The Undercover Indian: tv

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Monday, July 14, 2008

Aarushi Murder Case - Media circus and Police incompetency

So Finally Aarushi Talwar murder case is solved. Finally I hope. Unless there is some other hidden twist in this tale. After all, what can you expect when a murder investigation is done in full public view and media glare and when every day you have a new person being suspected for murder? It is not unusual for some investigations to take longer but Arushi murder case stands out not for investigation but the way it was (un)done by Police and circus which media created around it. Every news channel followed this "breaking story" like a mad hound. As if it was only murder committed in this country. What was even worse was the way all news channels shamelessly hounded Talwar family and others involved and ran theories as breaking news. There were stories of Aaruhsi's father being the murderer, insinuation of his affair with a woman and worse of all stories on Aarushi's character and hint of incest.

That there is something rotten with law and policing in this country is not something unknown. This is a country where suspects can be kept in jails for years waiting for their cases to be judged, police can be easily bribed and investigations are often botched up and superficial. But in Arushi's case, the media had created an unholy alliance with incompetent Police to feed us half cooked stories and lies as breaking news just to keep their 24 hours channels running. Every news channel was trying to come out with its own version of truth and investigations. Investigations, done in studio rooms with graphics and animation and by hyper news presenters asking viewers to vote who they think were the murderers. An Entire nation was turned into detective. A new form of collective wisdom perhaps where murder mysteries would be solved in news rooms and by news polls and not by hard and objective investigation. All ethics of journalism were compromised on alter of one- up-manship and TRP race. Firstly, illiterate police officers leaked absolutely private details of Arushi to media and then Media did nothing but feed on it. Whatever happened to a minor's rights of privacy? Few things come out of this case for us a society to introspect:

police force is unable to do any investigation in a scientific and modern way. They are too prejudiced and biased to employ objective judgement to crack a case. They also appear virtually illiterate and have no knowledge of a person’s (dead or suspect) right to privacy. If CBI has to be called out in every other case, then what happens to all those cases which don’t get as much press and CBI involvement as this one did? And when police officers who botched up the case would be punished, if at all? Dont we need massive overhauling of our police force to bring them out of medieval mindeset and methods or is it that Police has forgotten how to investigate as it has beocme merely a coercise tool in hand of state?

News Media is fast turning out into a parody and circus of speculations and theories. It has forgotten all journalistic values and ethics and is high on its power and privileges. It thinks nothing about runing speculations as stories on a 14 years old girl's private life. It thinks that it is not answerable to anybody and can do anything in name of freedom of press. It is not able to self-regulate it and it is about time that someone else (State!!) did it. As my friend, says "you can’t really expect bunch of kids to self-regulate, they need bit of parental control". And presently, Indian news media, especially news channels are nothing more than quarrelsome bunch of kids. They need little rap on their knuckles.

There no privacy laws in this country. Anybody suspected of anything can be hounded by media, their names and pictures splashed 24 hours on TV. All kinds of insinuations can be mixed with fiction and drama to cook up a truth. Can Talwars now sue all those news channels which ran day long stories on them and had camped in front of their house? And why not!

A voyeuristic society ? As the case was unfolding "live" on news channels, there were reports of some production house planning to make movie or TV show based on Arushi's life , even before truth was revealed and investigations were over. That was clearly insensitive and indication of how voyeuristic we have really become . Afterall, if there is 24 hours coverage of a murder , trial by media and attempt to make TV shows on a tragedy, then there must be because many of us want to watch this on our TV sets. Is it an indication that we are becoming a voyeuristic society now where news , entertainment, gossips, halftruths are all mixed together in a heady concoction of 24 hours news sprinkled with advertisement breaks?

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Reality Kid Shows - warped reality anyone!

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The recent incident of a 15 years old girl from Kolkata losing her voice due to reprimand by judges during a Bengali reality show is being widely discussed in TV and print media. Central Government has announced that it would soon come out with guidelines and regulations for such reality shows on TV where minors and kids are involved. Even as girl is being treated at a Bangalore hospital for reportedly severe mental shock, the show producers and parents are blaming each other in media. Times News ran the snippets of event last night with English subtitles and seeing them, I think the comments passed by judges were little harsh considering that the girl was in tears and visibly shaken.

