English-Language Media (ELM)

English-Language Media (ELM)

Wanted:
* Bureau chief for Lucknow
* Reporters for Uttar Pradesh

Requirements:
* BA/MA from JNU/St Stephens
* Must be solidly secular and liberal
* Must leave the comfortable environs of Delhi
* Must slog in the heat and dust of UP's cities, towns and villages

Job Description:
Must dig out stories on...
* Communal riots
* Construction of Ram Mandir
* Persecution/oppression/discrimination of minorities
* Persecution/oppression/discrimination of Dalits
* Persecution/oppression/discrimination of lower castes
* Crime/corruption by upper-caste ministers
* Crime/corruption by lower-caste ministers
* Crime/corruption by upper-caste MLAs
* Crime/corruption by lower-caste MLAs
* Any other matter of secular/liberal interest
(in that order)

Rewards:
* Bonus points for stories from Gorakhpur (Yogi Adityanath's constituency) and Varanasi (you-know-who's constituency)
* High performers will be made prime-time anchors (yes, in the air-conditioned studio in Delhi)
* Extra-high performers will get Rajya Sabha tickets from Congress Party (if it exists till then)

On Media, News and Journalism

In 1958 legendary radio and TV journalist Edward R Murrow gave a speech to the RTNDA* about the state of the American news media. Many of the things he said are relevant for the Indian media (print and electronic) today:

The elaborate structure of networks, advertising agencies and sponsors will not be shaken or altered.

That your voice is amplified to the degree where it reaches from one end of the country to the other does not confer upon you greater wisdom or understanding than you possessed when your voice reached only from one end of the bar to the other.

I am seized with an abiding fear regarding what these two instruments (radio and television) are doing to our society, our culture and our heritage.

If there are any historians about fifty or a hundred years from now, and there should be preserved the kinescopes for one week of all three networks, they will there find recorded in black and white, or colour, evidence of decadence, escapism and insulation from the realities of the world in which we live.

One of the basic troubles with radio and television news is that both instruments have grown up as an incompatible combination of show business, advertising and news. Each of the three is a rather bizarre and demanding profession. And when you get all three under one roof, the dust never settles.

Or do we believe that the preservation of the Republic is a seven-day-a-week job, demanding more awareness, better skills and more perseverance than we have yet contemplated?

I am frightened by the imbalance, the constant striving to reach the largest possible audience for everything; by the absence of a sustained study of the state of the nation.

If the sponsor always, invariably, reaches for the largest possible audience, then this process of insulation, of escape from reality, will continue to be massively financed, and its apologist will continue to make winsome speeches about giving the public what it wants, or "letting the public decide".

*Radio-Television News Directors Association

Charlie Chaplin Statue Illegal

Over the past few days, the media has been crying itself hoarse over "Hindu extremists" blocking the erection of a Charlie Chaplin statue near Udupi.

Turns out the statue is illegal.

The New Indian Express, in a report titled 'Proposed Chaplin statue flouts CRZ norms', says:
The organisers of the film, House Full, had neither applied for the licence from local gram panchayat nor moved papers to obtain a no-objection certificate (NOC) from the department of Coastal Regulatory Zone... any permanent construction within 500 metres from the seashore amounts to violation of the CRZ norms.

Then what's the fuss all about? Storm in a teacup. Much ado over nothing. The whole thing is a non-issue. Go home and sleep, everybody.

NDTV and Freedom of Speech

On 27 November 2008 an amateur blogger named Chyetanya Kunte wrote a post criticising NDTV anchor Barkha Dutt for her coverage of the Bombay terrorist attacks. The post later disappeared from the blog. On 26 January 2009 an unconditional apology to Barkha Dutt and NDTV appeared on the blog.

What happened? Did NDTV threaten Chyetanya Kunte with legal action? If the matter had gone to court I think the blogger would have won. But the last thing an 'aam aadmi' wants is a long and expensive law suit. So he did what he thought was best for him and his family (he is married with two kids).

Does this look like a case of arm-twisting and goondagiri? Did NDTV resort to the same tactics it accuses far-right groups of using? This is the channel that lectures the Right on freedom of speech.

I am reproducing in full Chyetanya Kunte's original blog post:
(No, I don't have written permission from him. But I doubt if he is in a position to give such a permission; so I'll go ahead anyway.)

Shoddy Journalism

Appalling journalism. Absolute blasphemy! As I watch the news from home, I am dumbfounded to see Barkha Dutt of NDTV break every rule of ethical journalism in reporting the Mumbai mayhem. Take a couple of instances for example:

In one instance she asks a husband about his wife being stuck, or held as a hostage. The poor guy adds in the end about where she was last hiding. Aired! My dear friends with AK-47s, our national news is helping you. Go get those still in. And be sure to thank NDTV for not censoring this bit of information.

In another instance, a General sort of suggests that there were no hostages in Oberoi Trident. (Clever) Then, our heroine of revelations calls the head of Oberoi, and the idiot confirms a possibility of 100 or more people still in the building. Hello! Guys with guns, you've got more goats to slay. But before you do, you've got to love NDTV and more precisely Ms Dutt. She's your official intelligence from ground zero.

