Manufacturing a controversy
On the diabolical role of certain sections of electronic media in the latest Tharoor controversy.
Another public statement by Shashi Tharoor and another controversy. So what’s new with that? It is easy to dismiss that off with a shrug and get back to watching that heady cocktail of Bollywood, cricketers [its not about the sport any more, but only the stars], horrors of jehadi terror, saturated coverage of the union budget for days culminating in an overdose of stuffed nonsense on the budget day, and shrill studio debates which, at the end, leave you little wiser about the subject. Welcome to the world of Indian television news. And this excludes stations like India TV and Aaj Tak, which are not worth wasting your breath over, unless you are suffering from jetlag like GreatBong.
Incidentally the above description of Indian news television has been drawn from the blogposts [here and here] by two TV reporters themselves. And we are not even venturing into that apperceptive — and accusatory — piece by P Sainath in the Hindu, which has gone unanswered by otherwise so-prone-to-feign-indignation star editors and editor-cum-owners of the Indian news television houses.
Just a quick recap of what happened earlier today. In response to a question on whether India will seek Saudi Arabia’s support to influence Pakistan to address India’s concerns over terrorism emanating from Pakistani territory, Minister of state for external affairs Shashi Tharoor, as part of the Indian PM’s delegation to Saudi Arabia said:
We feel Saudi Arabia has a long and close relationship with Pakistan and that makes Saudi a more valuable interlocutor to us.[TOI]
The statement was unequivocal, on-the-record, captured by the TV cameras and accurately tweeted by ANI News editor Ms. Smita Prakash. A little discussion on the subject took place on twitter between Smita, Acorn, Offstumped, Filter Coffee, and this blogger, which resulted in a blogpost on the subject by The Acorn. Attempts to search the above quote and related news item on the web met with no success for a couple of hours after that.
By late in the afternoon, the Indian TV news stations woke up from their Sunday slumber and flashing tickers on TV screens said that Tharoor had asked for Saudi mediation with Pakistan. More amazingly, TV news stations played the video clip of Tharoor making the statement and followed up the clip with newsreaders interchangeably using the words like interlocution, mediation and intervention in their commentary. English news channel editors are supposed to possess a decent knowledge of the language to not make such basic errors. Even if they don’t, a quick glance through a good dictionary or a Wiki search on the internet would have explained the meaning of interlocutor to the editors. Perhaps, as someone suggested, this being a Holi weekend, editors were on leave, leaving this to rookie interns. More on that weekend thing later.
If one reads it carefully, this is not really a path-breaking statement. Even if one were to read signs of a tactical shift in India’s position on bilateral nature of disputes with Pakistan, it nowhere — by any stretch of imagination — calls for a mediation or intervention. It merely suggests that India is asking Saudi Arabia to use its influence over Pakistan so that India and its citizens are better protected from the jehadi terror emanating from Pakistan. They say it is a dramatic shift without looking back at the active interest displayed by the US [interlocution, mediation, intervention, interference... take your pick here] to bring the Kargil conflict to an end in 1999 and then to stall the military stand-off between India and Pakistan in the wake of the attack on the Indian Parliament. The Acorn explains the geo-political context in which this is a realistic option for India today; although other analysts and media houses are free to disagree with the proposition and criticise it vehemently. What they are not free to do though is twist the statement to suit their argument and create a controversy that harms the national interest.
That bring us to the real issue under the scanner. It is not about Shashi Tharoor or the choice of English words. It is about the nature of some media houses in this country to feed off manufactured controversies to sustain their TRPs. National interest be damned.
The callous and disdainful attitude of the electronic media is best exemplified by this twitter conversation between Suhasini Haidar, Deputy Foreign Affairs Editor of CNN-IBN and The Acorn. First, the tweets from Suhasini.
suhasinih Methinks the articulation of interlocution may have been particularly badly timed….on a long news-free holi weekend.
suhasinih Or maybe we say it like it is….that India wd love for US, China and Saudi to intervene on OUR behalf with Pak. But nt the other way around
suhasinih Anyway Tharoor has now clarified….
Here is Nitin Pai’s reply.
acorn @suhasinih It is shameful that media decided to misrepresent a nuanced point @shashitharoor made, because it was a news-free holi weekend
acorn Good people of India beware, the TV media has a long news-free weekend!
And here comes the killer patronising line, with a smiley in tow, from Suhasini against the other media [i.e. bloggers and twitter users]
suhasinih @acorn also beware of media that blames media rather than gov
And finally, Nitin again.
acorn @suhasinih We do need media to keep media on the ball. Government is checked by opposition, media & punished by public. Not so for media
It was more surprising because Suhasini, in her media pieces and social media interactions, comes out as one of the more sensible and down-to-earth journalists on Indian television. One can then well imagine the attitude of those starry TV news editors that populate and shine on the Indian news channels.
It is difficult to digest the patronising and dismissive tone which reeks of unbridled power — We make the rules, we decide how it is done, we know best, how dare these petty bloggers correct us or point out the facts to us? And finally, we give a damn.
There were even more cynical responses from the media fraternity. Mr Tharoor has again created a controversy to stay in the news. Well, one may disagree with Mr Tharoor and his conduct or views but to bring it down to the level of a personal vendetta campaign is rather disagreeable. Personal attacks are just not done, whether on a politician or on a journalist.
A related argument is that why can’t Mr. Tharoor be like other politicians and keep quiet. This actually seems to be the whole agenda of this campaign to create controversies around Mr. Tharoor and diss him in the public domain. Certain sections of the electronic media are so rooted in their old ways that they don’t want our ministers to directly talk to the people, and talk a lot more at that. Rather than report that accurately, they want to continue with the old-style nexus between certain journalists and ministers. These ministers will either provide leaks attributable to sources within the government or interviews to favoured news channels, resulting in exclusives. Once the government becomes more transparent and accessible to all in its direct communications, these journalists and media houses will lose this exclusivity and the business their channels derive from that nexus, and consequent exclusivity.
This is not a rant against a particular journalist or a media house or in favour of one smart politician. This is not even about bloggers versus mainstream media. That’s an old story played many times over. This is about the role and responsibility, or lack of it, amidst sections of the Indian mainstream media, especially those broadcasting in the English language on television. If they claim to hold a mirror to all the other sections of the society, they must learn to hold a mirror to themselves. Else it will hurt them badly when active sections of the society, or even the government, are forced to hold a mirror to them and their ugly reflection is out in the open. They won’t certainly want that to happen. Nor does the nation.
Name of Source: Pragmatic National Interest