Why India needs an alternate Mainstream Media

Off late there has been enough clamor for the need for an alternate media in India. The need for an alternate media arises because in India perception matters a lot. Ours is not a mature democracy like the United States, wherein people actively participate along with their leaders in public debates. Unlike the United States where media channels openly profess their support to a political setup, Indian media tries to profess impartiality at the outset but deep down their bias against anything hindu is quite evident.

The biggest irony of a democracy is that people who think and vote are accorded the same status as the ones who vote based on caste, money etc. The Indian media has time and again gone ga ga over Indian democracy without editorials dedicated in the praise of the intellect of the Indian voter. When a pro-hindu party gets elected most editorials read the verdict as triumph of communal forces and hence insulting the intellect of the voters. However when secular governments get elected the same people call it the triumph of secular forces and claim the Indian electorate has buttressed the secular fabric of India. These claims are enough to expose the impartiality of the Indian media. Unfortunately the average Indian voter is fairly illiterate and ignorant to take cognizance of the double standards.

Today’s Indian Media must be reminded of the days of Indira and Pandit Nehru, on how media was gagged all through their rule. Take the example of Indian Express, how Ramnath Goenka and Arun Shourie were regularly persecuted by the Indira Gandhi’s regime. If not for the efforts of Arun Shourie and Ramnath Goenka many misdeeds of the Indira regime wouldnt have come to light. It’s an irony that the media freedom which was ushered in post 1990's i.e. the reform era and strengthened after the NDA government has backfired badly on the country and hindus in particular.

The Indian Media has time and again made an average hindu feel apologetic about his hindu credentials. The Indian media was quick enough to come up with the catch phrase "Hindu terror" when sadhvi pragya was arrested, but it never dared to call terrorist attacks all over India as "Islamic terror", nor did it try to paint the insurgency in the north-east as "Christian terror". The Indian media has never highlighted the double standards of the Babri Masjid committe and how it backtracked on its lofty statements of giving up babri masjid if proven that a temple indeed existed there. Many stories have been written about the attacks on christians in orissa since 1999. Let’s look at the baripada rape case which hogged headlines indicting people of a hindu outfit, but medical tests proved the contrary and it turned out the nun was lying to further the cause of the church. The media never reported the outcome of the case, even though it garnered lot of attention and unnecessarily tainted the VHP. Even in the case of graham staines, the media reported him as a social worker but never talked of his missionary activities. Thanks to Arun shourie and likes who exposed these claims. The killer of graham staines dara singh was linked to the VHP and the general perception is the same till day, but again it needed an Arun shourie to disband the connection. The media even today tries to portray Hindu hriday samrat Shri. Narendra Modi as a mass murderer and never reprimanded the people of the likes of teesta setalvad for fabricating evidence. Vir Sanghvi in has nothing but such words for Sri.Modi, however he doesn’t have the people who were at the helm of affairs when close to 4 lakh kashmiri pundits were rendered homeless. Close to 30% of the people who died in the gujrat riots were hindus. Has the media ever taken up the call for justice for the 4 lakh kashmiri pandits, or the kar-sevaks killed in the godhra carnage? It’s a well known fact that NDTV and The Hindu managed by Prannoy Roy and N Ram respectively owe their allegiance to the Communists. The Rajdeep sardesais, Vir Sanghvis make their love for the secular regimes very evident in their editorials and selective reporting of news. The killings of mostly Muslims in Nandigram didn’t sound communal to these holier than thou secularists. It’s also interesting to observe that the Tehelka magazine doesn’t have a single sting operation conducted against the UPA government in the past 5 years. Instead you find Mr. Tejpal singing paeans on the Gandhi family and MMS. The MSM ignored to report the desecration of 3 temples in Mysore and few channels reported it as a law and order situation, but felt it fit to telecast minor clashes in Bangalore all day long when supposedly carcasses of pig were found in a mosque and called it communal and blamed hindu outfits without prima-facie evidence. Such gross digression from journalistic ethics is a curse on Indian democracy. Its cancerous, and before it spreads it’s important that an alternate responsible media is ushered in the main stream. An alternate medium which acts as watchdog of the democracy as well expose the false claims and agenda of the main stream media. Unfortunately such an alternate pole is missing at the national level both in print and media.

