Press and prejudice

Representational image | Pixabay

It is difficult to recall when the last time the media got such bad press within the ruling establishment was. Narasimha Rao, I.K. Gujral and H.D. Deve Gowda never complained too much about the media, probably because they were more realistic about their expectations of it. Rajiv Gandhi, after his honeymoon was broken by Bofors, did try to take a leaf out of his late mother’s book though his response was confined to attacking only those sections of the media (notably this newspaper (The Indian Express)) that were in the forefront of the Bofors campaign. But there was no across-the-board condemnation of the media as a destabiliser that spread hatred, distrust, cynicism and other sorts of poisons, besides being mixed up with hostile foreign forces.

The last time that happened was in the run-up to Indira Gandhi’s emergency. The media then was the state’s Enemy No 1. On the Independence Day in the first year of the emergency, I — then a college student — was witness to a speech by Bansi Lal where he exhorted people to stay away from newspapers. What are they, he asked — “after 8 am two rupees a kilo as raddi.” But that wasn’t enough. He went on to ask, “What is that raddi used for? It is used by your pakorawala to wrap pakoras for you to eat. Don’t even do that. There is so much poison in the newspapers, you will die.”

Nothing of the sort has happened as yet. But the bitterness with the media that this government — or at least of some sections of its leadership — feels is rising to alarming levels. Every single day the media is accused of misquoting its spokesman. Every single day, somebody speaks out on some television channel accusing the media of being irresponsible, inflammatory and more guilty of fanning the riots in Gujarat then even the mobs and those inciting and protecting them. Motives, obviously, quickly follow this condemnation. The media is anti-sangh parivar, anti-national, pro-western, English-speaking, and so on. During one television discussion, a spokesman of the sangh parivar very condescendingly told me he did not have a problem with the entire media, but only with the “western-educated, chocolate-box, types who live in South Delhi” I told him I escaped the first two charges easily — I did not study overseas but in deep hinterland and even my mom would not have described me as having chocolate-box looks. But since I lived in South Delhi, I was guilty anyway.

The sangh parivar’s own obsession with the media brings a peculiar new dimension to this government’s distrust of the press in general. The parivar is unique in our political system in terms of not only owning and running a large number of publications but even employing, directly and indirectly, a large number of journalists with varying track records. The Congress has no such assets — or liabilities. Its only newspaper, National Herald, has been more or less dead for a long time. The Left had some pretension for running some publications but they are dying ahead of the ideology. Some of the regional leaders have friendly media groups but no one comes close to owning anything, except perhaps Jayalalithaa with her Jaya TV. There is, thus, a distinct element of “but my journalist must be better than yours” sentiment to this government’s anger with the media. The sangh parivar’s own publications which have been thriving — their ad pages booming since the NDA came to power — have been quick to attack the critical “secular” journalists as they have been prompt to salute those who speak their languages or endorse their larger views — even if a “secular” journalist took a view that converges with them, they are quick to embarrass him by reproducing it and making him sound like a Johnnie-come-lately to the parivar rather than just a mainstream journalist who could have different views on different issues, uncluttered by any ideology.

This govt has done more for friendly journalists than all others. Largesse has been showered in terms of RS seats, ambassadorships; spouses, mothers, parents-in-law have been rewarded. A problem with such generosity: its recipients lose credibility, govt is back to where it began

It is this psychology of dividing the media between ‘‘our people and theirs’’ that has complicated this government’s relationship with the media. Those who do not agree with us, or rather those we disagree with, must be hostile. So they must be condemned and abused. That is what encourages so many of the BJP’s hangers-on to pick up the phone early in the morning and wake up so many journalists in their homes with a torrent of abuse. The Vajpayees and the Advanis may continue to assert that these are, after all, only fringe people, they don’t speak for the party or the parivar. But it is difficult to buy that argument when the same people are seen speaking for the BJP on TV channels, are received in the prime minister’s house and when at least some of them have been gifted Rajya Sabha seats by the BJP.

The flip side to this is the lionising of the “friendly” media. This government has done more for friendly journalists than all the others preceding them put together. Largesse has been showered on them not only in terms of Rajya Sabha seats but also ambassadorships — even if it sometimes amounts to no more than the comfort of diplomatic immunity in cold Scandinavia. Spouses, mothers and parents-in-law, have all been beneficiaries of gifts that this government has bestowed upon its own in the media, besides rewarding them with positions on the so-called eminent persons groups, bilateral joint commissions and other government bodies where rewards come directly as well as indirectly.

One problem with such generosity is that its recipients soon lose credibility and the government is back to where it began. Journalists it regards as its own are not taken seriously by anyone other than those who are already its own. Worse, it has real problems relating to the rest who may neither be the recipients of its largesse nor applicants for anything in the future. If you subscribe to the worldview that a fair journalist is a friendly journalist who must also be a durbari who accepts your gifts for himself and his family and then hangs around your living room, bringing and carrying tales for your sake, you’d obviously find it difficult to relate to those who would do no such thing but may not be sold to the other side as well.

A peculiar feature of any democracy is that leaders who have been in the opposition generally tend to be more accessible to the media. In our country, while the Congress was in power for more than four decades, the media and the opposition fed off each other. But now that the same politicians are in power, the equation will take time to reverse. Too many of the BJP’s politicians remain mixed up in media coteries, and because they now think they have political clout, they try to play power games in the media. Failed journalists hang around successful politicians. hoping to settle old scores or even get perceived injuries undone retrospectively. Unfortunately, all they end up doing is tale-carrying in the good old tradition of Narad Muni, from whom all of us are supposed to have descended.

The result is an establishment entirely distrustful of those sections of the media — and that is most of the media minus a dozen hangers on — which is not part of the bandwagon. It doesn’t ask the government for jobs, sinecures, largesse, but is also disinclined to toe its line, or that of the others. It is by no means perfect and must be wrong a lot of the times. But it is not hostile, anti-sangh parivar, anti-national, cynical, or for that matter always western-educated, chocolate-box or living in South Delhi. But it does its job, nevertheless, and it is the government which has painted itself into such a silly corner just because it doesn’t have the comprehension to relate maturely to it. Between the adulation of the durbari and the condemnation of the hostile, there lies the mainstream reality where the media is driven by the quest of a story or the truth, rather than any ideological objectives or an ambassadorship or a Rajya Sabha seat.