The proceedings of the joint drafting committee of Jan Lokpal Bill have ended in the expected anti-climax. At a time when the government was under unprecedented pressure to bring in a tough law, a weak Opposition was two-timing the nation and the national media was more trusting of the government than “civil society”.

The result was that the government was allowed to wriggle out of a tight situation rather easily. Anna Hazare and his team were subjected to all kinds of scrutiny, which is as it should have been, but the government and the Congress got away scot-free. Little was being asked of them and nothing was answered.

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Respected Dr Roy,

I am writing to apply for the post of Group Editor, English News, NDTV.

I am a journalist with 26 years experience. Throughout my career I have made innocent mistakes. I have been silly, I have been gullible and I have been prone to making errors of judgement. Frequently, when I am “desperate for khabar” I also fib to sources. I string them along so much that I have often tied myself up in knots.

In short, I’m just the right guy to lead the nation’s most reputed English news channel.

I am aware, Sir, that you already have a silly, innocent and gullible editor prone to making honest errors of judgement. Those credentials were so clearly established on national prime time news the other day. Only an extremely innocent, very silly and highly gullible editor can do it with such aplomb.

Admittedly, Dr Roy, that’s a tough record to beat. But the silly are never daunted by the odds…recall that stuff about fools rushing in where angels fear to tread.

I take heart from two facts: One, that you are perhaps the only editor-in-chief to value such sterling qualities in a group editor, and two, while you might be pretty happy with your in-house options, there are some good alternatives in the market you might want to look at.

It is your faith in and commitment to the cause of the ISGs (innocent, silly and gullible), Dr Roy, that has emboldened me to give the job a shot. I want to convince you that when it comes to these sterling qualities, I dig a lonely furrow…it’s actually a deep trench because I have been at it for 26 years.

Sir, I suspect you will be extremely upset at the completely unconventional way in which this application is being framed. So, let me quickly give you three examples of the work I have done so far.  Please judge me only by my work, not what I say about it on tape.

1.       When I was just a few months into the profession,  Akali Dal leader Sant Longowal was assassinated. His assassination followed Indira Gandhi’s who was killed just a few months earlier. I had just subbed the copy when my chief sub asked me “what’s the headline?”  “Longowal calls on Indira Gandhi,” I read out loud and proud.

The chief sub leaped out of her chair in horror and grabbed the copy. She called me silly and stupid. She even proclaimed me “dangerous” and banished me from the news desk.

You see, Dr Roy, I was editor material even then. Just that I was in wrong hands. Where were you, Dr Roy? I can’t help wondering “why just Barkha, why is she so lucky”?

2.       Once when I was editor of a small Delhi afternoon paper, we ran an expose on upcoming illegal structures in Connaught Place. We illustrated the story with a big picture of a multi-storey building shot stealthily. Next morning it turned out the building belonged to the newspaper’s proprietor.

Error of judgement is passé, Dr Roy, I have monumental blunders on my hand.

3.       More recently, I was in the middle of writing Counterfeit, my most most-read weekly column on notional affairs. Two big corporate houses were warring over some goddamn national asset and I wanted to get to the bottom of things. Who better to get an insight from than the PR persons on both sides?  The first guy took me out to lunch and explained his client’s position. I was fully convinced he was right till the other PR took me out to lunch and explained her client’s position. I was convinced she was right too.

But I was two full, two convinced and too confused. So, I wrote about the food instead.

But then word got out. As you well know, our strict code of ethics lays down that a journalist can have only one free meal per topic. Fellow journalists were livid. But since nobody could prove quid pro quo, they pilloried me in public for being unethical and accused me in private of selling the profession cheap. I am however convinced most of them were just jealous of the extra meal I managed…but that’s beside the point, the pillorying continued because they said “joh pakda gaya wahi chor”.

I had to take matters into my hand because the cat seemed to have gotten my channel’s tongue. I agreed to be grilled by my peers in full public glare. Four white haired gents turned up. For the first time the channel made a departure from the policy of not putting out any raw material on air and played the full unedited tape.

