Friday, June 06, 2008

LiC rants on intolerance

Recently there were a couple of incidents where the members of media were attacked by goons and activists. LiC having experienced some of the medicine first hand courtesy of JJ few years back decides to rant against the atmosphere of intolerance.
Similarly, the proper course for those activists who vandalised the residence of Loksatta’s Kumar Ketkar was to write ‘Letters to the Editor’ disagreeing with the newspaper’s stance.

I'm sure there are thousands of readers of Chindu whose letters to the Editor were not published simply because the newspaper felt those opinions ran counter to the newspapers arguments. How about giving a few of those readers a chance to express their opinions before preaching a course of action to the goons?
Also does LiC know for a fact that those activists did not write to the editor or talk to him politely before engaging in vandalism? Does anyone think that Mr.Sherlock Ram would've done his due diligence?
Newspapers have a right — indeed also a duty — to express themselves strongly and unequivocally on matters of public interest. They are not expected to stake out positions that please those in political life, those in power, or even those who constitute the majority. Intolerance against the written word is commonly justified in this country by invoking hurt sentiment.

This statement defines what a newspaper should and must be. Unfortunately this is a case of a quack claiming to be a registered physician just by reading the hippocratic oath. There have been numerous incidents over the recent past, many covered in detail by the writers of this blog, where Chindu has written articles with a serious lack of journalistic integrity. Hence for LiC to preach from his mountain in Anna Salai that newspapers should talk about the common man's interest is laughable.
The conclusion deserves some thought,
The sorry truth is that hurt sentiment in this country has become a cynical justification for those who want to bend the law or to take it into their own hands.

I would like to ask a simple question. There have been numerous incidents where Communists have taken the law into their hands (Nandigram, Kerala, Tripura, New Delhi the list goes on) and attacked common civilians, other party activists and even bureaucrats.
Where is LiC and Chindu's sense of duty towards the common man when these incidents happened?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

"The sorry truth is that hurt sentiment in this country has become a cynical justification for...".

Great! Let the Chief first preach this sermon to his minority friends who at the slightest feeling of "hurt sentiment" take to the streets and attack/burn/kill whatever that comes into their sight. Particularly, the Chief should address this advice to his buddy the Prince, Nawab etc. of Arcot who made so much fuss about a recent exhibition on Aurangzeb exhibiting hate and intolerance.

Dirt Digger said...

Anon,
Its easy for Chief to talk from his high horse. Problem is unlike most good editors Chief never accepts his mistakes. The Nawab of arcot is a frickin a-h0le who gets a ceremonial title for a position that is not required. Problem is while Chindu complains about the royalty in Nepal and other countries abuses their power of authority they would not do the same for a-h0les like the Nawab.
Thanks for your thoughts.

Anonymous said...

Chindu reported "Friend in Need"@ http://www.hindu.com/2008/06/08/stories/2008060855180900.htm. Unfortunately China never treats India's friendship at par. Venue for this noble gesture is Chegdu Airport - a common place and from big brother side is Vice governor -no senior ministerial official!