The best example of a state where a significant presence of an alternate media house which has helped citizens form informed opinions has undoubtedly been in Karnataka. Despite Karnataka hogging the highlights in the national media for all wrong reasons be it the attacks by rama-sene, attacks on the church and the charlie chaplin episode the bad press didnt have any impact on the electoral outcome. Reason being a few news papers in Karnataka have time and again exposed the hollow claims of the seculars. During the rama sene fiasco the local newspapers were the first to point out the presence of the husband of a congress councilor amongst the hooligans who hit the pub going females. Papers were vociferous in exposing the double-speak of seculars like Girish Karnad and U R AnathaMurthy. The national media never reported these facts. After the scholarly work of SL Byrappa on Tipu Sultan in Avarana, a secular organization like "KaraVe" had to protest against naming the Bangalore International airport in the name of a Jihadi like Tipu Sultan. A section of media in karnataka had been instrumental in exposing the true colors of missionaries when they clearly exposed the contents of the blasphemous book Satyadarshini, which defiles all Hindu gods and traditions. The National media never highlighted the FIRs and the requests for banning the book that have been lodged since 2006 by the Bajrang Dal. But if someone had made such disparaging remarks on prophets of other religions Rajdeep Sardesais and Sagarika Ghose would have cried foul. What else explains the fact that despite heavy minority turnout and Mangalore being the hub of hindutva politics for close to 2 decades now, the seculars had to face defeat infront a novice like Nalin Kumar Katil. The opposition cried foul when Yeddiyurappa's government took a revolutionary decision to free the Gokarna temple from governmental control and transfer it to the Ramachandrapur mutt. It needed a scathing article by Sri.Pratapsimha to silence the opposition. Unlike the Vir Sanghvis, Tarun Tejpals who have nothing but eulogy for the seculars, the same journalists in Karnataka have been extremely critical of the Yeddiyurappa government on various issues. Such synergy and alternate viewpoint undoubtedly creates a medium of debate and helps citizens to make informed choices.

However a state like Tamil Nadu presents a different case. The main reason why a state like tamilnadu hasnt been able to overthrow the bigotic karunanidhi is the fact that they control most of the tamil media. There have been repeated attacks on hindus in kanyakumari by christians, There have been repeated protests against removal of hanuman statue in kanyakumari. There have been repeated protests by the locals in madurai against installation of the statue of Ramaswami naiker (a hindu baiter and atheist) in front of the meenakshi temple. But nevertheless people outside these local areas donot know the ground realities. Never was karunanidi reprimanded for his hate speech against the brahmins, but the media is ready to jump the gun and proclaim Varun Gandhi guilty. It needed a brave man like Subramaniam swamy to put a full stop to the anti-brahmin fusillade of Karunanidi. All that Mr. Swamy had to do was to remind ThiruKa that Ravana whom ThiruKa eulogizes was born in Brahmin caste. It was Mr.Swamy who took up the case of kanchi acharya Jayendra Saraswati, it was the same Mr. Swamy who took up the case of rama-sethu and exposed both TR Balu and ThiruKa. Interestingly the main stream media never actively followed the spectrum allocation scam running into crores by the IT minister D Raja. At the end of the day Mr. Swamy is a one man army, you cannot expect any more.

Karnataka and Tamil nadu present contrasting examples of how media can make or mar public opinion. With people like Baba Ramdev getting into media business, it just gives hope at the end of the road that the issues concerning the Hindu samaj and the demonization of hindu organisations like VHP,attacks on hindu institutions, illegal detention and false cases against our dharmic gurus like Asaram Bapu, Acharya Jayendra Saraswati etc are pursued with vigor to protect our dharma from the external aggression. India today needs responsible media which follows by the tenets of “Satyam vada, Dharmam Chara”.