Spectrum

Pavan Kumar H

Not so long ago, there were boundaries for opinion and counter opinion of both citizens and editors, in the newspaper—the centre page. However, with the introduction of power jacket and double jacket advertisements the centre page items started slowly creeping on to the front page, which was dedicated exclusively for the top news of the day.

Today, the lead stories of most newspaper are not decided on the basis of the importance but on the basis of political stand a newspaper has taken.

There are leftist ideology based newspaper, rightist views, centre of left and tabloid. It’s unfortunate that there is hardly any newspaper, which is standing for journalism for journalism sake.

Of late, the word intolerance has been bombarded on us so many times that we are being willingly or unwillingly forced to take sides. Can one ‘controversial’ man divide India into two sides, his way or highway? I don’t think so. More than his and his party men deeds, it is our biases that are making us take sides. We are getting so used to option of filtering that we are refusing to hear, read or even make an effort to understand the counter view point.

And with pain I have to say that few of our seniors’ journalists across the media houses are working so hard to make sure that the word #prestitutes stick on to our profession. When an anchor of a famous TV channel says on her show that ‘I walk with my balsas rolled up on the sleeves,’ what more can you expect out of such biased journalists.

It is unfortunate that most of the journalists have forgotten the Newton’s third law- for every action there would be equal and opposite reaction.  They are carrying on with their hidden agenda to such an extent that they were forced to face the wrath of the readers, not just in India but also outside the country when they go for coverage.

Media houses are no longer the sources of information and least does one expect to hear the biased opinion of the so called expert columnist. Sooner the journalists learn this fact the better it is for them.

Another accusation that media houses are facing is their urgency to jump to the conclusion. Before, a case unravels itself fully, the ‘news hungry’ anchors, as they are being called now a days, are jumping to the conclusion.

The best example of this is the recent cases of Dadri lynching and killing of ‘researcher’ Prof M M Kalaburgi.

Its been almost two months now since the two unfortunate incidents took place. The investigating officials themselves don’t have full facts with them, yet some section of media pronounced the judgment. Do these media houses have an answer to the question of common man, as to how they came to this conclusion? Their answer would be ‘sources cannot be revealed’.

What if the ‘sources’ led the media houses into a trap, as it was evident during the Aarushi murder case. What will be the reaction of the media house if it turned out to be totally opposite than what they had perceived?  Will they have a face to show to the society?

It is another issue that these journalists while giving talk to budding journalists call, its ok to broadcast a news few minutes late, but the news has to be accurate. But when in newsroom, their hypocrisy is thoroughly exposed when they don’t even spare mothers, sisters and others while ‘demanding’ for news to be broadcast first on their channel. Else, how can they publish their favorite tag line: ‘ours was the first channel to break the news on India television.’ Most of the time, they certainly have broken case, that too far from reality.   

How many times have we not heard an anchor shouting from top of his lungs that society is killing the messenger and not the message. It’s unfortunate that there is no punishment for the messenger who brings the wrong message!