TV ordinary citizens being interviewed and saying they weren't there. Logically, you have to prove something exists, not that something doesn't exist. It is easy for TV channels to do it, isn't it? I have not heard one TV reporter say, "Varun is lying. I was there, he said each of those words. I stand by this recording." Instead every channel is playing the stuff from the same CD that somebody made and released, just adding their retarded political commentary on top. To me, this looks like the most successful media scam of the decade.

You are looking at it your way because you are politically left of center (if you are not, you will not jump to conclusions either). I am looking at it my way because I am politically right of center. There are lots of other people who feel it is the self professed secularists who are playing havoc with the fabric of India.

I am an ordinary netizen and an ordinary supporter of BJP so I may be biased, but I detect such a clear change of accent at 1:57 in the video link I sent you that I wonder why people are not looking at it. There are too many unanswered questions here, and I am surprised nobody is asking them. Who made that CD? If newsmen were there why didn't the news go national on the day the speech was made, instead of 12 days later?

I am surprised that he is being jailed and the onus of proving his innocence is being put on him, before the charges are proven. It is draconian. Can you honestly say that you don't think the people who are doing this to him are not politically motivated?

Girish Shahane said...

Anything on videotape should be accepted as factual, unless proved otherwise. That's the premise on which the law works everywhere.
I won't take any more comments from you unless you actually read my post and respond to what I've written there.
The 'accent change' you speak of is trivial, not in any way an indication of dubbing. It follows smoothly from what was said before. Believe me, I've been in a studio where we tried to match two takes of the SAME voice-over artist, which happened to be recorded at different times and in a different studio. That was tough enough. To recreate the ambience of an outdoor meeting seamlessly while shifting from a real to dubbed track is not as easy as you appear to think. But if you look at the tape carefully, you'll see Varun's mouth enunciates words differently at that point. He is adopting a slightly different accent himself. This often happens with people who've come to speaking a language late in their life. Look at Narayan Murthy's interviews and you'll see him slipping in and out of an Americanised accent.
As far as the 'why not go with forensics' is concerned, can you tell me precisely which forensic tests you want the tape to be subjected to? I bet you have no clue. You just think, oh yeah, those forensic guys can sort the matter out.
As far as Varun's imprisonment goes, he got caught in a scheme of his own making. He had an anticipatory bail application going through. Why 'court arrest' at all? Of course what Mayawati has done is politically motivated. Varun's arrest drama was politically motivated as well. So is your website where you're shilling for the guy. We're in an election campaign, after all.

Support Varun said...

Anything on videotape should be accepted as factual, unless proved otherwise. That's the premise on which the law works everywhere.

Really? Is that how the law works? Which article of the IPC says this? Does that mean I can hire some voice-over experts, mix a video of a celebrity saying bad things, put it on youtube, and then ask for them to be arrested? As I said, I firmly believe Varun Gandhi did say some things and he didn't say some things. And it is the latter that he is in trouble for. If you see any sort of continuation in the video link I sent you, I don't know how you are looking at it. To me it seems like a collage put together. I am not a lawyer, but as a layman I would expect any court of law to ensure a video is authenticated before it is admissible in court.

I won't take any more comments from you unless you actually read my post and respond to what I've written there.

As long as you read them, my friend. :-)

You obviously have a right not to approve any of my comments that do not agree with your point of view. As far as not reading your post is concerned, reading it and agreeing with it are two different things. From your responses, it seems to me you haven't read some portions of my post or my comments either. But again, you may have read them and not agreed with them.

I think we all need to be patient. The truth will come out someday, hopefully. As I said, we are on different sides of the political divide, so I don't expect to convince you. So, I will not comment further either. Let us just agree to disagree.

Girish Shahane said...

"Does that mean I can hire some voice-over experts, mix a video of a celebrity saying bad things, put it on youtube, and then ask for them to be arrested?"

No, you can't. Because everybody will immediately be able to tell that that is what you have done.

"As I said, I firmly believe Varun Gandhi did say some things and he didn't say some things. And it is the latter that he is in trouble for. "

Well, he says something different. He says the ENTIRE track has been dubbed. Either way it doesn't work. The entire track cannot be dubbed because Varun's lips are clearly readable in close-up, and he is saying what is on track. Parts of the track cannot be dubbed for reasons I gave in my previous reply. Besides, he is in trouble for many things apart from the words you claim are dubbed. What about his statement about Pakistan, for example?

