Post the Second World War, most battles have been fought out through the media – be they corporate, territorial or political. Over the past few weeks, the Indian media has been in the thick of a trickier conflict than it is used to hosting: the people versus itself. The problem is, it is supposed to represent both sides.
Since Open and Outlook made public the transcripts and tapes of tapped phone conversations between political and corporate lobbyist Niira Radia and the who’s who of power corridors, there has been mass outrage on social media, cornering mainstream media to tackle the issue head-on. The tapes reveal fixing and power brokering in connection with cabinet formation, the 2G spectrum scam and the tussle for natural resources between the Ambani brothers. Even though a large number of the tapes released have prominent journalists engaging with Radia, in the scheme of frauds playing out, their role, at most, is peripheral. The debate, however, has been focused on them—Barkha Dutt, Vir Sanghvi and Prabhu Chawla in particular. The media is the only estate the masses see as an extension of themselves and trust to take on a mighty, corrupt and apathetic political class. So this disproportionate outrage is understandable but the media, has been caught unawares. It has no fix on how to manage this outrage, and obvious discomfort has been the leitmotif of its efforts to address the issue.
There have been only three big television debates so far, and all three were delayed responses, given the cycle of 24/7 news channels. The most talked about of these was hosted by NDTV. Manu Joseph, editor, Open Magazine, Sanjay Baru, editor, Business Standard, Swapan Dasgupta, senior journalist, and Dileep Padgaonkar, ex-editor, Times of India were called on to question Barkha Dutt, who has become the unwitting face of the controversy, on her involvement. The debate was conducted from an attempted moral high ground, with NDTV declaring it was the only channel opening itself up to questioning from all the media houses implicated and giving Joseph a chance to be a part of this, even though Open did not ask for Dutt’s response before carrying the transcripts. Dutt, however, was clearly not prepared to meet this standard and remained bitter and combative through the show. She later defended her aggravation saying that it was a natural response to the smear campaign against her and one cannot grudge her that. But if she had decided to take on a show like this, perhaps she should have come better prepared to leave emotion out of it and present her case calmly.
Dutt had some important points to make about the interpretation of the material, but they were largely lost because of her constant attacks on Joseph. At several points, she took on a condescending and dismissive tone, challenging Joseph’s understanding of political journalism. She shouted at him for not getting in touch with her before publishing the material and insinuated a conspiracy behind Open not carrying the transcripts of Prabhu Chawla’s conversations with Radia. Hitting out against a hoarding put out in Delhi she said, “I am selling your magazine for you.” Joseph’s response to that – ‘You are pretty’ – was perhaps sexist, even ‘misogynist’ as Dutt labelled it, but the tone for the conversation had already been set by then.
Joseph was not given the space to make his points during the show. He repeatedly asked her just one question: Why didn’t she see the involvement of Radia, who was also representing Ratan Tata and Mukesh Ambani, two of the biggest players in the telecom sector, in lobbying for the appointment of the telecom minister as a story in itself – first in 2009, when this was playing out, and then in 2010, when the scam carried out by A. Raja, (the candidate Radia was pushing), surfaced. Dutt’s simple answer, ‘What is a story to you may not seem like one to me’, can be extended to the 2009 issue, but does not quite explain the connection not being brought up when she was reporting the scam in 2010. Joseph chose to answer the question of whether the manner in which the transcripts were published was ‘good’ journalism through a column posted subsequently on the Open website. But while he put up a soundly argued defence of the choice, he laced the piece with sharp jibes at Dutt, beginning with ‘Everything Barkha Dutt says can be downsized by 750 words’. Taking the petty nature of argumentation, bridled by personal egos, further after both parties had had time to reflect was an unfortunate decision.
The other panelists on the show asked Dutt why she claimed to have acted as a mediator between the Congress and the DMK when she says she didn’t and why was she approached to do so at all. The questioning was tepid because they accepted her explanation without further argument. The essential problem with their conversation was that it was reduced to a debate between journalism as it is taught in schools and practised on the ground. Their questions came from an ideological standpoint that seemed unnatural for them to take- given that they have spent longer than Dutt understanding how the innards of high-profile journalism really work. One is curious about the bases on which Dutt chose these high priests to question her. On the one hand, social media was abuzz with skeptics claiming they are her friends and will help her whitewash the allegations; on another, it seemed unfair that journalists who can easily be questioned on their own professional standards over a number of issues are being afforded a space to grandstand over Dutt’s misery.
