we are like this only

I remember the phrase 'Draconian laws' being bandied about way back in the late 80s when the then government wanted to pass laws restricting what the media could cover and what they could say. The media made a spirited defense of the right to free speech and eventually managed to prevent the law from being passed. sad to say, according to media behaviour, it looks like the principles of free speech only seem to apply to the corporatised, powerful media today. Indi blogger Chyetanya, after the Mumbai attacks in November, had more than a few pithy things to say about the media coverage of it. Of course, many journalists have taken up this issue since, and it seems quite clear that if on the one hand the government was stupid to not orchestrate the media coverage of the event, the television media in particular left no stone unturned in covering every minute detail of what happened, to the extent of endangering the rescue operations. Television channels competed with each other t...

I'm posting an article written by a family friend, outraged at the kind of coverage post the rape of British teenager, Scarlett, in Goa. While I do believe that the teenager's mother showed remarkably poor judgement in leaving a 15-year-old on her own in the care of someone they had known for only a few weeks, that does not make Scarlett culpable in what happened to her. In typical fashion, the politicians and bureaucracy are not only busy covering up matters but also trying to victimise the victim. And media, in particular journalists who are known to be influential and should highlight the objective facts, are too busy making interesting shows that get higher ratings out of it. For Decency’s Sake………… Dear Barkha, This evening, when I got up after seeing your TV Show, “We, The People” on NDTV, I felt very sad. Not merely because of the fact that, as a parent, I went through the agony and pain which Scarlett’s mother must have felt when the whole abominable event took place but...