The Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, interacted with senior journalists of the media a couple of days back. He handled the media well, considering the amount of pressure he was in. He could not convince his critics, but he stood his ground and managed unscathed, largely, and his performance was especially laudable, considering he is an accidental politician.
In this media interaction, it was interesting to watch the media, rather than the PM. Prannoy Roy, Rajdeep Sardesai, Arnab Goswami were at their stupid best. Prannoy Roy went on talking for 5 minutes, without coming to the point. He spoke about how the first year post elections is a honeymoon period, and how you generally could pass policy decisions without much difficulty, how for Singh this was difficult, and that he would face elections in 3 years, and he forgot his question. He ended with a tame question, that was would he be the candidate in the next elections. How incisive was that?
Singh replied saying it was too premature to comment. Another senior media journalist asked whether Singh would like to see India lift the cricket world cup. What did she expect Singh to say - no? OK, they were bad! But what's the point I'm making.
When journalists reach a certain saturation point, they must be phased out. Just as everything in the world goes through a life-cycle, so does the journalist. And considering that the journalist is a much-watched and followed personality, the saturation is reached even earlier and is much more stark.
Because, once they reach a certain level of exposure, they stop being dispassionate about and distant from the issue, and they start taking a position. When they meet someone who doesn't agree with that position, they react in a belligerent manner. They hide this media blunder by saying that they provide us opinion and not just the news.
I can surely say that the Indian people are knowledgeable and intelligent enough to form their own opinion. They need only the news, experts' views and not the media analysis, most certainly not of these jaded journalists. So most senior journalists need to take vanvaas, and allow for some dispassionate and unbiased journalism.
How can we shake up this system? Or can't we?
In this media interaction, it was interesting to watch the media, rather than the PM. Prannoy Roy, Rajdeep Sardesai, Arnab Goswami were at their stupid best. Prannoy Roy went on talking for 5 minutes, without coming to the point. He spoke about how the first year post elections is a honeymoon period, and how you generally could pass policy decisions without much difficulty, how for Singh this was difficult, and that he would face elections in 3 years, and he forgot his question. He ended with a tame question, that was would he be the candidate in the next elections. How incisive was that?
Singh replied saying it was too premature to comment. Another senior media journalist asked whether Singh would like to see India lift the cricket world cup. What did she expect Singh to say - no? OK, they were bad! But what's the point I'm making.
When journalists reach a certain saturation point, they must be phased out. Just as everything in the world goes through a life-cycle, so does the journalist. And considering that the journalist is a much-watched and followed personality, the saturation is reached even earlier and is much more stark.
Because, once they reach a certain level of exposure, they stop being dispassionate about and distant from the issue, and they start taking a position. When they meet someone who doesn't agree with that position, they react in a belligerent manner. They hide this media blunder by saying that they provide us opinion and not just the news.
I can surely say that the Indian people are knowledgeable and intelligent enough to form their own opinion. They need only the news, experts' views and not the media analysis, most certainly not of these jaded journalists. So most senior journalists need to take vanvaas, and allow for some dispassionate and unbiased journalism.
How can we shake up this system? Or can't we?
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