Why news channels are as bad as saas bahu shows
National security is serious business. Unfortunately, for a large number of TV channels, the word “national” seems to have got lost in the blinding desire to make it good “business”. Irrespective of what the “nation” wants to know, one certainly has a reasonable idea of what some of these anchors want the people to perceive.
A brief, casual look, since a protracted one is no longer possible, and there it is. News is the new saas bahu formula to hit the idiot box. There is no dearth of vamps and villains across the border in Pakistan. Just like our forever extending soap operas, their denial of the obviously devious plot is a charade that makes viewers forget their differences and come together in a rare moment of unity. The anchors, much like the knights in shining armour, charge at their steadfast defences, in a daily ritual of aiming at the ultimate weak spot.
Thrusts and slashes are exchanged with the anchor’s army, often comprising retired men in uniform. Their vicious barbs and frothing anger raises a din that heavy artillery in battle failed to generate. Oh! how I wish both armies had discovered their talents earlier. There would have been no need for spending scarce resources of the country on prohibitively expensive missiles and bombs. Just yesterday, I was enlightened. India had captured a second Kasab! Wow. This was no mean achievement. But wait. Did I hear that between the first and second Kasab, there had been more than 50 foreign terrorists arrested and in jail! Noooo, but what happens to the story and the TRPs? Damn the reality.
How do the common folk know? They have by now been addicted to their daily dose of unending episodes of the modern day Mahabharata, fought on prime time news.
TV news is also the new joint interrogation cell (JIC)! After all, if one has to win the mother of all battles, what better place than prime time news. So a group of journalists and interested bystanders commence with the electronic filing of what must be the world’s first live interrogation report. Where else, obviously on television. Relentless questions and and real time answers, give a new meaning to Shankar Mahadevan’s famous song “Breathless”. Everyone seemed to be riding the wave of “exclusive” reporting. Something or the other had to be “for the first time on television”. Well, as far as I was concerned, interrogation of a terrorist on television, much before intelligence agencies could even commence their procedures was certainly a first!
So what next? Anchors leading operations themselves! Nothing gets more exclusive than that. As it is, some boast of reaching areas that the security forces can never do. This might as well be the best way forward. They also seem to be knowing when, where and how intelligence failures take place. As do they understand the intricacies of tactical and strategic operations. This is it. It is time to start a new signature campaign titled: Anchorman! Maybe, Marvel will adopt this, bringing India into the much desired exclusive club of indigenous characters.
Interestingly, the Gurdaspur terrorist strike was no different. There were exclusive stories of a woman terrorist, a Sikh terrorist, a terrorist having been caught alive and much more. Maybe the terrorist was caught alive. It is just that he sneaked from Gurdaspur to Udhampur, and was finally captured there! After all, it is the question of the integrity of our men in shining armour. Have you ever heard any channel issue an apology for misleading the people. Obviously not. This comes under the purview of artistic freedom! This is a saas bahu serial after all.