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July 29, 1998
ELECTIONS '98
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How Readers responded to Rajeev Srinivasan's last column
Date sent: Mon, 27 Jul 1998 10:43:47 -0500 This is one absolutely heartening piece of writing, coming from an Indian journalist about his own tribe in India and elsewhere. I must congratulate you for this occupational introspection. Rajeev is dead right about the foreign press, especially the American ones. America is a free country and people believe (and are made to believe) they are the most free people. But one look at their press writings on international issues actually makes one feel if the media is US government's extended organ. Add to it the national jingoism and market economy, and Truth (about foreign things) takes a bloody bashing at the American media's hands. Seeing their blatantly erroneous writings, one becomes almost paranoid if their criticism of American politicians and local issues is an exercise in MakeBelieve. Rajeev is also right on target with his criticism of the Indian press. Most of the vernacular press in India is some political party's unoffcial mouthpiece (I am writing this from my knowledge of the Telugu press). The national press is likewise for national parties or at least ideologies. Nobody bothers to look at issues for what they are. (Just look at how the barabaric Yadav work in Parliament was glossed over). And very few English journalists, as Rajeev pointed out, are original and self luminous. They are just copy cats, or are so enamoured of either foreign press that they are just echoes (beleiveing they are still original), or just brazenly self serving (for a party, ideology or personality). Sometimes I just wonder if I am wiser for reading and would be better off not reading. And then a piece like this comes along, and deceives me into believing all is not lost.
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 16:56:29 -0700 Well written article. Although Rajeev says he does not have any journalistic credentials, his analyses on various topics are well thought out and make a lot of sense to a common reader like me. I agree with his views on the Western journalists especially the correspondents for the NY Times. I still remember the articles that Barbara Crossette used to write: she would write about India while she was stationed in Karachi or Lahore! I hope the current Indian correspondent for Business Week, stationed in Bombay, reads Rajeev's article as his commentaries after the nuclear explosion clearly ape those of the other western correspondents in bashing India. Keep up the good work, Rajeev.
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 19:08:11 -0400 J'accuse is so guilty of everything that the author accuses other journalists of that it is almost pathetic. Physician, heal thy self! Two minutes of analysis would have shown a gulf so wide between the Republican Party of the US and the BJP of India that he could have poured not only the Atlantic Ocean into it but also the Indian Ocean! The Republican party is primarily the party of small govermment with some religious types in it. The BJP is primarily a party of people affiliated by religion with all types of economic philosophies in it. The Republican party has no analogue to L K Advani driving a rath yatra through India and creating a religous juggernaut. He has roused the passions of Hindus of the type that Bhindranwale roused in the Sikhs. Pat Buchanan is by no means as central to the Republican party as Advani is to the BJP. Every movement will have its extremists -- but one can't tar a whole movement because of them. That Buchanan, David Duke, Zhirinovsky or Le Pen exist is not the issue. The question is how central they are to the country's ideology. By just grabbing their existence and building a whole thesis around it, Rajeev Srinivasan has shown how lazy and stupid he is. People like him think because they know a little, they understand a lot.
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 98 13:54:11 -0500 I agree to some extent with the basic premise that Mr Sreenivasan is struggling to make in his recent column. There certainly are some Indian journalists, who, in their zeal to be seen as "secularists", oppose almost everything the Indian government proposes, especially if the government is led by the BJP. Mr Kuldip Nayyar is one such journalist. Mr Nikhil Chakraborty was no better either, irrespective of the sentiments expressed by Mr Srinivasan. But Mr Srinivasan in his tirade has gone off course and commits the same offences he accuses the nameless Indian journalists of committing: "based on personal peeves, political grandstanding, and just plain ignorance..." He names three American news organisations -- The New York Times, Time and Newsweek -- as being "propaganda mouthpieces of the US government", but he does not name even a single Indian journalist who consumes the "pre-digested disinformation pabulum handed out freely by the media barons of the West." For some reason, his courage and conviction fails in this case. Mr Srinivasan's contention that the US media is of "one mind" with the US government when it comes to foreign affairs is a gross exaggeration. His source for this contention is Mr Noam Chomsky -- an American version of the Indian type for whom all the major national institutions are corrupt, oppressive and downright wrong. Mr Sreenivasan probably has forgotten -- or is he "plain ignorant" ? -- of some of the major events of the recent past. How come the "one mind" US government-media "military-industrial" complex were at logger heads during the Vietnam War and the Iran-Contra scandal? Regarding the BJP-Republican party comparison: Yes, both are conservative and right-wing. But one of them has not destroyed a minority community's place of worship. At least not yet. I agree with Mr Srinivasan's last statement: "The consumer deserves better". In that spirit, will Mr Srinivasan name the names of Indian journalists and media organisations who practise the "shoddy swadeshi journalism", so that I can avoid consuming their writings?