"If you see any sort of continuation in the video link I sent you, I don't know how you are looking at it. To me it seems like a collage put together."

You obviously understand nothing about film or video. I have written on film for twenty years and worked extensively in video. I understand the technology, you do not.

"You obviously have a right not to approve any of my comments that do not agree with your point of view."

Well, you're entitled to your opinion but not your own facts. Whether what Varun said is justifiable or not is a matter of opinion. Whether he actually said it or not is a matter of fact. There are always conspiracy theorists about, like the chaps who show you videos of 9/11 to 'prove' the structure was actually detonated by bombs in the basement. You can take your place alongside those nut-jobs.

Girish Shahane said...

Not only are you a nutcase and a shill, you're also a coward. That's why you're hiding behind that pseudonym. I'll debate endlessly with people who identify themselves properly, but have no desire to keep arguing with someone like you.

Support Varun said...

Well, he says something different. He says the ENTIRE track has been dubbed.

No, that is not what he is saying. He is saying that single words have been inappropriately changed or beeped out. He says I said "cut votes", and it was beeped or changed to mean "cut heads" or "cut Muslims". He is standing by what he said in favor of Hindus, and refusing to acknowledge what he didn't say against Muslims. Watch any of his statements made to the press before he went to jail.

The problem is there are too many versions floating around now, with TV news inserting their own real footage, combining that with so called "hate speed CD", and it has become one big mess. Unfortunately Indian news TV does not seem to have any accountability or objectivity either.

You have also selectively answered my questions. If you are really impartial, don't you think of these questions: Why are the TV channels not saying - we were there when you said it so shut up Varun? He has been interviewed by all major channels, so why didn't they say that to him? Was the video shown locally or nationally before it appeared in the form of a CD given to EC and released to news media? Why did the footage appear 11 days after the reported speech? Who made it? I am sure such explosive speech would have become newsworthy on 5th and not 16th?

As far as my being a coward is concerned, let me tell you this - people have many reasons for keeping their internet identity safe, one of them being their careers. So call me a coward if that is ok with you. Would it have been ok, if I had used a name like Rakesh Sharma, or Murali Vaidyanathan? Then you wouldn't have called me a coward; would you have? I can give any name, or I can use a different name every time. According to Mr. TV Raman, on the internet "No one knows you are not a dog, nor if you are still the same dog." So, call me a dog if you want, but we are discussing logic here not personalities.

Girish Shahane said...

I heard what Varun said in his first interviews. He specifically said his voice was thin and the voice on the tape was deep, I have quoted his statement, please read it. The voice pitch stays the same all through, so he couldn't possibly mean a few words here and there had been dubbed.
After his initial statements, there has been a lot of shuffling about. Oh, I said some of it, but I won't say what exactly I said and didn't say, and so on.
The most pathetic cover-up relates to the word 'katua', which you bring up. The word is beeped on TV because it is offensive. It is used regularly by BJP, VHP and Shiv Sena types. 'Cut votes' on the other hand, which is what you claim Varun said, is not a phrase anybody has ever used and is entirely meaningless in the context of his speech as well as outside of it. If you really think he said 'cut votes' then you are pitifully deluded.
As far as cyber identities go, they aren't just a question of taking on a name. To have a believable identity, you need a presence online which is consistent with your website's content, plus an image of the sort I have on my blog.
Even Ajmal Kasab, by the way, can say the footage of him is a conspiracy. But all of us know that is him with the gun at VT station, and that he is a cold-blooded mass murderer. Similarly, Varun Gandhi and sycophants like you can twist the truth as much you like, but that won't change the fact that he said what is on those tapes.

Murali Vaidyanathan said...

Even Ajmal Kasab, by the way, can say the footage of him is a conspiracy. But all of us know that is him with the gun at VT station, and that he is a cold-blooded mass murderer.

This is the difference between the two cases:
We all saw the Kasab episode unfolding live on major TV stations. In this case, I am yet to see one TV station claiming the footage is theirs. We are all following a shady CD, made by some mysterious, unknown people. In Varun's case any footage of him that we can say "all of us know" is the BBC Hardtalk interview, the CNN-IBN interview, the Deepak Chaurasia interview, and there you see the soft-spoken, Hindutva-selling Varun. Nobody will call that doctored. Can you tell me which network this footage belongs to? If it was a sting operation, who did it? You don't find me credible because I didn't tell you my "real" name. But you are blindly believing a CD which nobody has so far owned up to.