On air I made a clean breast of things.  “I may have been greedy, I may have been hungry, but nobody dare accuse me of corruption,” I said, clearly setting the contours of the debate. “But of course, it’s been a learning experience. Looking back now with all that one now knows about dirty lobbyists,  I have no hesitation in saying that it’s perhaps best to carry one’s own lunch box to work. I have since bought a Milton electric lunch box.”

“No journalist is lily white,” the oldest and gentlest of them all began, “I don’t know of many journalists who carry their tiffin to office….” but I cut him short.  ”Nobody is lily white but all that you will discuss is one spot on my kurta? Why only me,” I thundered. I wanted to punch all of them in their holier-than-thou faces but for form’s sake I just bit my dry lips and somehow held my temper and my hand.

Many close friends upbraided me for appearing on the show. They told me I looked angry, sounded pompous and arrogant. They advised me not to mention the incident in this application because it would look rather silly trying to get an important job on the evidence of this show.

But that is the point I’m trying to make, Dr Roy. I am silly. And I did not stumble on silliness, innocence and gullibility “inadvertently” after 16 years of blemish-less journalism.   I worked at it for 26 long years.

In other qualifications, I must point out that I am a damn good political reporter, even if I say so myself. In the thick of things such as the UPA’s cabinet formation, all kinds of people call me to carry messages to the Congress party. Sometimes there are problems of non-delivery such as that message I did not give Ghulam Nabi Azad but I believe, because I’m a good journalist, even if this were about the NDA forming its cabinet, I would still be a busy courier boy.

I would have loved to attach copies of my work as a political reporter but sadly, Dr Roy, I have none. That is because I have never reported politics.

I know, I know…that is not consistent with my claim to being a good political journalist. I was just stringing you along, Dr Roy.

When can I join?

Yours sincerely,

B V Rao

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I was always worried I would die without knowing enough about Arindam Chaudhuri. But last week, The Hindu and Tehelka put me at ease. Thanks to these two highly respected publications, I will leave this world armed with better information about the management mogul, his life and his works.

Arindam, the management guru turned academic turned author turned editor turned film producer has a way of staying in the news.  The latest is a 110-page “success book” titled “Discover the Diamond In You” that he wrote in five days flat on his mobile! That was provocation enough for these two publications to do lengthy articles followed, a few pages later, by paid advertisements from Arindam’s IIPM. (That’s another way of staying in the news.)

At 48, it’s a bit late for me to try to succeed at anything based on the wisdom of a book written in five days on SMS and, anyway, Arindam says he has written it for the young, in their language and idiom. If the diamond in me is destined to go to the grave without being discovered, so be it.

At least, I’m getting some serious insights into the life of a “discovered” diamond (more about that in a while). The Hindu wrote a glowing piece and aptly titled it “This gem’s aglow” (Metro Plus, Dec 10). “Anyone seen Arindam Chaudhuri without an impish grin on his face? Anyone? Well, chances are pretty bleak considering the man believes in turning every calamity into an opportunity,” the article began. The calamity in reference is the economic slowdown and the opportunity is the five days’ time that Arindam could afford as a result to tip-tap the book on his mobile (because he can’t still handle the desktop).

I quote him from the article: “I took five days for the book. Two days just to jot down the things I wanted in the book. Then I typed out the contents on my mobile for the next three days. I SMSed it to my designer.  Mobile is such an uncomplicated way of communication that I am not used to a computer even now. I prefer to speak the language of 140 characters than long mails.” (I can’t figure out why writing 110 pages of a book on the mobile is not the same as writing long mails…it takes a diamond to understand a diamond and I’m not one as I told you at the outset.)

