Is the pen gone?

I don't speak to most of my former colleagues who still pursue journalism and are lucky enough to have retained their jobs. That is perhaps because they disgust me. Strong statement this, you may deem, but I say this as they have chosen to follow a path I find deplorable. Somewhere along the way, they have become pawns and messengers of fortune or misfortune, as the situation suits their fancy and warrants the diktats of the powers that be. For the sake of livelihoods, these former colleagues today blatantly misreport, misrepresent and spread mistrust, most-oft intentionally. That is certainly not why I took to journalism.

I am lucky to write for a newspaper that stands tall even in these trying times. But then, I have always been lucky on this front. Circa 1998 and Mumbai's Azad Maidan, where then Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray addressed a massive rally. A thunderous Thackeray dictated from the dais that no Marathi girl would be allowed to attend college clad in jeans. Right next to the boisterous Thackeray was his daughter-in-law, attired in a pair of jeans. My head photographer managed to capture this delectable moment and rushed back to office with a priceless silver halide. As the Resident Editor of a leading newspaper, all of 28 years of age, I squinted a few times to make sure the picture was real. I squirmed a bit too, for this was a tremulous situation; the repercussions could be deadly. Nonetheless, I steeled myself and we carried the photograph across all eight columns of the front page of our paper, powered by a headline that screamed 'Heights of Hypocrisy'.

The morning was rough. I got a call from Mumbai's Police Commissioner and was eventually escorted to my office by the police. Protected by 20 policemen, I managed to get my poor 'guilty' photographer to exit the washroom in the office, where he had locked himself for hours after goons stormed the premises, demanding his innards as well as the silver halide originals. Somehow, we both survived that day. We were not scared. We were young and such a feat was a feather in our then-growing caps. We damned the whiplash and reveled in the outrage, highlighting every mockery and mimicry in society.

Things have now changed.

The new decibel

What is wrong? Well, pretty much everything. The last decade has been different and the rules of living are different. We are now learning to be fearful and subservient, even soul-less. The media has been impacted and hit hard, impaled even, turning into a pusillanimous skeleton at the altar of the new today. If you do not toe the line, you risk losing those very toes. At large, the media has succumbed to the new masters and become a victim of its own making. I have written columns on a vacillating media before, citing instances of misreporting and loathsome journalism. But this column is different – for it iterates on shine-out developments that are being deliberately left out of newsprint and news-bytes, only to please the high and mighty.

This new decibel in journalism is a precipitous one, for it cannot be heard out loud. This is a new trick, where the 'aakas' (Lords) don't want something to be known to the people and obedient genies rush back to their bottles and slam the cork shut above them, only to resurface later.

Examples? Sure. Chinese incursion(s) into India – nope, never happened, and let's forget the US Pentagon's images of full colonies established inside our borders. Lakhimpur Kheri and a cavalcade of SUVs bull-dozing peacefully marching farmers facing the other way – nah, all speculation and hype; it was a total lie. Hathras rape case and the midnight forced cremation of a victim girl despite the grieving family's protests – yawn, what are you talking about? People dying of oxygen shortage across the country during the second wave of COVID-19 earlier this year – what a waste of newsprint, since no one died of oxygen deprivation (even our Parliament has been thus told). Farmers dying on Delhi's borders during the agitation over a year – hello, they are not farmers and never were. Kangana Ranaut, anyone – no, I shall not even go there.

I could go elsewhere, but that would be futile. The new norm for our obsequious and sycophantic media is to ignore the real, look the other way when things are not conducive and, if not beneficial, not report. Better still, misreport.

What of social media?

Let's check. One of the doyens of Indian media, Vinod Dua, passed last week. A large part of India's media fraternity mourned, with most of them having grown up and learnt the very basics of true journalism from him. Yet, he was berated in the social media even after his passing. I can't think of anything worse or more mor(t)ally despicable. But it happened, and it was 'managed' methodically. Other than this temerity, one of Indian cricket's most prolific pace-bowlers, Mohammad Shami, was abused and trolled when India lost to Pakistan in the T20 World Cup September opener, perhaps because Shami is a Muslim. Thankfully, Indian captain Virat Kohli stood up for him and bared his famous fangs. In another incident, stand-up comedian Munawar Faruqui's shows were cancelled because he is 'anti-national'. The jury is out on this one, but the verdict has already been passed and justice meted out. Veteran politician Salman Khurshid wrote some truths in a book – his house was burnt down. A Muslim selling bangles to Hindu ladies was beaten up. It is a long list.

Paradoxically, it is the same social media that is attempting to keep the flame burning. I will not take names and twilight the new saviors of India's fast-depleting journalistic index, but there are some who carry the torch still. They report on incidents without worry of reproach. They visit people at the ground level and talk of things that affect the average Indian. They brave whiplash and abuse, yet make a point. Why? It is perhaps because they yearn to when no one else does. In the process, especially in today's trying times, they also see an opportunity to make a difference, in the hope of a better media tomorrow. Whichever way that ship turns, they are making a difference.

The simple moral

The moral is simple. Today's reporters need to re-grow some sensitive body parts, something that they lost on their way to an eventual and unequivocal moral subjugation to the powers that be. Somewhere, they need to exhibit spine and spleen and bring back the journalism of yore. Life shall go on, but the epitome of yesteryears cannot be discarded thus. I could take a leap of faith and go back years and decades to the Amin Sayanis, Pratima Puris, Salma Sultans, Neeti Ravindrans and Jaswin Jassis, people who star-studded India's budding media universe. I shan't. For we need to create new edifices in media today, find new heroes and heroines.

There are some that remain, though they are few and far betwixt. While they make whatever meaningful difference they can, there is only so much that they can do singularly. That is a mockery indeed, an indignity to India's historical media fraternity that has been full of verbal virility and faith. I grew up with hundreds of such people, living in pumped-up colony of journalists. Today, I wonder what my elders would say, watching us turn into morsels of a sick-fest, feeding on crumbs and making our feeble way, only concerned with keeping the new demons and beasts at bay.

The author is a communications consultant and clinical analyst. Views expressed are personal. [email protected]