New Delhi: Even as some channels maintained their unwavering focus on the Sushant Singh Rajput case and Rhea Chakraborty’s arrest by the Narcotics Control Bureau, it appears that at least a few prime time TV anchors’ attention has, finally, been drawn away from Bollywood, as India Today and Mirror Now shed some light on the border tensions between India and China — not without an element of drama.
On ‘Taal Thok Ke’, Zee News anchor Aman Chopra began by saying, “Hind’s army has now sworn to give China lessons at every step, watch how Bharat has become a vishwa guru”.
“The big news is India has occupied more heights on Pangong Lake,” he announced, aadding that this was India’s sharp reply to China. “Now India will keep an eye on the Chinese army from the heights,” Chopra said. The channel even ran the hashtag #TirangaOnTop, just in case the sharp reply wasn’t enough.
“Defence ministers have already spoken and now foreign ministers are talking eye to eye,” Chopra went on. “The Rafale era has also started today,” the anchor added, as the channel showed pictures of the Chinese army holding spears near the LAC.
“Now I believe Rahul Gandhi will not say that the Indian Army is weak and that China was heavy on our troops?” Chopra asked political analyst and Congress ideologue Tehseen Poonawalla, unable to resist making this a political issue.
“Rahul Gandhi has never doubted the Indian Army’s capabilities,” Poonawalla replied.
India Today’s Rahul Kanwal waxed eloquent about India’s military forces and their preparedness: “Make no mistake, Indian troops are on highest form of alert… Even as the PLA tries every trick in the military book to try and invade, as they say, saam, daam, dand, bhed,” he said, referring to the age-old strategic principle. “The Indian Army has also deployed its mountain forces at key friction points,” he added.
The channel’s correspondent Abhishek Bhalla revealed, “The Chinese have made multiple attempts to dislodge troops from the heights they’re holding. The mountain troops have been added on the Pangong Lake’s north and south to support the Special Frontier Force which brought the strategic heights firmly under Indian control.”
On Mirror Now, Tanvi Shukla explained,”We have been given to understand that the situation from the last stand-off, which happened two days ago, has not really improved significantly. There’s still a massive build-up of troops on the LAC. This kind of a face-off hasn’t really happened at such little distance.”
Manu Pubby, senior editor, Economic Times, explained why the terrain of the current stand-off was more conducive to conflict: “Unlike Galwan, where too many troops can’t fit in because of constraints of space, the area where the stand-off is happening right now, there are huge open lands, which creates the possibility of a higher escalation.”
Meanwhile, NDTV 24×7‘s Sonia Singh still couldn’t get over the Rhea Chakraborty case, telling viewers that the actor is “currently in jail over charges of procurement of drugs. Her bail verdict will be decided tomorrow.”
Singh explained, “She has retracted her confession statement to the Narcotics Control Bureau saying there were no female personnel present.”
And on News18 India, anchor Amish Devgan’s discussed Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury’s comments on how the Sushant Singh Rajput death case has been turned into a political slugfest by the ruling BJP to score points ahead of the Bihar elections. Chowdhury had called Rhea Chakraborty a “Bengali Brahmin lady” whose father, a retired Army officer, is “entitled to demand justice for his kids”.
Devgan took the opportunity to ask,“Should the Constitution now be amended to allow Brahmins to take drugs?” Wait, what?