Similarly, Varun Gandhi and sycophants like you can twist the truth as much you like, but that won't change the fact that he said what is on those tapes.

Let us not make it personal. You are calling it the truth, as if you were there. If it is the truth, it will come out. At this time, I need to see more proof. At this time, I don't know who is twisting the truth.

Girish Shahane said...

Murali, you are wrong about the Kasab case. We did not see him on live television at any point of time. It is easy to construct a fake conspiracy theory around the episode with questions like: the killers were in VT station for 30 minutes: Why have we seen such little footage from the 50 plus cameras inside the station? The administration claims over half the cameras failed to work during the massacre. Isn’t that very fishy? And so on.
We already have proof that Varun Gandhi is a liar. He claimed to have degrees from LSE and SOAS, and that claim has now been discredited. The footage that we have seen, as I have already pointed out, is technically impossible to doctor in its entirety. The theory that a few words have been changed falls flat because: 1) The voice remains exactly the same throughout the tape; 2) this perspective contradicts what Varun himself said in the immediate aftermath of the tape's release ("that is not my voice"; 3) The ‘cut vote’ phrase you say he used is akin to Harbhajan Singh’s ‘monkey’ being changed to ‘maa ki’. Except that ‘maa ki’ has the benefit of being a credible phrase, ‘cut vote’ is nonsensical.
The BJP’s double-speak on the issue is also evident. They wrote to the Election commission dissociating the party from Varun’s comments, but now they’re backing him whole-heartedly.
As far as the origin of the tape is concerned, it is obviously no sting operation. That word refers to hidden camera footage. This camera is out in the open, it is standard coverage of election meetings, which has been, in my best guess, edited and distributed by somebody who wanted to hurt Varun. The fact that the compilation, in its edited form, is probably a political ploy does not stop it from being an authentic representation of what Varun Gandhi said. 'Political motivation', in and of itself, should not be grounds for dismissing evidence of this sort.

Kaul said...

Girish, the above discussion is interesting. I did look at the video that "SV" is mentioning, and I see a point there. Since you refuse to acknowledge there is any way of putting words into his mouth in the videos, I did some annotations on the video (watch here). Please watch it with an open mind, and with a thought that anything is possible in the murky world of Indian politics, of which Varun Gandhi is an equal part - no less, but no more. I'd ask the same question that you almost asked, "Why are the TV presenters being nice to him in their interviews?" If they can be so scathing in their criticism of him, why don't they call his bluff and tell him: come on, I was there when you said it? Is it possible that nobody is witness to the visuals that never occurred? I searched youtube for the "katua" video, but couldn't find it. If we can see his lips, it should be easy to find out if he said "katua" or "vote katwa" as he is claiming. I would appreciate it if someone can point the video out to me. If Varun Gandhi did say those things, he must be punished. But if he didn't, then we should be looking for the real culprits.

Girish Shahane said...

Kaul, the video you and SV refer to is mostly voice over and beeps. The video I have seen has Varun speaking in close up. Please post that video, without any voice over, and with only 'katua' beeped, and then we can talk.

Kaul said...

If possible, please send me a link to the video you are talking about, as my access to Indian TV is rather limited. I have been looking for this on youtube, but couldn't find it. All the videos on youtube (from CNN-IBN, Star News, NDTV) are like this - grainy, long shots, political voiceovers. If this is what the whole hullabaloo is about, then our media is really to be pitied. I watch NDTV and India TV regularly, but could not see any such video. If you or one of your readers can point it out, I would appreciate it. Thanks. The video that I annotated is the one where he "says" Muslim names are scary, but in long shot. Is there another one with the same dialogs in close-up? I want to get to the bottom of this. I hope you would like to do that too.

Girish Shahane said...

