'Terror' convicts temed as 'servants': Is section of media soft on right-wing groups!

DNA newspaper news

I don’t consider myself an extra-intelligent person. I try to understand things and when I fail, I have no hesitation in discussing or asking others.

Recently, court held two Sanatan Sanstha members guilty of bomb blasts. While many cases involving Hindu and Muslim radicals are currently being tried in different courts, in this case the court gave a verdict and convicted them.

Still, newspapers didn’t give much importance to the news. What I found even more strange was that some newspapers reported the matter in a bizarre fashion. Particularly, Mumbai-based English newspaper DNA’s reports surprised me the most.

I am simply writing my observations here:

1. When police claim arresting a person for terror links, he is often pronounced terrorist even before trial. But on Monday, two Sanatan Sanstha members who were arrested by Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) were convicted by a court. Most newspapers didn’t term them terrorist even after conviction. I agree that for the arrest or conviction of some members, an entire organisation shouldn’t be branded but this is the first time journalistic propriety have reached such dizzy heights that those convicted of blasts have not been called terrorists.

2. When I read English daily DNA I was even more surprised. Its reports doesn’t call them militant, radical or extremist. The report terms them as ‘sevaks’, yes sevaks [that means servants] of Sanatan Sanstha. Whose servants! They were not even volunteers as in that case paper could have labelled them ‘swayamsevaks’ or even activist. But the daily seems to be so soft on the group.

Or to avoid showing affinity to RSS [that has swayamsevaks], it terms them as simply ‘servants’. I don’t say that you defame the Sanata Sanstha, an organisation which is quite candid and accepted that they were its members and said that the group had nothing to do with the handiwork of the duo. But paper, instead of writing activist, member or volunteer, uses the term ‘servant’. Can there be such a mistake or use of the word erroneously at the desk or it was done after thinking over it.

3. A day after conviction, the journalists would have tried to do story about these persons, their backgrounds or why some members of an organisation would go astray. But instead of that, DNA printed a long story that threw light on the group for its wonderful social work.
Hmm. Why should someone be negative all the time and hound everybody! This article was published when the conviction was made but  the next day the court had to deliver the quantum of judgment. One may appreciate that paper has no prejudices against any group.

It is a different matter though that the state government intended to ban Sanatan Sanstha for its alleged role in Goa and Thane-Panvel-Vashi blasts. Hope the paper will continue similar non-biased approach and also write positively about other groups after their members are convicted or jailed (and highlight the social concern of other organisations).

4. Now that the persons convicted of bomb blasts and sentenced to ten years of jail terms have not been called as terrorists,will the paper maintain the same standards of journalism in future. Or will it still call any Muslim or Hindu youth who is simply rounded up, not even jailed or convicted, terrorist!

5. This is the same multi-edition English newspaper that had published Subramanian Swamy’s article that put all Indian Muslims under suspicion and labelled the community as prone to extremism and terrorism and what not. The article had put onus on Indian Muslims to prove a whole lot of things. The particular piece has been widely discussed, criticised and even National Commission for Minorities took cognizance of complaints against it.

Just like the newspaper had liberty to publish it, which I support in principle, I too think I can take a little liberty and write about what’s going in my mind after reading these reports. I don’t know what is going through the minds of those who run this paper or decide the editorial policy.

The little an average reader and Indian citizen like me expects is that the paper should show decent standards of journalism. Either you should don’t turn suspects into terrorists or don’t term terrorists as ‘SERVANTS’. Will servants object to the usage? Perhaps, it’s a new style, which they will adhere to in future [for both Hindutva inspired groups as well as Islamist extremists]!

Sorry to say but even RSS mouthpieces Panchjanya and Organiser are [at least] consistent in their policy. On the otherhand DNA sells copies in lakhs [tens of thousands] and I wonder how many readers are mediocre and what percentage of readers are intelligent enough to figure out the unique journalism practices adopted by this great media institution. Pray for me so that my mind could become capable of understanding these issues.

Frankly, I always liked the paper and as a reader felt happy when the DNA made a space for itself in the crowded English market. In Mumbai, the paper has a large circulation now. However, such selective and biased reporting is really upsetting for a reader like me.