Both the parties are to be blamed here. Both the Producers of such shows which try to make money by staging drama by encouraging unnecessary provocation and comments and parents who are ready to go to any extent to ensure that their kids become celebrities. Most of reality shows for kids are about songs and dances where kids enact popular movie numbers. Shows are sold to audiences as a quest to search for new talent and parents go to any length to make their kids participate in them. Some parents even quit their jobs to support their kid in this quest of this mini-celebrity hood. Now I might be little slow here in understanding but I don’t understand what sort of talent is found in these shows!! Often you see kids dancing to raunchy numbers which they don’t even perhaps understand. There are little girls who sing "beedi jalile jigar se piya...." and judges comment "fantastic...your expressions were excellent". That is preposterous. How can little kids be expected to or even required to understand such songs and then emote them either through song or dance!

In India parents often derive their own sense of achievement or failure by what their kids achieve or don’t achieve. This adds lots of pressure on kids to perform. You could see this behavior on so many reality shows for kids. You can see parents fighting with show organizers when kids get eliminated as if their whole world has crashed down. You can see parents staging emotional drama or using parchocial appeals to get votes from audiences. What sort of reality does it create for a kid who is still trying to get any comprehension of world around him/her?

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Speaking Sai- India TV gone bonkers

It is difficult to gauge where does India TV stand in plethora of Hindi news channels in India, which mostly cover nothing else than banal to Bollywood. Is it news channel or is it gosssip channel or is it live circus ? It frequently runs stories which verge on sensationalism, presented in most bizarre fashion by presenters who are TV equivalent of quacks. While browsing Tele for news, I came across two stories on this channel. One breaking news story was showing a video grab of dark, rain heavy, clouded sky and anchor was claiming that cloud was a giant demon (daitya) in sky. The cloud indeed vaguely resembled face of a man. Anybody who has ever looked at clouds in sky would know that traveling clouds can take many shapes. You can see dogs, cats, humans, war scenes or anything you can imagine. But India TV would have you believe that there was a Giant in sky in form of clouds. Story Anchor (are these guys worth calling journalists?) was repeatedly insinuating that cloud was a giant in sky and then it was asking viewers to call teh cahnnel and discuss if this was indeed a Giant in sky?

"Kya ye eak Daitya hai?"
"Kya apne kabhi aisa Daitya dekha hai?"
"Dekhiye kitna daravna hai iska chehra"
"ye deikhiye dataiya ke hoth, uski aankhen, kya ye hum se kuch keh raha hai?"

The very next day, in another breaking new, India TV ran another video which was sent to it by some viewer (picked from YoutTube as posted above) and which had Sai Baba moving his lips and ostensibly speaking. The Breaking story ran for good 3 hours and Channel was asking its viewers to call and discuss the speaking Sai baba video. What was most bizarre and ir-responsible was the way in which whole story was run with sensationalistic headlines, a ludicrous anchor and equally ridiculous voice over.

Dekihye , Sai baba ke hoth hil rahen hain. Unki Ankhe bhi hil
Rahi hain. Kya Kah Rahen hain Baba?

For an un-initiated viewer, the story would have come across as some sort of Miracle that Sai Baba was speaking in video. It was very obvious that Channel had clear intentions of grabbing eye balls by playing on gullible viewer's religious sentiments by hiding facts and presenting them in a way which would have a Sai baba devotee think that some sort of Miracle had taken place. In a country where large number of people can believe on anything in name of God, running such a story was tantamount to deliberately creating sensation. The height of stupidity was reached when competing news channel AajTak also picked the story and was keen to declare that it had reached the truth of "speaking Sai".

Towards end of the story India TV started claiming that it was showing the video in interest of nation and devotees of Baba and all it wanted to do was properly investigate if this was a real video. So is this what India TV finds worth investigating? An Animation posted on You tube? A video which anybody in first look would have said was work of an Animation? A video which is posted on Youtube with heading of "SaiBaba Animation" ? The very next day Channel again ran same story with "fresh claims" that after its pain staking investigation the truth was finally out and that India TV can now proudly say that it had found out the truth that Video was an Animation. And then it claimed that Saibaba is real and so is this video.