I appreciate your effort, Kaul. The problem is, YouTube has not eliminated the problem of distance, at least not yet. People like yourself and 'Support Varun', who live abroad, don't necessarily get the whole picture. I've looked at YouTube's list of Varun videos, and none of them captures the entirety of the footage as it has been shown on TV channels here in India. Also, the footage is not overly sharp in the first place, but is clear enough; by the time it goes through the YouTube filter, it looks absurdly grainy.
All I can say is, I live in India, have watched the recording repeatedly, without any newscaster's voice-over, and with nothing apart from 'katua' beeped out. What I have seen makes it perfectly clear that there is one person speaking throughout, that person's words match Varun's lips perfectly in close-up, and what is said in close-up is offensive in itself, though does not include anything as bad as the word 'katua'.
I have heard Varun's defence, and it is far from convincing. In the context of his speech, the word 'katua' fits perfectly, 'vote katua' seems a bad excuse. It's like a guy who says something like, "we have to throw all these niggers out" and then claims he said, " we have to throw all these figures out".

Kaul said...

I assume you saw those videos on TV only (i.e., what you saw was seen by all of India). I understand the limitations of youtube, but since it allows Varun's detractors to discredit him completely I wonder why such videos have not been posted so far. Not only that, I have been looking into the video database on CNN-IBN site also, which has 7 pages of listings on Varun Gandhi, but all I see is a repetition of the same visuals that I have already seen. Are the videos you are talking about not in these channels' possession, I wonder?

Katua (कटुआ) and katwa (कटवा) are phonetically very close (not like nigger and figure), so I would need to hear the whole sentence to understand if it is possible to fudge that. I still believe that this guy is being victimized. The "scary names" portion is definitely not his voice.

Girish Shahane said...

I see now that the conspiracy theory has grown to envelop me as well :)
I assure you I have seen X, you say, well, if you had, why is not on this or that site. Am I lying, then? If you think so, it's pointless continuing the discussion. You could look up sites of newspapers like the Indian Express which have a transcript of Varun's speech, though not the complete video: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/badey-daraawne-naam-hotey-hain-inke...-karimullah-mazharullah...-varun-gandhi-kaat-daalega.../435950/
Though perhaps you believe the Indian Express is deluded as well, reporting something that does not exist.
As far as 'katua' and 'katwa' go, Varun Gandhi claimed he said, "vote katwa", which is meaningless in the context. Here's what he says:
"Yeh panja nahi hai, yeh kamal ka haath hai. Yeh katue ke galey ko kaat dega chunaav ke baad. Jai Shri Ram! Ram ji ki jai! Varun Gandhi kaat daalega! Kaat denge us haath ko, kaat denge, kaat daalega!"
Would this kind of fury be directed toward a 'vote katwa'? It is traditionally directed toward Muslims in Hindutva gatherings. What does that phrase 'vote katwa' mean anyway? Makes no sense to anybody but Varun's apologists.
When you assert it is 'definitely not his voice' speaking about scary names, it shows your bias quite clearly. The voice is the same throughout the tape; but you choose not to believe it despite not even having seen the footage properly. What I have seen clearly shows Varun enunciate 'Karimullah', 'Mazharullah', and 'Osama bin Laden'.

Kaul said...

Thanks for pointing out the place where the word I was looking for appears. After seeing your response, I feel that I have seen all the footage there is to see, which I was convinced of anyway and which also makes sense. Not only does most of this stuff get posted on youtube, I have been following it closely on NDTV and India NOW (sorry, not India TV), which are the only two Indian news channels I get and watch on a regular large screen TV, not internet. Living outside India, I may not be completely wired to Indian TV, but I am not completely disconnected either. I was just making sure I have not missed anything. The sentence you are talking about, allegedly using "katua", appears at about 1:00 - 1:03 time marker on my annotated video, and this is a screenshot of how the video looks at that exact moment. First of all, it is in longshot and I have seen it on TV too. Secondly, there is that hand coming up from one of the onlookers, covering his face. I see that person in the right of the frame giggling at the mention of that word, which has been beeped, so there is a possibility that he said it, but there is an element of doubt. I have no reason to believe there are more videos of the same instant, in close-up, that have not been posted, although I will be happy to be proven wrong and shown that there is. I am not saying you are lying, but since our memories are subjective and we sometimes reconstruct them to reinforce what we think happened, I would rely on what I can still see. I am not saying it is impossible that he said it, but here is how an alternative could be claimed:

"Yeh vote katwane wale ke galey ko kaat dega chunaav ke baad."

You give me that recorded sentence and a video editor and with no experience I can edit it to sound like what it does, and it will match your lip movements too, although here that was not a requirement.