Corruption And Eleven Day Test Matches

Saeed Naqvi
22 November 2010

Three batsmen at separate test venues on the same day score a triple hundred, a double century and a century. Captain M.S. Dhoni throws up his hands: “We will need eleven days of play continuously to obtain a result”. A spinner hits two hundreds in a row.

What does all of this have to do with 2G Spectrum, Adarsh, CWG? A great deal.

Pundits say Chanakya’s Arthasastra refers to “utkot” which means bribe, something that was fairly common for “rajkramcharis” or state officials to accept.

The British used the caste hierarchy to minimize corruption at the lower level bureaucracy. The ICS steel frame kept order at the top. It was, for instance, not uncommon for a Saiyyid from the landed gentry to monitor the excise department in a district where poppy cultivation was extensive. Genteel upbringing, it was assumed, would create an automatic distance between the excise official and the potential bribe giver.

Word “sharafat” was at a premium. Unfortunately, there is no exact English translation for that word. “Nobility of character” minus the class connotation and “honesty” do approximate to “sharafat”.

There was sufficient corruption even in 1950 to inspire Josh Malihabadi to write his poem “Rishwat Khori” or “bribery”. Josh’s satire is directed at traders and businessmen who had “fattened” themselves in cahoots with the corrupt instruments of the state:

“Tond walon ki to ho teemardari

Wah, wah!

Aur hum chaata karein imandari

Wah, whah?”

(The fat bellied and the corrupt, their cups full, are pampered;

While we lick the sweetener of honesty.)

Rising prices also underpinned corruption. Witness Josh’s punchline:

“Hum agar rishwat nahin lenge to phir khaen ge kya”

(How will we feed ourselves without taking bribes.)

The corruption that disturbed Josh was largely a function of a sudden breakdown of the feudal order. Declining aristocrats were overnight reduced to penury. Middlemen turned up to pick up the heirlooms at throwaway prices. Patwari upwards, everyone in the revenue and land departments got into the act of transferring land to the “investor” or “Lala” at fictitious prices. The upheaval of partition followed by zamindari abolition brought in its wake a variety corruption.

From 1952 onwards, demands of electoral politics opened up another channel. Arrange for jeeps and country liquor for four “bastis” (colonies) of low caste voters. If the candidate wins, turn up at his MLA quarters in Lucknow for a canal building contract. This is the tiniest example.

There had always been a nexus between the Congress party and big business. After all, Mahatma Gandhi’s Ashram at Sevagram was financed by Jamnalal Bajaj; Gandhiji was assassinated in Birla House, New Delhi. Members of the Union cabinet like Satyanarain Sinha never disguised their loyalty to the Birlas.

The nexus between the party and sources of funding was monitored by individuals of integrity: Rafi Ahmad Kidwai, C.B. Gupta, Atulya Ghosh, L.N. Mishra, Rajni Patel (the last named with a caveat). It has always bothered me that Sitaram Kesari, remained Treasurer of the party for nearly two decades without a single allegation of corruption being made against him. But the manner in which he was dismissed confirmed that in Congress culture considerations of caste and power would trump financial honesty.

The system expanded where politicians with less than few thousand crores began to suffer from an acute inferiority complex. Why can’t the finances of all these fat cats be investigated? Yes, bureaucrats, industrialists, journalists, everybody.

By the time the post Cold War economic liberalization was upon us, ancient wisdom had been made to stand on its head. We had been taught: “The purpose of life is the pursuit of happiness”. Rampaging capitalism altered the basic lesson: “the purpose of life is the accumulation of wealth”.

The balance between Lakshmi and Sarawati, the basic Indian equilibrium, has been tilted obscenely in favour of wealth. It is this culture of grab, grab, grab of which 2G Spectrum, CWG, Adarsh are only the latest examples.

Avarice and greed were values for Henry Ford when he advised: “Buy when there is blood on the streets”. The theology had currency until Enronn, Fannie Mae, Freddie Max, Lehman Brothers, AIG have cumulatively brought down the global economy to a point where even a nervous Economist is editorially advising us not to lose “confidence in capitalism”. The guiding theology of our times is being re examined.

Pitches are “guaranteed” for matches to last five days so that billions in TV ads (never mind the empty stands) are not lost just in case a fast track or a turning wicket terminates a test match in three days! This grab, grab application on cricket has denied it of the game’s poetry encapsulated in Neville Cardus’s description of Hammond driving between cover and extra cover.