The fourth pill-err!

The mention of media at the start of this post might dissuade you from reading any further. Isn't it the same topic on which we have read and heard so much that it seems we know everything about the debate? Well...No! Not if you have been on the same page as me. What came to me as a revelation was an article in the recent issue of Hindi literary periodical "HANS". I would like to summarize my understanding of that article (Beech Bahas Mein by Prabhash Joshi) and certain issues further to that article for your information:

i) The coverage of elections in Indian media (based on instances from the Hindi-land of Hindustan) and the spotlight put on various candidates is upto a large extent, PAID-UP by the candidate himself! To clarify the extents of the "large extent", I'd cite an example from the newspapers covering the elections:

the daily Hindustan (Hindi, Varanasi, Mughalsarai-Chandauli) - 15th April 2009
Lead news headline (front page): "No false promises, he believes in work"
2nd Lead, (front page): "No caste, no religion, I'd only fight for development"
3-column news, (front page again): "Separate Purvanchal for development would be his priority"

The common thread among the above 3 items from the front page of the most read daily in that region is that they were all written in reference to one Mr. Tulsi. While this created a flutter in the political circles, the newspaper followed up with a clarification the next day:"The published items were actually the advertisement put up by the said politician." This while the newspaper had published it in the same space, same format as it publishes any common news.

ii) Further probe revealed that all media houses were selling coverage to candidates in terms of packages ranging from 1 lakh per week to anything beyond that. This included scribes from electronic media charging for the "Khaana peena aur gaadi ka tel" (Food and fuel for the TVC van) and various other overheads which results in a hefty amount.

iii) The 16th April, 2009 edition of a leading Hindi daily from Patna had a 8-column banner heading - "Congress ready to script History in Bihar'. This banner of course does not relate to any further news in the newspaper.

iii) While you might be tempted to think that it all happens only in the "darkness" of U.P./Bihar, a WSJ report by Paul Beckett revealed similar manipulation happening in Punjab too. While I rang up a few of my friends and mentors in different media houses spread all over the country almost all of them accepted it to be true for their respective houses (anonymity clause attached :) ). Yes, some of them do it subtly and others do it openly. But there's again a pattern to that. While subtlety is the name of the game in English dailies and Hindi dailies (metropolitan editions), all pretence is left in the closet when it comes to the rural/semi-urban editions. Not that people there don't understand, just that the majority doesn't!

The issue here is not that media houses are making big bucks by selling their space for astronomical sums. After all advertisement revenues are their biggest source of income! The issue here is that we are not talking advertising here, we are talking news! And while it comes to that, a story from the same article (Prabhash Joshi) deserves a mention.

The CM of one of the states neighboring Delhi was surprised to see the repeat coverage of a rally organized 3 days ago in the same newspaper, on the front page again. When he called the owner of that newspaper he promised to call him back in 10 minutes. He called back in 10 minutes and said, "Oh it is an Ad! We publish such ads." The said CM then told the newspaper owner, "O.K. Please publish one advertisement by me in your tomorrow's edition which says that this newspaper publishes fake news in the name of advertisements!" Nobody knows what became of that proposal! :)

Smoke without fire?

Just came across an interesting article:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1904250,00.html

Having been an On/Off smoker for quite some time now, I still tend to be amazed by the whole smoking/anti-smoking lobby and legislation thing. I myself started smoking totally out of the blue (that experiment idea :P) sans any peer pressure or favorite hero following or sucked-in-by-the-babes-in-ads. For long I believed that like so many good/bad habits that an average human being picks, smoking should also be left at his/her own discretion. After all there is no legislation to stop a diabetic from munching Rosogullas or an obese from feasting on high calorie chips et al. I also felt that an ideal administration or governing body should create equal awareness about the consequences of any such choice, period. But of late I have realized that there is more to Tobacco than the warning signal that says "SMOKING KILLS".