"India TV ko apni Tehkikat par garv " (India TV is proud of its Investigation)
What Investigation? If there was anything to be investigated, why did you moron showed the video before finding the truth? What was the urgent need of showing video? And why present a simple story in a way that it will sound fantastic? Why to run Animation with Sai Baba Bhajans in background? Would India TV show any video sent to it by any viewer and run it for 3 hours in name of investigation?

"Age bhi jari rakeha a jung" (Channel will continue this in future.)
Of yes. Grab animated videos from You tube and start investigations and run them as breaking news.

"karodon bhakton ne abhar jataya" (Millions of Devotees thanked India V)
This is as preposterous as the story channel ran. Do they know how much is one crore? How did channel find out that there were Crores of people thanking it? Did it talk to crores of people? And what were devoteed Thanking India TV for? Pointing them to YouTube?

"India TV ke tehkikat ka asar" (Effect of India TV's investigation)
What effect and on whom. Does India TV think that showing videos of vanishing statues, magicians, flying men and animations amount to Investigation!

"Sai bhi Sach or Video bhi Sach" (Sai Baba is real and so is video)
How did Channel reached on conclusion that Sai baba is real? Was that under investigation at all?

Rajat Sharma, perhaps its time that you retire or perhaps you have lost it. Otherwise how can you be in channel which seems to be infested with dementia stricken people in guise of journalists? But the malaise doesn't seem limited to India TV alone. Other Hindi News channels like Aaj Tak and even IBN7 are equally culpable. At time when India TV was showing Speaking Sai as breaking news, IBN7 had "messages from aliens" as breaking news.IBN7 claimed that it was doing "Duniya ka sab se bada khulasa", "world's biggest expose". Well. What next are we going to see as breaking news ...UFOs, invading aliens, Barmuda Triangle??

Shame on you India TV. Shame on your journalists. You don’t deserve privileges granted to Fourth Estate. If you don’t have anything worthwhile to show as news, you can do a little favor by not creating controversies and feeding on them.

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Cricket , Media and Gods

I was watching Australia South-Africa Group world cup match the other day. Australia had scored some 360 runs and South Africa was Chasing to win. Graeme Hick and AB DeVillers started the innings on aggressive note, not sparing any bowler including the once fearsome McGrath. Before the match, both the teams indulged in war of words. Australians called South Africans chokers and South Africans reminded Australians of their recent defeats and wondered if tag of chokers now needs to shift to Australians. I like Graeme Hick. He is built like a bully, hardly seems to emote anything and constantly chews while on the field. He looks like this gladiator who is not taken in by the awe of occasion or fear of enemy. Eventually Australians won the match but not before South Africans had instilled fear of God in them. This is what a good game of cricket is all about and this is what sport is all about. Competitiveness, aggression, hard work, self belief, desire to win and lots of sweat. Our team lost because we had none of it. Contrary to what people are saying about world cup being over, it is just starting now. The real contest is beginning now.

No doubt, the way we lost was shameful, but it was coming nonetheless. We just had to cut the media hype before the cup to see that. Media in India, specially the news channels, is turning more and more into theatre of absurd. News is being made and presented the way we have made our movies for so longs. Over the top, exaggerated, dramatic and overly emotional. May be this is how we are as people and so it reflects in whatever we do, whether it is movies or news. I wonder if some news channel in future is going to start item songs as well. Before cup hype by the media, made billions of cricket fans to believe as if Cup was for India to take and other teams were just coming there to have some fun and frolic. As if, like a Bollywood hero, team India was destined to get the girl and others teams were just the supporting actors needed in the drama. Funny that it is, the hype was so much that almost every cricketer of past, found his way into one or the other channel's expert panel. The same players, who were themselves failures when they played the game, were now commenting on what strategies India should adopt to lift the cup. I know that it is not necessary that you be a stalwart to earn your right to comment on the game, but even then it is little funny.

