In an
article somewhat critical of Manmohan Singh Rajdeep Sardesai now finds his silence a curse. In June 2011 the
MMS made an extraordinary promise that he would meet the press every week.
He started off the first with a private, closed-door meeting with five
hand-picked editors who were practically Congress spokies in the media. I had
called it “friendly fire”. Nobody really knows what questions were asked
and what answers MMS had offered. And that was that. Since then MMS hasn’t spoken
to the media again except in his flights. A few months prior to June in
February 2011 MMS had held a televised meeting, again with hand-picked editors.
While Rajdeep writes “Silence as a curse”
in his home paper of Hindustan Times I wonder if he ever reads the comments on
his article. When I last checked a few days ago the following comments were on
top of the list:
The third comment says Rajdeep is
actually covering up the Himalayan deficiencies
of MMS. The media had hailed an ordinary babu and a puppet as a great economic
reformer and architect of the reforms. This is a lie that the entire Indian
MSM, Rajdeep included, has peddled all these years. The Congress party had
wiped out Narasimha Rao from their history because he was not a “Gandhi”. But
people are indeed slowly starting to realise that Rao was the real architect of
the reforms which were also triggered by other compulsions. MMS was just a
senior clerk implementing these measures. It is now also widely known that far
from being a free-market supporter, MMS was a socialist more suited to the large
govt and doles philosophy of the Congress. And silence? That is precisely the
reason Sonia Gandhi chose him as PM. To
keep his mouth shut, to bury his conscience. Simon Denyer was more direct
when he called MMS a “tragic failure”.
The first comment in the box drives home
an important message. “Any journalist
who is soft on ruling party is corrupt” it says. I cannot help agreeing. This
describes the Indian MSM perfectly. They are slaves to the Congress and the
ruling UPA. Rajdeep is nothing more than an English speaking Laloo who is a
slave of the Congress party. Time and again, in every scam, in every crisis his
channel and also other media outlets have spent their time finding faults with
other parties instead of keeping a watch on the ruling party. And then Rajdeep
gets upset because people question his “integrity
and credibility”. Rajdeep forgets that all his staunch critics were also
his one-time admirers. Frankly, if Rajdeep is such a moron that he still believes
all the myths about MMS being honest, a great economist or reformer, then he’s
not a journalist but a bed-fellow of the Congress. He is just another Mulayam
Singh or Laloo Prasad. They support the Congress for the same reasons that
Rajdeep defends the crimes of Congress and MMS and washes their sins with
clever words.
Being an embedded reporter has its own
problems. You soon become the team or the party. This is what CNN-IBN reporter Pallavi Ghosh frequently shows in her
messages. When Pawan Bansal’s nephew
was arrested in the bribery case for railways appointments she tells us how
earnest the guy is. Surely, corrupt people don’t wear a badge do they? None in
the media wants to ask how a nephew can effect senior appointments in the
Railways Board without the connivance of a top minister. Secondly, the men who were
paying such huge bribes are certainly not fools to pay these to a person unless
they were certain he can deliver results. This was a deal running into crores
and cannot be anything but a national racket. But CNN-IBN and their sisters
will tell you “Pawan Bansal is innocent”. HeadlinesToday reported that his
nephew, Vikas Singla, was a frequent guest at Rail Bhawan and was always
closeted with Bansal. Ah well, I guess they must be discussing what to cook for
dinner in the night or who to invite. There’s a reason I keep repeating that
the MSM is the first line of defence for
the corrupt.
What about CNN-IBN’s sister channel
NDTV? Both are members of the unholy trinity that includes Hindustan Times,
which is their mother-paper in print. When people from NDTV and CNN-IBN find
time, you can usually find them in Hindustan Times. NDTV is now famous for giving clean chits to the corrupt, providing
platforms for the tainted to shed tears and often quoting “sources” to plant stories in the public. By now almost everyone
knows who their “source” in their cabinet is. A few days back NDTV put out news
about Army’s proposals to the Cabinet on dealing with the Chinese incursion in
Ladakh. You have to be a bed-mate of the Congress to be getting such leaks from
the highest levels. I don’t think anyone needs to be an Einstein to guess who
these “sources” are. And as with PallaviG of CNN-IBN they also claim Bansal is
not connected to the bribery. The trick
is to attribute the remark to some unverifiable “source” so that the channel
can pass it off as “news” and not as their personal defence of Bansal.
The other trick NDTV employs is to
always describe any crime or scam by the Congress or UPA as an “allegation”. They are all innocent, aren’t
they? And some people are just making allegations. Take a look at this headline
from the Bansal bribery case:
It is a report by Sunetra Chaudhary and
another. It screams the bribery is an “allegation”. Wow! The CBI catches Singla
red-handed with cash of 90 lakhs. Books him for bribery and arrests him and on
May 4 he was presented in court. He is an “accused”
with some serious evidence. But for
NDTV, this is mere “allegation”. This “source” and “allegation” trickery of
NDTV is now a joke on the social media. You sleep with someone in an illicit
relationship you are naturally going to defend that person at any cost. Wouldn’t
they? That’s what NDTV frequently does.
Our news channels, particularly CNN-IBN
and NDTV, have gone far beyond being embedded reporters and channels. They are
sick and termite-infested like the Congress and UPA. They have now extinguished
any semblance of reporting or journalism from their menu. They are as
bed-ridden as the conscience of Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi and the Congress.