This Time article talks about Philip Morris' attempts to discover a reduced-harm cigarette and their support to anti-Tobacco legislation bill as it raises the entry-barriers for any new player and also favours its momentum as the biggest market player. This article also talks about the anti-tobacco sentiment that Big Tobacco has encountered in the last two decades in USA and that brings me to a pertinent query. Well more than one query.....a few queries I must find answers to form a clear opinion on the whole "Big Tobacco/Anti Tobacco" episodes going all over in the past few years:

1. Does tobacco generate so much hype only because there're conglomerates who are building big money by "killing people"? If that is true why not so much debate against alcohol or the snazzy zunk food which is obviously ruining a full generation with slow killers like obesity and high cholesterols?
N.B. this and the other queries address India because I'm vastly unaware of civic/government activism in USA on other issues. In India, the energy in the efforts of health ministry against smoking has been found missing from its efforts in other essential fields!

2. The data from various agencies that I have been able to find on these issues has looked very one-dimensional so far. India has 10% of the whole world's smokers and 20% of the whole world's smoking related deaths which obviously points to the fact that overall living conditions make a person more prone to catching a certain kind of illness. Further corroborating this is the fact that 70% of these Indian deaths come from rural/sub urban areas. How much of the "Tobacco induced deaths" are completely so?
Obviously the bottom line is that tobacco contributes in its own way, but singling it out might eliminate tobacco and not the deaths!

3. Ban of smoking in public places is a welcome step; wonder what took the government so long to come up with it. It reminds me that the warning label on packs have not been enforced properly so far. Do we have only two kinds of ministers - one who have a single point headstrong vendetta against smoking carried over generations (the father of Mr. Ramadoss was a big anti-tobacco activist) and the other who simply play to the Big Tobacco lobby?

4. Chewable tobacco has done its own share of damage in India especially. Wonder why whatever little media or government coverage tobacco gets, goes to cigarettes?


And to end it, a scene from one of my favorite movies "Thank you for Smoking":
Senator Lothridge: Mr. Naylor, we are here to discuss cigarettes - not planes, not cars - cigarettes. Now as we discussed earlier these warning labels are not for those who know but rather for those who don't know. What about the children?
Nick Naylor: Gentlemen, it's called education. It doesn't come off the side of a cigarette carton. it comes from our teachers, and more importantly our parents. It is the job of every parent to warn their children of all the dangers of the world, including cigarettes, so that one day when they get older they can choose for themselves.

The coming of age of the Indian Voter?

A few disclaimers first - I was as relieved as Mamta Di to see the left being left out all over India. I am happy to see a national party playing a dominant role at the central level and to see the regional parties reduce substantially in terms of the bargaining power. But then, that's that!

In the past few days we have seen the national media hail the Indian voter for displaying maturity and voting a national secular party to power. We have seen the Indian voter being hailed for his political sense. All I want to say is that I strongly disagree. Our media can go overboard with its analysis - be it the overestimation of the regional parties' performance pre-poll or the underestimation of the local influence in this national trend post-poll. Though nobody can discard the political sense of the Indian voter, a sense of perspective is necessary to be retained so that the credit is given where it is due.

The pivots of the national results in these elections hinged on West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. While CPM committed harakiri in Bengal (industrialization ate into its traditional vote bank) and Kerala (factionalism at its heights), Mayawati and Mulayam went a bit too far with their experiments in U.P. Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh saw regional parties play major roles in shaping the results! So what emerged at the National level was a sum total of these inherently different patterns in different states.
The scenario at the national level is no more soothing post elections than it was pre-elections. BJP, which was so far content playing the B-team of Congress will now either return to its mediveal Hindutva ideology or shape itself up and become an "improved" version of the Congress. The only leader of CPM who was slightly in sync with the changing times would either be wrapped up and thrown out or would mend his ways and return back to the regressive anti-industrialization agenda. The DNA of congress (read Dynasty's Natural Ascendance) will become even more hard-wired and Mayavati and Mulayam would go even more hardcore on their agendas to win back their vote banks from Congress.

