She who slaps the hardest

"Deepa Sharma slaps Baba Om Ji on Live News Debate for Radhe Maa" screams the headline on YouTube. It is tagged under "Entertainment" category.

There’s nothing surprising about this. People have got physical with each other before in heated discussions. A tiff here and a tiff there invariably goes viral. And the audience derives great salacious pleasure in seeing a woman make the first move. It’s role reversal after all. And the extraordinary on air always sounds better at the cash register too. Ratings soar. The channel repeats the clip. It is milked dry. Brand building, you see.

Thousands today have watched this 47 second clip and laughed. I am laughing more at those of us who are watching it. Including myself. We are seriously news deprived.

On September 13, a rape victim in Sitapur was shot, allegedly by her rapist. How many of us watched that piece of news more than once, if at all?

Baba Om Ji is a Made for TV person. One glance at him and you are hooked. The costume is a statement in itself. How can you not want to  hear what this apparition has to say?

“Tu kya maaregi?” That’s what he had to say.

Once Deepa Sharma got up calmly, unhooked her lapel mic, walked up to the man, tapped him on the shoulder, I knew the magic had begun. Then came a series of firm thappads, as if she were swatting a dengue carrying mosquito with a vengeance. The "holy" man promptly slapped her back, challenging her to beat him up.

I think I should have been a soothsayer. Just yesterday I was thinking that one of these days the news slugfest is going to yield a few slaps on some channel or other. Or a guest is going to slap another for an unacceptable viewpoint. Well, here it is.

Why should a Radhe Maa make news anyway? And why should a Baba Om Ji be a panellist? And why are we propagating myth and superstition so rampantly on news television? Will this topic ever make it to a debate on the News Hour? Will the I&B ministry take cognisance? Will the matter ever reach a courtroom? Nope.

"Aaj Ka Mudda" should have been the question of safety of rape victims. And justice for the girl and the others waiting in the wings to be killed by this example. Helping such women and lauding them for their bravery and honesty should be of primary concern to the nation. Not an overdressed woman with a bad make-up job who claims she has descended from the heavenly stars.

News will continue to be sold in the "entertainment" category as long as it remains so fiercely competitive and fragmented. Credibility is really not high on the agenda of even the leading news brands. Staying ahead in the ratings is. 

For now, the audience shall resort to astrologers for the news.