You do not need to be a journalist to understand the basic premise of ethics, which starts with protecting victims first; and that is done by avoiding key information from being aired publicly — such as but not limited to revealing the number of possible people still in, the hideouts of hostages and people stuck in buildings.

Imagine you're one of those sorry souls holed-up in one of those bathrooms, or kitchens. A journalist pulls your kin outside and asks about your last contact on national television, and other prying details. In a bout of emotion, if they happen to reveal more details, you are sure going to hell. Remember these are hotels, where in all likelihood, every room has a television. All a terrorist needs to do is listen to Ms Barkha Dutt's latest achievement of extracting information from your relative, based on your last phone-call or SMS. And you're shafted — courtesy NDTV*. If the terrorists don't manage to shove you in to your private hell, the journalists on national television will certainly help you get there. One of the criticisms about Barkha Dutt on Wikipedia reads thus:

During the Kargil conflict, Indian Army sources repeatedly complained to her channel that she was giving away locations in her broadcasts, thus causing Indian casualties.

Looks like the idiot journalist has not learned anything since then. I join a number of bloggers pleading her to shut the f••• up.

Update: In fact, I am willing to believe that Hemant Karkare died because these channels showed him prepare (wear helmet, wear bullet-proof vest) in excruciating detail live on television. And they in turn targeted him where he was unprotected. The brave officer succumbed to bullets in the neck.

Update 2 [28.Nov.2300hrs]: Better sense appears to have prevailed in the latter half of today — either willfully, or by Government coercion**, and live broadcasts are now being limited to non-action zones. Telecast of action troops and strategy is now not being aired live. Thank goodness for that.

Update 3 [30.Nov.1900hrs]: DNA India reports about a UK couple asking media to report carefully:
The terrorists were watching CNN and they came down from where they were in a lift after hearing about us on TV. — Lynne Shaw in an interview.

*Oh, they have a lame excuse pronouncing that the television connections in the hotel has been cut, and therefore it is okay to broadcast. Like hell!

**I'm thinking coercion, since Government has just denied renewing CNN's rights to air video today; must've have surely worked as a rude warning to the Indian domestic channels.

Blog Squatting

I started my blog in September 2006. After blogging for more than a year I decided to make some changes to the blog. Chief among these changes were the blog URL and blog name. Since this is an India-centric blog I wanted to have "India" in the blog URL and blog name. I tried out several variations of "India" and found that all of them were taken. But what pissed me off was that all these blogs were inactive. Here's the list:
1. India.blogspot.com – 2 posts
2. Indica.blogspot.com – 4 posts
3. Indian.blogspot.com – 4 posts
4. Indiana.blogspot.com – 4 posts

I was furious. All these cool URLs had been wasted on some dead blogs. Talk about blog squatting! After 1947 we had land reforms that outlawed absentee landlords and gave the land to people who would actually use it. Today we need similar laws that will take away cool blog URLs from undeserving owners.

Anyway, there was nothing I could do about it. I had to settle for "Indian Take". The changes were made on 31st December 2007.

For the record, this was the old avatar of the blog:
Blog title = 21st Century Chronicles
Blog subtitle = A turbulent world seen through the eyes of an unknown Indian
Blog URL = http://psomax.blogspot.com
My display name = Psomax

Media And The Sangh

Of late I have been thinking a bit about the media's coverage of the RSS. This is an important issue because most people form their opinion about the RSS based on what they read, see and hear in the media. The RSS's membership is estimated to be 45 lakhs. If we include the families and friends of these swayamsevaks, the number may go up to 5 crores (roughly). That is only 5% of the country. The remaining 95% depend on the media to give them a correct picture of the RSS.

So the question is how well is the media living up to its responsibility of portraying the RSS accurately? (The responsibility here is to the readers/viewers/listeners, not to the RSS) Not very well, according to me. The portrayal is mostly negative and unfair. [My comments here are mainly about the English language media - with which I am most familiar. I believe the situation is slightly better in the case of the Indian languages media]

Most newspapers and magazines depict the RSS as a communal, fundamentalist, casteist and fascist organisation (I have responded to some of these allegations here and here). Prominent examples are Frontline, Hindu, Outlook and Times of India.

• Frontline - Perhaps the worst offender; mouthpiece of the Communist Party of China; helmed by the notorious Mr N Ram.
• Hindu - Should be renamed as Anti-Hindu; from the same publishing house as Frontline; another platform for leftist views; amazing how it is considered as one of India's most respected newspapers despite its espousal of a failed ideology.
• Outlook - Edited by Mr Vinod Mehta, one of India's chief pseudo-secularists; a good example of how otherwise intelligent people can be knuckle-headed in certain matters.
• Times of India - The less said, the better.
  

There are no 'pro-RSS' publications. But there are a few which are less biased than the rest. Two I can think of are India Today and Indian Express. These are not entirely free of RSS-baiting, but at least they are not fundamentally opposed to Hindu nationalism.