Concerning the voice of the portion I call doubtful, it is not just the voice that is subtly different, it is the accent, which is rather "Haryanvi/West-UP" at that moment, which Varun certainly doesn't have. I can say this as a person who has lived and worked extensively in that region, and knows the intricacies of the Hindi language. Why didn't I say the "katwa" portion was somebody else's voice? I would suggest you show it to some people who can differentiate between various accents in the region. I will ask for opinion from readers on my Hindi blog too.

I admit I have a bias (being hounded out of Kashmir along with all my relatives and community members 20 years ago shifted me to the right side of India's political divide), but my bias is no different from yours. I am far from a conspiracy theorist. In fact, I tend to believe everything that is in public domain, and like to trust people by default and even think that most democratically elected governments are well-meaning. But here, there is just not enough meat in the available evidence, there is too much that is shady, too much that is at stake for the people involved, and the way the Indian TV channels report news has disgusted me. It is like watching Fox News on steroids. Even the governments involved are not well-meaning as anybody can attest to. Yes, we are in election season, but let us play hard and play fair.

In the end, it may come out that it was all doctored, but justice delayed is justice denied, and then there will be "conspiracy theorists" like you who will still not agree. Or, it may turn out that I was wrong all along. I guess we will have to wait and see. I am open to all possibilities.

I saw the transcripts on Indian Express site too. The sentence "agar raat ko kabhi dikh jaayen... to darr rahen hain... " just does not make sense and seems to be badly put together. I hope you have enough working knowledge of Hindi to make that out. The original video and the Hindi transcipt are both discontinuous. It is only the English translation that has been constructed to make sense, as are the journalistic voice overs. Similarly, the portion about his "sister" doesn't make sense. Instead of something being "lost in translation", here things seem to have been generated in translation.

As far as the LSE, SOAS episodes are concerned, we have yet to see where he "claimed" what sort of degrees he had from those places. This link from a 5 year old news report seem to suggest he was an external student at LSE, and that is what LSE said too. I saw another old report about SOAS too. So, we seem to love putting words into his mouth and then condemning him for them. As I said before, he is not a saint, but he is no more a demon than any other Indian politician, and demonizing and jailing him at this crucial time of his career is a mockery of democracy.

Girish Shahane said...

So I'm the conspiracy theorist now :). You are the chaps who are saying -- without any technical knowledge; without any reply to the technical points I have raised; without any evidence provided of such doctoring having happened in the past and passed of as true; without any evidence that this footage is doctored; without any understanding of the context of Varun's utterances; without any response to my observation that Varun's lip movements change when he speaks in a more 'rural' accent, showing he is deliberately trying out a 'dehati' style of speaking; without any attention to the many offensive things he says in close-up when it is clearly his voice; without any addressing of the discrepancy between his assertion that the voice on tape is not his at all, and your contention that a few words in it are not his voice; without any acknowledgment of his false assertion before the court that he possesses a degree from SOAS -- you are the chaps who are saying without any of these things that the material is doctored in a conspiracy against Varun Gandhi. Let's get straight who the conspiracy theorists are, I'm not falling for those rhetorical manoeuvres.
As far as the Express transcripts not making sense goes, that is further proof of the authenticity of the tapes. Varun Gandhi is not a natural speaker of Hindi. That's why he goes from 'behen' to 'bitiya' and so on. It's not like he's actually claiming a sister. Transcripts are always discontinuous and full of garbled grammar: that's the way individuals actually speak. When material is doctored, those doing the tampering fail to copy the patterns of actual human speech and tend to substitute fully formed grammatically correct sentences. It is one of the reasons why tampered footage invariably has a false ring to it.
In the 'katua' bit, while it is true that Varun's mouth may not be perfectly visible at that moment, there is not enough time for two or three words in that space. Try and dub the same footage in exactly the same way and say 'vote katwane wale' in the beeped frames and you'll understand what I mean. These are technical matters that you obviously do not understand, instead barking up the wrong tree with your talk of accents.
As far as Varun's jailing goes, let me repeat what I said before, and what none of you have answered: why did he not take the anticipatory bail available to him? Why did he go in procession to jail with thousands of supporters making himself out to be a martyr while assuming he'd spend just two days in custody? He played a political game, under the instructions of his BJP masters, and Mayawati turned the tables on them, simple.

Kaul said...

Girish, I have raised some questions about the genuineness of the videos in my post here. I am looking for somebody to answer the seven questions I have asked there about the videos. But, here are my answers, phrase-by-phrase, to your above comment.