The cynic would obviously ask - "So what do you feel the voter could have done better?" And this question has no easy answers. But for the time being we can stop calling the seasonal mood swing, "maturity" and seriously find the answer for the question - "Does an average Indian voter think national before casting his vote?" Even better would be to reframe it as, " Do the national parties in India really represent two valid alternative ideologies to choose from? Is there anything called national politics left in India? Or are we merely witnessing a musical chair of similar parties?"

In the mean time, we can certainly say that the Indian voter has got a memory. How mature that memory is, or how well equipped he is to utilize that memory is anybody's guess!

P.S. Good governance is something people have started valuing - that is a good sign! But the party in power at state being rewarded in Loksabha elections is like handing a dollar to a hungry man in India.

Why nobody hums in Mumbai?

I have been in Mumbai for a full month and a half now. Though this does not supply me with enough credentials to comment on the city, its culture or its people per se, I can obviously share with you my perception of the city so far.

There has been a consistent pattern in a Mumbaikar's opinion about Mumbai right from the first person I met at the airport to the last durbaan I crossed in order to reach my desk today. "This city draws you towards it, once you have stayed here for a week or so you won't feel like leaving this city for whole of your life." Well they didn't know me, they couldn't have! The energy that Mumbai exudes in its daily sprint through roads, railroads and walkways is yet to catch me. To me, a city is the most lovable when it relaxes and takes stock of the day gone by. The evenings here are beautiful but I suspect there are very few people who bother to notice it. This is a city immersed in its daily task like a monk, going through the motions like a giant machine - a machine whose many parts are stuck (in traffic jams or in other obstacles) and yet which whirrs and whines day in day out.

The topic of the post and my keenest observation about this city is an irony. The city where a large chunk of India's most preferred opium (call it bournvita if you please) viz. movie and music is produced, I am yet to stumble across a soul who would be humming through his day. My flatmates in the bathroom - no, commuters on the local train - nope, the vast ensemble on the roads, in the streets, in autos, near offices - nada! What is the significance of this observation, one might ask! Well, we in India have music in our veins. Right from a lone rickshawpuller in Patna to a sales executive in Patiala to an IT engineer in Pune to a nariyal paani waala in Pondicherry - you can find, without fail, a person who is humming either to attract you or to distract you or at the very least to please his/her own self. Why I haven't met a single such guy (and I have already explored a large chunk of the city) is anybody's guess! The most fathomable reason that I can come up with is the "energy" of this city - people here have a single point agenda - "Dhandha" and this focus plays in their demeanour and in their lives at multiple levels. To put it in a perspective, this single mindedness to get on with things is what makes this place our commercial capital. And while this city is also the entertainment capital of India, I do feel that the music has also become a part of the commercial portfolio becoming an integral part of the lives of the people for whom it is closely associated with their - you guessed it right - dhandha!
To summarize it then, I'd return to the topic of the post "Why nobody hums in Mumbai?" - To the pedestrian rushing to catch the next train I'd like to say," Bhai thoda gun-gunaao...give yourself a break!" And for all the people who told me that Mumbai would hold me in its spell, my message is that I salute the energy of the place but it hasn't been able to cast any spell, not until it compliments its hectic activity with moments of peace, silence and introspection!

P.S. The farther portion of silver beach at Juhu (where autos don't go and so does the crowd), I could listen to the sea humming. For a moment, I started falling in love with the place but as I walked towards the more populated chaupaati, the buzz took over reminding me that the hum was so un-Mumbai that it must have been a lonely beach's private folly!

Welcome

Welcome to the blog! As the name of the blog suggests, the theme of my writing here would be dissidence - of or against anything under the sun. Even in the normal course of a day, there are so many things which leave a desire in us - "it should have been better". This blog is primarily a place to discover the creative dissidence which answers "why" and suggests "how". For the occasional onlooker: if you find the topic interesting, just pitch in with your 2 cents and that'd be a wonderful RoI for me.

Sk