Rajdeep On Deception Lane

There are principles of propaganda that Joseph Goebbels had laid out. Not sure if they were in an organised form but there is a writer, Leonard Doob, who has organised and listed Goebbels’ principles of propaganda very neatly. One can Google it and find those anywhere. There are at least two that Rajdeep Sardesai (RS) and his Hammam practice regularly and religiously:

Material from enemy propaganda may be utilized in operations when it helps diminish that enemy's prestige or lends support to the propagandist's own objective.

Who’s the enemy? Well, once again in the case of the spurious loan of 90 Crores by AICC to Associated Journals Ltd. (National Herald) it is clearly Subramanian Swamy. Here, he is the enemy of the Congress and the Gandhis. So Swamy’s own charges must be used to target and tarnish him to support the propagandist’s objective. Who’s the propagandist? That’s not hard to tell is it?

Propaganda must label events and people with distinctive phrases or slogans.

Bluff-master, muckraker, anarchist, fascist; you have all these titles and many more for Swamy from the Congress and the job of the propagandist is to further the agenda. Simple; eh? This is exactly what RS did on November 1 on his nightly show on CNN-IBN. He made a brilliant attempt at using charges made against Sonia and Rahul Gandhi (RG) by Swamy to tarnish Swamy rather than making an attempt to understand or explain the case for the viewers. Read the first principle of the propagandist I quoted above again. The very opening tagline of the show “Where is the fraud” gives the game away. The video of the discussion is available on Youtube (10.37)

Let’s hear Rajdeep’s mindless rant:

2.09: These are mere allegations; no quid pro quo has been shown.

Wilful ignorance doesn’t have a remedy. Young Indian is a company in which 76% shares are held by Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. Who benefits by transfer of National Herald to Young India?

4.05: RS claims having spoken to “sources” close to the Gandhi family who stated they are restructuring the entire National Herald company.

Really? Restructuring to what? First the Congress and the media touted the nonsense that Young India hopes to revive the National Herald newspaper. Then there was a clear statement by RG that there was no plan to revive the newspaper. Either RS must be blind or, once again, wilfully ignorant. The nonsense of RS goes on in that vein right through the show. But here’s the first clincher:

6.10 RS says the acquisition took place in April 2012 and it’s now November and that Swamy should have taken the case to the courts instead of making allegations.

That, for you, is stupidity personified. Consider this: It took the PM over two years to sack A. Raja and took him over 3 years to even reply to Swamy’s letter on 2G. ET article on Robert Vadra was in March 2011 but the news channels didn’t pick it up till there was an outrage in October 2012. And Rajdeep would have everyone believe that six months are too long for Swamy to wait to go to the courts. Where in the world will you find such a media propagandist?

Firstly, it’s Swamy’s business whether he wants to go to court or not. Secondly, RS completely ignores the fact that SS has written to both the Election Commission and the PM for action on this fraudulent donation of 90Crores by a political party to a regular company. SS is on record stating that if he doesn’t get a reply or action he will indeed go to court. I guess only misadventure enthusiasts like RS pick up documents and rush to court without exploring normal procedures of seeking action or inquiry. Whatever else RS can justify for his propaganda, not once does he bring up the question of a political party, which gets income tax exemptions, loaning 90 crores to a company. In all of this that issue is the crux of the whole argument of Swamy. So, SS is the guilty party for making the allegations, with documents that seriously need attention, and not going to courts. He is kicking up dust in the wind. See the propaganda principle number two that I stated at the beginning. Tarnish the enemy to protect your party.

Now, even the Congress first dismissed all of Swamy’s charges as baseless, motivated and utter rubbish. But by late evening on November 1, a somewhat agitated Janardhan Dwivedi, their spokesman, helplessly admitted that the AICC had indeed made a 90crore interest-free loan to National Herald. It doesn’t matter whether it was interest-free or if it was unsecured. Question remains; do political parties make such donations which they receive from the people? Are they lawfully allowed to? Out of 90 crores it is safe to say 27crores can be assessed as IT exemptions that the party has already received and that is public money that the party has used for the illegitimate loan to a company. None of these serious questions figured on Rajdeep’s show. Well, obviously the purpose of the show was to protect and serve. Then RS comes up with further nonsense of RahulG threatening defamation case against Swamy. If RS truly believed RahulG then he is clearly more gullible than I thought he was; hardly fit to be the “newsman” that he calls himself. Even ordinary folks didn’t believe RahulG’s silly threats.

What RS should have stated at the beginning of the segment he states at the end. He had asked Congress men to appear on the show and they refused. That says everything. Rajdeep doesn’t like his integrity being questioned. Nobody does! But I have to remind him again that he’s in a profession that has been acknowledged as dishonest long before he was even born; long before TV was invented. John Swinton, Chief of Staff of New York Times, was called the ‘Dean of his profession’ by the industry. This is a speech he made to the New York Press Club in the US in 1880:

"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinions out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone. The business of the journalist is to destroy the truth; to lie outright; to pervert; to vilify; to fawn at the feet of Mammon, and to sell the country for his daily bread. You know it and I know it and what folly is this toasting an independent press. We are the tools and vassals of the rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes”.

At the feet of Mammon! Even if Mammon represents greed, I could easily replace Mammon with another word. Rajdeep once used to have a segment called “Crossfire” on his shows. It used to be a full-fledged show on IBN’s US partner CNN. Once called on Crossfire, Jon Stewart, the satirist, blasted the hosts for their divisive program and said: "Now, don’t you think that, for people watching at home, that’s kind of a drag; that you’re literally walking to a place called deception lane”? Following the beating that the CNN hosts took on that episode ‘Crossfire’ was permanently pulled off the air. It was dumped. Rajdeep may not face the same fate for his spin but there is no doubt he knows quite well which direction he’s headed when he walks that Deception Lane.