So I'm the conspiracy theorist now :). You are the chaps who are saying -- without any technical knowledge;

Without any technical knowledge? Well, you don't need to be a professional cinematographer to point out some of the glaring inconsistencies in the videos. In your post you are saying that "At the very least it would require dozens of people working for weeks with a budget of tens of lakhs to animate each frame (there are twenty five per second in the format used in India)." I think you are talking about the pre-digital era, when video was shot on film and then people worked on it frame-by-frame. I am not saying this video was generated from scratch. In the case of digital media, if you want to delete portions of a word or sentence, it just means moving the cursor over a timeline and deleting the portion. The visuals - and corresponding lip movements go with it. To add audio, you rely on long shots. This is what seems to have been done here. It is not rocket science.

without any reply to the technical points I have raised;

I did give a reply to your "technical" points. See above, if any was missing.

without any evidence provided of such doctoring having happened in the past and passed of as true;

Do you mean that video doctoring has never been done in history? Or never passed as true? For the first question, all you need to do is search Google. Videos have been doctored in the past and for some time duped people. For the second question, this one has not really passed any impartial test of being true, yet. There are too many unanswered questions, and all the people who are accepting it as true are politically motivated or politically pressured, or otherwise using preconceived notions. So far it has been "passed off as true", but any "passing as true" is awaited.

without any evidence that this footage is doctored;

I don't have any clear evidence that it is doctored but I have my doubts which I have expressed. There is no evidence that it is genuine, either. So, I am raising my questions. One thing that will convince me of its genuinity is at least one channel claiming ownership of the footage, and even better, two channels showing the same footage from different angles. Some eyewitnesses appearing on TV would be icing on the cake. So far, we have only seen footage from one anonymous source, and at least one report saying it is not true.

without any understanding of the context of Varun's utterances;

I have a clear understanding of the context of Varun's utterances.

without any response to my observation that Varun's lip movements change when he speaks in a more 'rural' accent, showing he is deliberately trying out a 'dehati' style of speaking;

I did not notice that observation of yours (not in this post) or I would have responded to it. Since you cannot even see his lip movements in that portion of the video, I wonder how you discern a change in his lip movements and conclude that he is "trying a dehati accent". It is all a matter of pre-conceived notions.

without any attention to the many offensive things he says in close-up when it is clearly his voice;

The things that he says in close-ups when it is clearly his voice is pro-Hindu rhetoric that BJP uses all the time. I understand that you have an issue with that, but speaking in favor of Hindus (or Muslims, or Sikhs, or Christians) has not been outlawed in India, yet. BJP is a right wing party, so don't vote for it. But his saying those things in close ups does not mean he will only say worse things in long shots. That would be possible if he asked the cameraman to take long shots when he said those dreadful things.

without any addressing of the discrepancy between his assertion that the voice on tape is not his at all, and your contention that a few words in it are not his voice;

He is not saying that the whole tape is not his voice, although in some cases he is not making this crystal clear. He is saying repeatedly that he spoke in favor of Hindus, and defends it.

without any acknowledgment of his false assertion before the court that he possesses a degree from SOAS --

First of all, this has nothing to do with the video footage being genuine, which is the main topic of my discussion. I am no apologist for all of Varun Gandhi. His perjury about degrees will depend on what exact language he used in his court petition about his education. LSE has said he was an external student, and SOAS has said that he withdrew from the course. So he can get away with saying he "passed LSE and attended SOAS". But that is beside the point here. One crime does not necessarily relate to another. Smoking pot doesn't necessarily make you a murderer. I hear all of the Gandhi family has lied about their degrees, and none has gone to jail. I can see the Indian media going gaga over Sonia-Rahul-Priyanka everyday.

you are the chaps who are saying without any of these things that the material is doctored in a conspiracy against Varun Gandhi.

Obviously not "without any of these things".

Let's get straight who the conspiracy theorists are, I'm not falling for those rhetorical manoeuvres. As far as the Express transcripts not making sense goes, that is further proof of the authenticity of the tapes. Varun Gandhi is not a natural speaker of Hindi. That's why he goes from 'behen' to 'bitiya' and so on. It's not like he's actually claiming a sister. Transcripts are always discontinuous and full of garbled grammar: that's the way individuals actually speak. When material is doctored, those doing the tampering fail to copy the patterns of actual human speech and tend to substitute fully formed grammatically correct sentences. It is one of the reasons why tampered footage invariably has a false ring to it.

