If you cant defend.. Deflect

It seems the Radia Tapes has split Indian journalists right in middle. A group probably representing older generation is now advocating much needed radical corrective actions to bring repute back to once noble profession and prevent it becoming synonymous to worlds oldest profession. But surprisingly as this older generation tries to cleanse the system another influential section of Journalists, the armchair types who you mostly find in TV chat(they call it discussion programs) have closed ranks.

Media Watch sees Swapan Dasguptas Times of India  column Time to fight the cancer, not join the lynch mob in this context.

Knowingly or unknowingly, It seems that Swapan has completely missed the core issue surrounding the Radiia Tapes. In his naiveness, Swapan tries to explain the outrage as an misplaced anger of “lynch mob” “against India`s entire wealth-generation process” who according to him has shown “gritty determination to overcome a difficult, if not hostile, business environment”

Media Watch is surprised that Swapan who is a regular in twitter has missed the most trending topic in recent times. It didnot read #Ambanigate or #Ratangate but it was #BarkhaGate and #MediaMafia which was trending as number 1 topic in India. So the anger is not against the wealth generation process of business houses. It is not even against Radiia who most of us believe was just doing her job(rather efficiently). The popular anger is directed against a prominent group of media ‘celebrities’ who have overstepped their brief by miles and played fiddle to current day neros of India i.e corrupt politicians. Yes sir…. the anger is against Wealth Generation activities but not of business houses but of Media houses. In short,  the anger is against corrupt Media the fourth pillar of our democracy.

Lastly, Media Watch is taken back by the audacity of Swapan to call ordinary man rising in anger against deep rooted malice as Lynch Mob. It gets more painful considering the fact it is written in an article where he himself praises how commonman of India rose against the tyranny of British Rule. Perhaps if Swapan could move from dance floor (proximity to politics, business and the media) to the balcony, he will realize that there are no Lynch Mob here. He will find here a motley crowd of engineers, businessmen , housewife, student who want nothing but a better and just India. But then it donot surprise us as Swapan was among the first to use the term ‘Internet Hindu’ perhaps he just upgraded the much maligned Internet Hindus to Lynch Crowd.

I am not a doctor but common sense tells me that sometimes its best and safest treatment for malignant tumor is amputation.