In his Hindu op-ed today, Sidhdharth Varadarajan says:
... Despite the 24x7 presence of TV cameras, the daily protests in favour of reservation by AIIMS doctors and staff under the banner of `Medicos Forum for Equal Opportunities' were virtually blacked out. One channel showed the counter-protest last Sunday only when a `citizen journalist' presented it with footage he had shot. Often, it was impossible to separate the breathless TV reporters from the anti-reservation doctors they were reporting about. The insensitive and casteist forms of protest some of them adopted — the `symbolic' sweeping of streets, the shining of shoes, the singing of songs warning OBCs and others to `remember their place' (`apni aukat mein rahio') — were put on air without comment by the channels. Nobody asked what kind of doctors these `meritorious' students were likely to become if they had such contempt towards more than half the population of India. ...
I too blogged about the specific show that he mentions in his op-ed: CNN-IBN's Face the Nation that carried Shivam Vij's 'citizen journalist' footage of the pro-reservation rally.
I also remember seeing, on a different CNN-IBN program, the other thing that he mentions: "songs warning OBCs and others to `remember their place'". It was truly atrocious; they actually showed four young men singing one of these songs. Since my Hindi is not great, I first assumed that these striking medicos were just having fun! My bemuseement turned into horror when the reporter translated the song (which essentially said, "know your place, and stay there") -- and the reporter didn't even bother to comment on the kind of garbage she showed to the viewers. Neither did the anchors.
Siddharth goes on to talk about the need for diversity within the news organizations. Some of the statistics he provides are quite revealing. As they say, read the whole thing.
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On a not-entirely-unrelated note, do read this post by Cosmic Voices accusing The Hindu (where Varadarajan is a deputy editor) of bias in its selection of letters it published in the 'Letters to the Editor' section immediately after Arjun Singh made his first move. In comments, this blogger also points to the shift in the Hindu's stance within a short time after that!
3 Comments:
It was in my college final year, and we were on a strike against Private Medical Colleges. As always there are only two reasons medical students strike in Tamil Nadu ......
1. When there is some problem between a student and some one else (and they want police to arrest the other party). These strikes are limited to the particular college or few colleges and lasts for one day (the so called token strike) and everything resumes next day. Usually such strike begins by noon as it takes some time to inform every one and collect people and by the time the Out patient department will be over and the house surgeons (interns) completed their routine job. They assemble for an agitation, Demand police action, and either the ASP/JSP or the Commissioner/JC etc come and "promise" that the law will take its own course. And then voila, they go to the latest movie.....
2. The second reason is when GOvernment Permits a new Private Medical College. In fact no other state could claim to have fought so many strikes against private medical colleges as Tamil Nadu.
And coming back to the main stream, in 2000 February, we were on Strike demanding restoration of the old law that one medical college should be situated atleast 100 kilometre from the next medical college and few other demands (like free Hepatitis B Vaccination to all medical students - which was granted ) and the obvious fee reduction and stipend hike. We had gone on a human chain one day and cycle rally the next day and there will be always a very good media coverage..... but now there were a lot of agitation, rallies and human chains which were well covered in vernacular media, but was there was no mention in the English media.
//the `symbolic' sweeping of streets, the shining of shoes,//
Why can't they protest with symbolic lawyer's coat, T Square, painting brush.......
The "medicos" forum for equal opportunity? You mean the squad of Congress goons led by Shivam Vij?
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