For you the Express transcripts not making sense may be proof of the video being genuine, but I don't think it will pass any unbiased muster. Do you mean all fully formed grammatically correct sentences have more chances of being tempered with? It all depends upon the technical capability of the video makers, and it does not appear to have been very high.

In the 'katua' bit, while it is true that Varun's mouth may not be perfectly visible at that moment,

Thanks for acknowledging that, after saying in the post that "the words we heard synchronised perfectly with his lip movements". Actually his mouth is not visible in any of the more objectionable passages, where he "calls" Muslims by name. Yes, the place where he says "agar kisi galat tatva ke aadmi ne.. hindu ke upar hath uthaya... uska hath kaat dunga" there is no doubt it is his words.

there is not enough time for two or three words in that space. Try and dub the same footage in exactly the same way and say 'vote katwane wale' in the beeped frames and you'll understand what I mean. These are technical matters that you obviously do not understand, instead barking up the wrong tree with your talk of accents.

Read my reply to the first paragraph. If Varun said "vote katwane wale", as he says he did, you can take that and identify the extra frames in the video containing the unwanted syllables, using the timeline, delete the video and audio you want to get rid of, and "vote katwane wale" will become "katwa" or "katwe". The video and audio will perfectly match. You don't need to use longer video and shorter audio, or vice versa. I assume you understand what I am saying. I do not know if that is what has exactly been done, but the quality of video and absence of any supporting evidence keeps that possibility alive. And again, it doesn't need experts to do this. Even I can do this, without any knowledge of technical matters.

As far as Varun's jailing goes, let me repeat what I said before, and what none of you have answered: why did he not take the anticipatory bail available to him? Why did he go in procession to jail with thousands of supporters making himself out to be a martyr while assuming he'd spend just two days in custody? He played a political game, under the instructions of his BJP masters, and Mayawati turned the tables on them, simple.

Again, that has nothing to do with the topic of my dispute about the video, but I believe his bail was expiring and his request to quash the FIR had been refused. His public tamasha was politics and that is what politicians do. They don't get slapped with NSA for that, but I am not sure you are supporting NSA here, so let us not discuss that.

Girish Shahane said...

Kaul,
1) You have just proved how technologically illiterate you are, by saying, "I think you are talking about the pre-digital era, when video was shot on film and then people worked on it frame-by-frame." Anybody altering video has to work on it frame by frame, just as in film. That is precisely the point of my original post: people are under the false impression that it is easy to doctor video footage. It is not.
2) Asking people to do a Google search is an easy way to get out of a direct question posed to you. Again, I stand vindicated, you have not shown any evidence of the kind of doctoring you suggest.
3)You do not have an understanding of the context. Merely asserting you do will not help, it is the equivalent of asking me to do a Google search. I've asked repeatedly about the history and context of the use of 'vote katwe', for example, and you have never responded with specifics.
4) I can clearly see the lip movements change when he is speaking in the portion of the video where he speaks of Karimuulah and Osama Bin Laden. Since you rely on YouTube, you probably can't.
5) It is not just pro-Hindu rhetoric in the clearly visible footage. He speaks of Hindus uniting to stop the area from becoming Pakistan. If that's ok with you, why is 'katwe' not?
6) He says the voice is not his, period. Either he is lying, or you are contradicting what he said. The pitch of the voice (NOT the accent which you keep bringing up) is exactly the same throughout. Varun says he has a thin voice and therefore the voice on tape is not his, he must mean the entire tape is dubbed over, which contradicts your argument.
7) His lies about his education are pointers to his character as a whole. If he lies about this, he can lie about other things. It is not proof, true, but evidence of character is accepted in court as part of an argument against people.
8) I don't know about unbiased muster. It won't pass muster with you because you are biased. That's understandable, but you can make no comments about what will or will not pass 'unbiased muster'.
9) You are wrong, his lips are perfectly visible for much of the footage. Not on the YouTube track laden with commentary that you have on your site, of course...
10) There you go, your technological illiteracy shows again. If there was any deletion of frames in that shot, the jerk would be visible immediately. There's a lot of movement in all the shots, you can't just cut out a frame or two. But thanks for acknowledging that three words or even two would not fit there without manipulating the video through cutting out frames. It's precisely what i've been arguing. Well, no frames have been cut, that is clear, so your contention is decisively disproved. I repeat: you can look at that footage frame by frame and you will see not a single frame is missing. Well, maybe YOU won't see it, because you are illiterate as far as understanding video goes.
11) His bail was not expiring. I'm glad you agree he staged a tamasha for political purposes. The mob he led got violent, went on a rampage, damaged property, I guess you think that is just politics as well. Mayawati staged her own counter-tamasha and outwitted him, that is politics as well.
I don't support the NSA, but I know your party does.
Listen, Kaul, I thank you for arguing with such civility. I've used words like 'illiterate' and you've never gone even that far, which is why I have responded at length to so many of your posts. But there is a sense of diminishing returns being derivable from our exchange being continued beyond this. Perhaps we should just agree to disagree at this stage, and leave readers to make up their own minds based on all we have written already, what? Of course, if you have any specific new information to add, I'd be happy to consider it, but otherwise it's going to be more of you saying 'his lips are not visible' and me replying, "are, too".