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 11:04:53 -0500 Rajeev, we needed that article on swadeshi journos. You are right to place the blame on the stupid curricula for liberal arts in India from the primary school level up. The curricula is designed to breed in us Indians (all of us) an unambiguous love for the Western view of the world -- added to the fact that very few of the people that end up as journos have the capability of thinking for themselves in an Indian milieu (mainly because of the social class that they come from), the final product is a mind trained to lap up Western bullshit unconditionally. As a bit of an elaboration on the comment made earlier about the social class that most Indian journalists come from, I would like to say that most of them are from urban upper middle-class society where Indian-ness is defined by how much one is aware of the latest trends in the US and their closest parallels available locally. Also, journalism is looked upon as the ultimate liberal-secular-leftist-fiery western intellectual kind of 'timepass'. Which mostly means hanging out at the trendiest restaurants with celebrities, dancing late into the night fuelled by scotch (courtsey, a generous parent) and surrounded by fellow journos celebrating each others 'arty' sophistication. Of course, the journos think they are very Indian -- mark their kolhapuri chappals, outsize bindis and Khadi Bhandar kurtas or salwar kameez. Their whole mentality is summed up by a true story -- this happened in Bombay. The SPCA lobbied against the Bombay municipality for banning the capture (leading to termination) of stray dogs. The ban was upheld and stray dogs may no longer be captured (and thus terminated). This has caused the dog population to go unchecked -- it is a serious health hazard. Hydrophobia being the leading factor, of course, and other related civic hygiene problems. Add to this the physical danger that many people now have to deal with -- imagine a mangy rabid dog roaming around unchecked in their neighbourhood ! The outcome is, the SPCA got to behave like what they believe their American counterparts would have, completely ignoring the fact that the SPCA in the US will never have the temerity or power to pull off something like this where people's healths and lives were endangered. The solution obviously was to push for more humane ways of terminating the dogs and/or to have the dogs neutered or spayed as the case may be. Expense is an issue, of course, but starting out by splaying one dog will cut down the problem by 10 times extrapolated to a few years. The SPCA here in the US does put dogs to sleep if they cannot find an owner for the dog within a few weeks of putting them out for adoption and neutering a dog is encouraged in all cases -- even domestic dogs that live as pets. A case of selective emulation of behaviour -- it's easy to shout slogans and carry placards and demand to shut something down instead of working with the municipality to improve the situation. Journos are made from the same stock, and probably the same journos were in with their SPCA cousins in this endavour to endanger public health.
Ashish Gokhale
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 19:42:09 +0530 I have been quite fond of Rajeev, but with this article I have become his fan. I only hope he will not hesitate to emulate Zola when the time comes. My best wishes and prayers that his voice grows stronger by the day.