Also, we must be the only people in world who would invoke God to beseech him to let us win the cup. How many Yagnas and sarpdosha yagans were performed before the cup! If Gods really did played their part in sports, then we would have been world champions in every sport, considering how religious we are and how many varied gods we have. And we share this trait of invoking God in sports with Pakistanis, proving that two people are not really different. Pakistanis always say that "It was Allah's will and grace" when they win the game but don’t say same when the lose it. Before team was to travel to West Indies, most of channels ran programs where "leading" astrologers and tarot card readers were invited and were asked to predict the fate of team. These chaps did some crystal gazing and most of them predicted that team India was sure to reach the Semi finals. Beyond that they were noncommittal as they usually are when it comes to sticking their neck out. I wonder what these soothsayers would say now that India is out of first round itself, forget the Semi finals. May be the planetary position was changed after their predictions.

Then the great Indian cricket fan is so emotional and fickle minded Same batsmen who couldn’t move the bat against Bangladesh, become heroes all over again when they butchered poor , first timers like Bermuda, Bermuda which is country of 60,000 people and whose cricket team is made up of amateurs like doctors and school teachers. Why do these fans think that we lost because our players are more concerned about advertisement money than the game! Because money is bad!!. Money is sinful!!. Just because players are earning more money they should be made to feel guilty about it. May be it is true that cricket players in India are spoilt with the money and once they become stars, they start behaving more like movie stars than sport stars. May be our fielding is bad because these stars think it is beneath them to slide on the ground to stop couple of runs. May be. But I think the real reason is that we are week in mind. We are not aggressive and competitive. We don’t understand that sport is all about competitiveness and about winning. Sport is about skills and fitness. Sport is about testing. It is about testing the real men. It is about testing physical endurance. It is about testing the belief and courage. It is about rising to occasion. Whoever told us that it is more important to participate than to win was merely consoling. Obviously we can not win every time, but when we start thinking that we can’t win every time, we certainly legitimize possibility of losing in our minds. This is why current team of Australia is such a champion team. Because they hate losing. And they win because their sum is higher than the parts, unlike Indian team which if media reports are to be believed, is perennially divided into groups, into groups of junior and seniors, into groups of who speak Kannada and Marathi, into groups of who eat pada paav and who eat masala dosa.

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

News is no News

We all know what the Indian News channels have come to become. They have proliferated like mushrooms and have left some of us wondering if those days of conservative Door Darshan were better. In quest of TRPs and beating the competition at any cost, these news channels have denigrated news into cheap sensastionalism and tabloid gossips. Anything can become a breaking news, even if it is hardly a news. Every news channel repeats the same story and claims the first one to break it. Most of their field reporters have no sense of what news and reporting is all about and their presenters sound uneducated (there are very few Mini Menons and where is Barkha Dutt!!). Even some of better channels like Star News have consistently gone the downhill.

We know that large number of masses like to know about celebrities and their lives, so recently when engagement of Abhishek Bachachan and Aishwarya Rai was announced, it was no surprise that all the news channels were on it immediately. But, what defeats me is the way it was covered. I don't understand why it was necessary to invite "pundits" and "astrologers" and ask their opinion about wheather marriage would be a success or not, or what chould be the date of marriage or scores of such stupid questions. In doing so, these channels are also indirectly promoting some superstitious practices and thier practitioners. The whole reporting on Aish-AB affair was nothing but tabloid news and channels acted like paparazzi. Why is it so important for nation to know what temples these guys went to and what pujas they performed or what pujari had to say!! Why should a new channel extensively report on how couple's new house is being done up and how many swimming pools it has!! How is it a news when Bipasha Basu is rehearsing for one of 1 million bollywood award functions !! And sample the news caption "Bipasha ke Jalwe"..."Bipasha ne bikhera husn ka Jaadu" . I mean there has to be some distinction between serious news and this kind of "page 3" , peripheral reporting which can be left to channels like Zoom.

There is no doubt that media as such and TV in particular has been largely instrumental in making people aware of various issues, keeping issues in focus (Jessica Lall for example) and forcing lethargic government agencies and institutions to act. TV has also made many corrput politicians and officials mend their way and has instilled a fear in their heart as nothing escapes the media these days. Media is one of 3 pillars of democracy and news channels have such an important role to play and they must not let their reputation and credibility sullied by irresponsible and amateur reporting. They need to move away from thier fixation with bollywood, celebrities and Cricket. They need to understand distinction between reality, triviality and sensationalism. May be it is just that this medium is new in India and has not yet reached maturity which is desired out of it. With great power comes the greater responsibility.