The reporter now poses a profound question: Writing a book in times of economic recession makes perfect sense… but when did he (Arindam) realise he had the diamond in him? “The process of discovering the diamond in me started when I was a student. I aspired to be a teacher seeing a couple of my teachers. Then that unpolished diamond got exposed to good light and the urge to emulate only got stronger.” (Those damned 40W bulbs during my childhood… they destroyed the diamond in me.  Philips will pay this!)

The reporter is not done yet. Another profound question follows. With his quick read, is he (Arindam) not treading in the territory marked as his own by Chetan Bhagat who too speaks in the language of the young? Arindam is accommodative: “I have heard of that comparison but I have not read Chetan’s book.” (Chetan’s loss entirely.)

This glowing piece on Arindam appears as the cover story of Metro Plus and on the back page is a half-page ad of Arindam’s IIPM. The ad has nothing to do with the launch of the book, but it helps you understand the article better, if you know what I mean.

Luckily for people like me who strongly feel the media just doesn’t give us enough of Arindam, Tehelka also tried to address the need gap. On its Society and Lifestyle pages (Dec. 12 issue), it ran a two-page interview of Arindam with the launch of the book as the news peg. But Tehelka’s literary correspondent who did the piece — rather half-heartedly, I suspect — obviously did not think much of Arindam’s literary prowess.

The book is just one passing question in the two-page interview-biography that gives us critical, “you-can’t-die-without-knowing-this” kind of information about the author such as that Arindam:

• Lectures at IIPM campuses
• Writes the editorial for and oversees the cover story of “The Sunday Indian”
• Writes his books and reads potential scripts for films
• Gets his news primarily from print
• Doesn’t watch television except for the odd spurt of breaking news
• Is frank about his fear of addiction, particularly of the Internet
• A staffer operates his blog since he doesn’t know how to upload content
• Occasionally uses Facebook to interact with students but barely touches email
• Instead, claims to write mostly on SMS, including all of his latest book

Twelve pages later, on the inside back cover, is a full page IIPM ad. As with The Hindu, the ad has nothing to do with the book but helps us understand the report in better light.

It is quite possible that the editorial in both the publications did not know that the ad would appear in the same edition but the tone and tenor of the write-ups make one suspicious. While The Hindu is completely in awe of Arindam without once suggesting it has read the book (so forget about critiquing it), from the Tehelka piece it is clear that their literary correspondent did not even think it was worth commenting upon the book. Yet, there it is, the two-page piece.

There are two reasons to worry here. One, The Hindu and Tehelka (especially the latter) are two institutions that still revere honest journalism. So this kind of surrogate advertising (or is it surrogate editorial?) appearing in them is not good news for news.

Two, Arindam has just about started on his 22-city publicity binge for the book so you know there’s a lot more to come in the near future…

The Hindu is right. It’s hard to find Arindam without his impish grin. If you had the nation’s media eating out of your hands, you would grin too.

After all, 24×7 news channels need meat and blood to sustain viewer interest but one-upmanship in breaking news seems to have created a virtual storm in a tea cup in the trainjack case.

More at expressbuzz.com

When was the last time we saw a prime-time debate on the issue of the drought and the impact it will have, not on the prices of Tur Dal in Mumbai or Delhi, but on the mere survival of crores of Indians? I remember watching one discussion on the subject on NDTV two months ago.

After 40 years in journalism and running 12 newspapers I have to confess to two passions. Aviation and the pursuit of human dignity. In the second category, the judgement by the colour of one’s skin has always burned me up and I see it as the worst form of racism practised with sinister malice in India.

The agony and pain and mental degradation it spawns is criminal. Millions have been seared by our viciousness. So, even though I am not an expert on Bollywood (although I did work on Filmfare for a year) one of the guys I have had a pretty decent opinion about is Shahrukh Khan. Just a good sod.

A man like him who trumpeted about racist America not a few weeks ago now makes money telling 80 per cent of racist India that unless they are fair they are damned in the depths of hell and can never make the grade. Apartheid rightwingers could make him their poster boy.