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 09:29:47 -0400 I enjoyed reading this article. I particularly endorse his statement on secularism. I think that this is the most misused word in the media. None of the political parties are truly secular, yet the only party that is being accused of being non-secular is the BJP. What bothers me is that the Indian media also contribute to this misuse of the word 'secular'. I also notice that the media always refers to disturbances between Hindus and Muslims as "riot broke out between members of two communities" but when when there is a clash between two groups of Hindus, the concerned castes are highlighted. If the idea is to lessen tension by not naming the communities involved when it concerns Hindus and Muslims, doesn't the same rule apply when naming castes? I agree with Rajeev when he says the Indian media is guilty of not being objective and of essentially being copy-cats of Western journalists. The reports on the Bofors scandal by The Hindu was a fine piece of investigative journalism, but how is it that this prestigious newspaper is silent about it now? Is it because the current Leftist editor of this newspaper has decided that raking up this issue will only help the common enemy of the "secularists", namely the BJP? All that the Bofors reports did was to drive out Rajiv from power to be replaced by the likes of V P Singh, Chandra Shekhar, Deve Gowda et al. Ven Hari
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 11:11:27 +0530 Can you guys make this audible to those dumb journalists in India? It is only the Americans who deserve to control the world. It is only America that deserves the divine right to possess nukes. It is only America that deserves to spy through satellites. Tell me something, how on earth is anyone tolerating spy satellites when the Americans mention it in the media (I mean Indian media)? As long as sensationalism prevails and facts are buried, India will continue to get treated as a piece of shit in the media. I guess, the Indian media should have the guts and backbone to expose this aspect of the American media. Indians still don't have a backbone or self respect. Baski
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 11:19:26 +0530 Rajeev has clearly exposed the true face of Indian journalists. In fact our journalists are more selfish, more corrupt than our politicians and govt officials. Elango
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 10:55:38 +0800 What a breath of fresh air! At last, an Indian calling a spade a spade. Rajeev Srinivasan has painted a true picture of the Indian journalist and the press, generalisations notwithstanding. About a decade ago, S. Mulgaonkar, one-time editor of the Indian Express, told someone I know that half the journalists in Delhi were under the pay of the home ministry. They apparently fell in the "ignorant/lazy" category that Srinivasan defines. A good portion of the other half probably fell in the "intellectually enslaved" category -- the ones who think the West offers all the answers. The scenario in the districts is much worse -- in a sense: Top reporters routinely blackmail businessmen, even bureaucrats, by threatening to write damaging stories about them unless they are paid not to do so. About a decade ago, a stringer in Ghaziabad for a leading Delhi-based Hindi daily told me that most district-level chief reporters in UP make around Rs 30,000 to 40,000 through blackmail. This figure must have doubled by now. Some of you might recall a story reported in the Indian press a few years ago: A cub reporter -- I think it was in Lucknow -- had not been paid his salary for several months. He finally summoned the nerve to complain to his boss, the owner of the newspaper he was working at. The boss’s answer was something to this effect: “What salary? You should be paying me for giving you this job that allows you to make so much money on the side.” So yes, Indian journalism is in grave danger, but it is, to be fair, part of the larger rot that has set in the country. Does Rajeev Srinivasan have any answers on how to cure that nationwide plague?
Ajay Singh
Date sent: Thu, 23 Jul 1998 21:16:57 -0400 Rajeev, You are bang on target about the bias of the Indian and Western media. My letter is prompted by one comment you made: that the BJP is quite similar to the Republican party, yet no one includes the prefix "Christian-nationalist" in front of "Republican party." I have done some work going through the party platforms of the Republican party in the USA, the Conservative party in UK, the Likud party in Israel, and, of course, the BJP in India. Surprise, surprise -- the BJP's positions (official and not-so-official) are more liberal in many instances than that of the Republican party, the Conservative party, and the Likud party. In fact, there are many issues on which the BJP is downright tame compared to its conservative compatriots in the USA, UK and Israel. Yet I have never seen the phrase "Christian-nationalist" used to describe the Republicans or the Conservatives, or "Jewish-nationalist" to describe the Likud Party in Israel. Why? Some (only some!) examples to support my argument: All of the above named political parties (1) oppose preferential treatment to minorities, (2) favour a strong national defence, (3) are perceived as the party of the business, especially small business and traders, (4) have a very high degree of support among defence personnel, (5) emphasise the ethos of their respective cultures, (6) are strongly anti-communist or anti-socialist, and (7) are supported by some whose views may be classified as extreme. Why single out the BJP for special scorn and vilification?
Professor Kannan Raghunandan
Date sent: Fri, 24 Jul 98 01:06:21 PDT I enjoyed reading Rajiv's article on Indian journalists. I agree with his viewpoint. You forgot to include Kuldip Nyaar, Abu Abraham and Khushwant Singh. I have read their articles and it makes me sick that these people blindly display the same anti-India bias as the western media. Kuldip Nayyar is not only pro-China-US, but a pro-Pakistan as well. I wonder if there are any Pakistani journalists who have criticised their nuclear tests as Mr Nayyar has. You are right Rajiv, we get the journalists we deserve. We should stop treating these guys as icons of Indian journalism. Agara Sudhindra |
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