dailyO
Politics

India's Daughter a fake. Nirbhaya's friend claims prove BBC played us

Advertisement
Devanik Saha
Devanik SahaMar 12, 2015 | 11:19

India's Daughter a fake. Nirbhaya's friend claims prove BBC played us

Barely had the dust settled on the controversial Nirbhaya BBC documentary, Avanindra Pandey, who was with Nirbhaya on that fateful night of December 16, has stepped out, calling the film a fake.

Pandey accuses Leslie Udwin of handling the issue insensitively. He said he finds, "The documentary is unbalanced as the victim's viewpoint is missing". He claims that he never heard of her "tutor" Satyendra who has been featured in the movie. Moreover, he also questions how Satyendra knew which movie they wanted to watch. According to him, the documentary has made fun of people's emotions for the sake of sensationalism.

Advertisement

Evidently, the truth behind the BBC's documentary is much darker than anyone imagined. Avanindra's shocking claims will steer the controversy in a completely different direction. If his statements are to be believed, then clearly, the BBC, for reasons best known to themselves, has exploited an unfortunate incident to advance its agenda.

Here are three factors which helped the BBC to promote its documentary:

1. Disgruntlement of the Indian public: It is a well known fact that even though the Nirbhaya incident attracted immense outrage and protests throughout the country, apart from a Justice Verma Commission being set up to bring some changes in rape laws, the law and order situation hasn't changed much in Delhi as well as India. Though the recent Uber cab rape incident drew huge criticism and brought women's safety issue again to the fore, apart from its trademark reaction of banning things, the government still hasn't focused on taking concrete measures. The government's recent decision to reduce the number of rape crisis centres from 660 to just 36 (reducing funding from Rs 244 crore to just Rs 18 crore) also hasn't gone down well with the activists and civil society groups. The BBC knew that the general Indian is quite disgruntled with the government for not doing enough to ensure safety of women in the country, in spite of repeated incidents and pressure by civil society groups.

Advertisement

2. Obsession with foreigners: Indians have been always been obsessed with foreigners and foreign countries. When it became clear that the documentary had indeed flouted some laws, the question arose that how did a foreign journalist get access to a rape convict in such a high profile case, when our own journalists couldn't get it? The BBC claimed that it complied with all the laws and undertook various permissions, but as proven, they flouted laws and there were definitely some hidden facts which they never made public.

Not just laws, the BBC's tag of being a big international media brand, attracted more audience than a normal filmmaker's documentary would have done. I found some friends commenting on social media, "Yaar, BBC ne banaya hai toh sahi hi hoga". Such mindsets portray our obsession with foreign affiliations, which was again leveraged by the BBC to the fullest.

3. Sensationalising mindsets of Indian men: Since the documentary focused a lot on the mindset of the rapists, the BBC knew that it would lead to numerous discussions and arguments around patriarchy in the Indian society. Predictably, news channels and social media platforms were flooded with such debates, creating unprecedented buzz for the documentary. While some chose to support the documentary for portraying the truth, others vociferously criticised the BBC for stereotyping Indian men. Even the Parliament wasn't far behind. Rajya Sabha member Javed Akhtar said that the documentary exposes the real mindset of many Indian men.

Advertisement
Last updated: March 12, 2015 | 11:19
IN THIS STORY
Please log in
I agree with DailyO's privacy policy