Karan Thapar’s show on CNN IBN with Baru, N. Ram, editor, The Hindu, Dilip Cherian, lobbyist and communications consultant, and Joseph had the same air of sitting in judgment. Thapar did invite the accused journalists to be a part of the proceedings but they declined. He asked the panelists if they ‘believed’ Dutt and Sanghvi’s explanations and the proceedings were reduced to an improvised courtroom analysing their conduct- a ‘them’ versus Open and Outlook argument. N. Ram, who was also a part of the Headlines Today debate (with M.J. Akbar, Chawla, Sanghvi, Cherian and Hartosh Singh Bal, political editor, Open), in particular, pronounced definitive summary judgments against Sanghvi and Dutt, without explaining his stand clearly. He used the phrase ‘my verdict’ with no irony whatsoever and expressed gratification that no one else seemed to be buying Dutt and Sanghvi’s explanations either. He went ahead and suggested that they should be sacked, asking the Indian media to raise its bar to match that of the BBC, Financial Times and New York Times. In the same vein, he declared that Chawla had no charges to answer and was innocent. Chawla, who could not decipher this clearly on live TV, reacted by accusing N. Ram of advising the Sri Lankan government.
By the end of it, the debates were playing out like farces – half-hearted attempts by mainstream media to clock coverage on the issue and save face rather than actually wade through the morass that the tapes have uncovered. But in order to wade through that morass, they would have had to bare the actual machinations of the media as part of the establishment today. It is for the same reason that Sanghvi, Dutt and Chawla’s explanations did not convince us. They were all forced to mince words that would have gone to the root of what mainstream media really is today. What they actually seemed to be saying is this: we are no more guilty than our peers and colleagues, we are only walking the lines constantly re-drawn by a fraternity trying to catch up with the proliferated existence and importance of their medium. Words like ‘corruption’ and ‘quid pro quo’ were thrown around a number of times in these shows, but the point at which we need to start debating these tapes is to define what these words mean in today’s context.
The case against Dutt is the weakest of all. She is neither negotiating how she will carry a story nor asking for an opportunity to lobby for the DMK. She has also been the most willing to take questions on the issue from all quarters, despite her loss of poise in the debate. And her explanations warrant benefit of doubt. As she pointed out on the show, the mobs outraged against her keep shifting the goalposts, without a clear sight of what she is being accused of. But she is far from acquittal in public perception. The select quarters of the media that are responding to the crisis by ‘introspecting’ are doing so by either skirting the question of culpability or assuming the accused are guilty. According to reports, Rajdeep Sardesai was attacked by a majority of speakers in an Editor’s Guild open conference last week for supporting Dutt’s case even indirectly.
In an environment charged with loud rhetoric, the only way to afford these journalists a fair trial is by treating the tapes first and foremost as sociological documentation rather than hard evidence. And then by beginning to ask some very fundamental questions. For instance: is a journalist only corrupt if she is found guilty of accepting a material reward for her services to Radia? Is lying to a source corruption? Is shafting elements of a story to retain favour with a source for many a story to come corruption? Are you a corrupt journalist if you prioritize bagging a great story over safeguarding the interests of humanity or a nation? Are you a corrupt journalist if you are posing as one? And is a corrupt journalist an altogether different beast from a cynical, news-hungry, political journalist, as Dutt insinuated herself to be in a moment of wry introspection?
There are other questions too. What role does the audience have in shaping the ethics of these journalists? Are we willing to pay for news that corporations wont subsidize? Are we willing to be more judicious in how we reward our channels with the TRPs that sustain them?
Until every side in this conflict is willing to deal with these questions and their aftermath, the real debate over the Radia tapes will not be televised. It is also time to hold the shock and awe. How long can the journalist evade being a target while hosting wars on her medium. How long can the audience expect to be privy to increasingly gory battlefields without being prepared to accept that everyone on it has to eventually pick a side.
Pragya Tiwari