We screwed the female psyche for years with all that ‘if you get dark no one will marry you’ crap, then we condemned all dark women to that nether world of self-loathing, flung the word ‘gori’ into all our songs and are now putting the colour sword to the men.

To shame millions because success and failure are fair and dark is sick and I am revolted to the pit of my stomach. Yes, I feel violently about it. I said that first up. My grown up daughters tell me I am being a phony, pious pratt and Khan has a right to be making his money any which way. It is commercial and not a pulpit pounding philosophy. “If someone paid you a million dollars to sell a skin fair cream, would you say no?”

I hope to hell I would have the courage to say no. Because I have spent years researching this issue and I have seen a great amount of the hurt and the confusion, the drop in self esteem and the ugliness of what we do to the darker amongst us.

Sorry, Mr Khan, you don’t get a free pass on this one…for what it is worth, shame on you, Sir, for perpetuating a national grossness. And shame on anyone else who would do the same. What’s wrong with you, man, why would you would do this?

And, hey, you, the media, where are you?

— B V Rao, administrator

By S B EASWARAN
Is a Maoist the more interesting for having gone to Doon School, for coming from an affluent and urbane Parsi family of Bombay? Is he the more interesting for his naive psychology of minor or ritual brutality in preparation for human violence and death of hundred-fold magnitude? Is he the more interesting for the polished affluence of his fruit-icecream fortunes? Or is he just a more interesting story for all that?
 
In the weighing of a man and his story against each other which one comes out the more heavier with the power to evoke empathy? Is a writer’s quaintly silly adoration of a man and his condonation of mindless violence worthy of circulation and revulsed consumption through print and cyberspace? Is all this bollywoodised news-script at its very best, with the power to hold you, the reader, in mild syrupiness you don’t want to regret being held in? Do you, Everyreader, object to the wiles of story-telling rhetoric, its swirling, snaking, greased ropes holding you in weak, suspended awe?

There is something called ethical intelligence, a mere wisp of a faculty in most of us, but a complete weather system in those who have cultivated and amplified it over the years through years of attentive use. Coverage of stories like Kobad Ghandy’s–in which the telling of the story casts fierce black linations, like an interfering line cartoon on the film we are watching on our mindscreen–is a test of that faculty. It is a test Everyreader shies away from, lazily ducking it like the sudoku or crossword or bridge puzzle that catches attention but one is too lazy for. It is a test and a bracing mindgame. It is a foundation drill in navigation through a cross-section of that complex weather system.
It is an exercise in watching our minds read. It is a riddle to test our ability to discern the building from the magical but interfering shadow of the scaffolding suspended about it, a perceptual grid and, at the same time, a perceptual cage.

I’m not saying that. Kobad Ghandy, the top Naxalite who was recently arrested in Delhi, is saying that. And he’s saying that courtsey Jyoti Punwani, a Mumbai freelance journalist and courtsey the Hindustan Times.

Jyoti is clearly impressed with Kobad’s ideology and friendshio (he stood witness to her wedding and served his family’s ice cream at the dinner that followed). So the tone of the write up is one of admiration for the man. Which is all very well. But while discussing his early days in Mumbai the writer slips this in:

“After a whole morning of wrestling with Lenin’s “Imperialism” at some open-air camp outside Mumbai, Kobad would start making lunch, insisting that we learn to wring the necks of chickens, else how would we stand the sight of blood when the revolution actually came?”

Now, that nonchalance might suit a hardened Naxal teaching his prospective comrades but what about the writer? Is it the norm these days for journalists to draw such vivid imagery of violence with the same nonchalance? If the writer is swayed by the subject, the editors at Hindustan Times seemed to have relished the ghastly quote even more to have thrown it up into a blurb to ensure nobody missed it. It seems that any talk of chicken is toast for HT.

One can understand Kobad espousing violence. But what was the point and purpose of the writer in bringing such stomach-churning stories from Kobad’s kitcthen to millions of breakfast tables? Shouldn’t somebody at the HT have used the editorial scissors?

Help me figure this one out by making your comments.