No Dent in Sidhu's celebrity status

CHANDIGARH: "I have lit a lamp in many a storm," Navjot Singh Sidhu said, as he came out in a rush of humanity from the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Wednesday. For most other celebrities facing a similar crisis, the lines would have got lost somewhere between their heads and pursed mouths, especially if it came minutes after a court had pronounced a conviction in a serious criminal case.
But that's just the way the Sikh from Amritsar is.And people here love him for that, for reasons right or wrong. His celebrity status is intact. On Tuesday night, as a brimming, blue-turbaned Sherry — a name Sidhu is known by — got down at the Chandigarh railway station, there was a horde of supporters waiting to extend him a wave and a smile. And in keeping with the fashion of these times, they were carrying burning candles.
Mostly it is the Punjabi pride thing that's happening. Few Sikhs have been able to match Sidhu's success and chutzpah as a cricketer while he was playing and the game's brand ambassador once he quit. That's why Ranman Deol, a DAV student who was one of those carrying a candle said, with absolutely no trace of ambiguity, "Badhiya banda hai, yaar. (He's a nice bloke.) "We'll take out more such processions if need be."
Mahesh Inder Singh, another torch bearer to Sidhu's cause, said,"We will always extend our moral support to him. Look at him, he can't do such a thing. Phasaya gaya hai (He's been framed)."
Of course, Mahesh would have been a two-year-old when the cricketer got into a scruff in 1988 that led to a man's death. That hardly matters, though. The faith is blinding, just like the candle flames. Told that the man has
been sentenced for culpable homicide, Mahesh didn't want to get into the nitty-gritty. "Oh, that's the court's business," he said.
Mahesh had passed his sentence and it had nothing to do with fair or foul. That's just not the way people react to celebrities. Sidhu is no exception. One of Punjab's big stars, Darshan Aulakh, an actor-writer who's featured in several films like Veer Zaara, Bhagat Singh and Salaam Namaste, said,"Sidhu’s stardom will remain as unaffected as those of Sanjay Dutt and Salman Khan. In politics, though, he will not have the high moral ground after conviction. I know him and, if anything, he is guilty of recklessness. It was a youth's folly." Fattest pigs go to the butcher first, Sidhu had once said during commentary. His supporters, though, feel that he might have been a pig, but he is not fat. Whatever the butcher says.