Kaul said...

OK. I will keep it short (relatively) :-). Your calling me illiterate and other commenters other names only shows your bias and shortness of temper. I never said video was altered frame by frame. There are 2 ways the video can be edited or doctored - by deleting or shortening words, and by adding audio in long shots. No, with software you do not need to work frame by frame. If you think to do this you need millions of rupees or man-hours then you are displaying *your* lack of technical knowledge. Yes, in case of deletion of syllables, there will be some jerk, but it will be limited if the camera is at the same angle, and since it is only a couple of syllables lasting fractions of a second the camera angle will be the same. Even if there is some minor jerk, who is looking for it when people like you have already made up their minds and are overlooking everything else.

Even though I have acknowledged my bias, I am still open to both possibilities. You are, on the other hand, adamant and sticking to your conclusions based on a shady video, without answering my questions about absence of any other evidence, absence of a credible media source owning the video, all video being from the same source (no multiple channels), no eyewitnesses seen on TV, source of the video, delay in the airing of this "news", the motives of people who can make such video, news reporters present at the original meeting not confronting him, official analysis of the video not having been done. I mean, this speech should have appeared in regular news on the same day -- just like the Lalu or Vaiko or Mulayam statements, not in a third party CD so many days later.

I didn't just ask you to do a google search, I sent you a link of the google search where there are links to many cases of video tempering. In each case the video has managed to dupe people for at least some time. I don't know how else you expect to be proven wrong.

I admit I am basing my views on the youtube videos, and whatever little I can catch on TV, and I go back and try to look at it differently. It only reinforces my belief. I wonder how you reinforce yours to make sure what you are saying is accurate. Do you have access to the original CD?

To conclude, I understand that you will need to have the last word on your own blog, so I promise I will not comment after this one, whether you approve it or not.

Girish Shahane said...

Kaul, I'm afraid you are simply wrong about frames. Of course one has to use software; but the work is still done frame by frame to alter video.
About deleting frames, you write 'Even if there is some minor jerk, who is looking for it when people like you have already made up their minds and are overlooking everything else.' I had not made up my mind before seeing the video. My eyes and mind would have registered any jerk immediately, it is second nature now. I'd have been most happy to point something like that out in my blog, as would hundreds of others.
That's what happened with the doctored videos in the link you sent me. I said you asked me to search Google, you said you had done something different, ie. sent a link to a specific search. But the link is only to "video doctoring", which is really no different than saying, "go, search Google". Because 'doctoring video' is the first term one would use in a search.
If you'd actually bothered to watch the videos, you would see why NONE of them convinced a large section of the public for long: they were debunked almost immediately in the media. You could have proved me wrong by giving a specific example of a visually doctored video that fooled all the news media for a substantial period of time, like two or three weeks. Linking to a Google search for 'doctoring video' is pretty pathetic as disproof.
You claim to be more open minded than I am, and suggest that being open to different possibilities is a fairer viewpoint; but that is the case only if one's mind is made up without considering evidence. Keeping an open mind after seeing evidence may be suggestive of bias rather than open-mindedness.
For example, if I said, "You are convinced of Kasab's guilt, I'm keeping an open mind. This proves you are biased and I am independent", that would be ridiculous, wouldn't it? Of course Kasab must be found guilty in a fair trial, but there's little doubt about his guilt, and I'm quite content to presume it.