Fragile Basis to Support Barkha Dutt
Friday, 30. January 2009 - 2:26 PM
From the chaos of outrage in the entire Indian blogging world emerges a lone (so far in my reading on the issue) dissenting voice. Let’s hear her out. At the outset, she says that her stance is “neither in favor of Kunte nor Dutt, I just think the Bloggers are blowing it out of proportion…” Fair enough but what follows is a stream of stumbles.
…bloggers don’t have the right to judge the journalistic ethics of mainstream media. If at all they do they certainly don’t have the right to call a leading professional with considerable repute an idiot. That word alone would give Ms. Dutt a reason to drag Kunte to Court, which Kunte probably have realized either on his own or after a meeting with Ms. Dutt’s lawyers, which is why he apologised.
Here’s the thing. As Barbar Indians puts it really well, ethics–journalistic or otherwise–is majorly about “levelling the playing field, a subject that shouldn’t really be that alien to the self-styled protagonists for social justice.” Sanjukta should substantiate why she feels bloggers don’t have a right to judge journalistic ethics mainstream media. By that token, journalists themselves don’t have the right to question the ethics of our universally-reviled politicians and bureaucrats. Taken to its logical end, nobody will have the right to call evil by its name. In addition, because somebody is a “leading professional with considerable repute” doesn’t automatically make them immune to criticism: nobody is sacrosanct. And if people’s fragile sensibilities are offended by a relatively-harmless word like “idiot,” they should seriously stop hogging the limelight and look for other jobs.
Also, isn’t Sanjukta making the same assumption about Kunte’s guilt here–the same assumption that she attributes to bloggers: “The language of the withdrawal post was very legal so Indian blogshpere went ahead and assumed (may be rightly) that Ms. Dutt might have threatened him with legal consequences.” Then, Sanjukta writes as though Kunte told her the real reason for his apology-post while the man himself is silent about the whole affair! I suspect Kunte apologized simply because NDTV’s threat worked as it did in Mediaah’s case. And further,
The blogsphere should understand that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Before going all out making a Bhagat Singh out of Kunte, they should find out from their lawyer friends if Ms. Dutt does have a case or not. If she does, that alone is a proof that Kunte isn’t so innocent after all.
I’ll lay it out for Sanjukta. The finding-out-from lawyer friends doesn’t arise at all. Bloggers are pissed because Barkha Dutt’s threat to take legal action is in itself a bullying tactic to suppress his right to air his opinion against her reporting style, which we all know actually endangered the NSG operation. If you are interested, I can forward a copy of the Rand Institute’s factual dossier on the Mumbai attack. The dossier is critical of the irresponsible role the media played in covering the operation. It is beyond doubt that Barkha contributed a major chunk of that irresponsibility, which made her put out a rather lame defence. Calling her antics as “idiocy” is actually mild, considering that she goes around yelling “fascist” and “fundamentalist” at the drop of a hat. What’s best, she uses these terms casually. There’s actually a whole tome of scholarship behind those terms. Can’t we now conclude that Barkha is either:
(a) Ignorant: because she uses it casually without understanding its meaning; or
(b) Idiotic: because lots of bloggers (yes!) have pointed her attention to the mincemeat she makes of these terms and yet she doesn’t just get it?
Given Sanjukta’s description of Barkha as a “leading professional with considerable repute,” highhandedness is hardly a response that befits her dignified stature. At best, she could’ve written a piece taking Kunte to task. Or is her professional repute so fragile that one post in some remote corner of the Web threatens to smash it to bits?
With that we come to a very important point, and I’m going to be a little dramatic. Only the spirit of blogging unites bloggers worldwide. Bloggers routinely have severe disagreements with each other but I’m yet to see a case where they’ve intimidated one another with stupid tactics like sending legal threats. This is precisely the point the Indian media doesn’t get. It is used to playing the Big Brother for far too long that it can’t admit any challenge to its hegemony.
I’ll round off this post with an observation on what Sanjukta wrote.
Now since you, Nitin and rest of the team belong to the elitist camp of bloggers and I am a mere mortal my criticism is obviously unworthy, never mind my freedom of speech. Elitism at its best.
There’s nothing like an “elitist camp of bloggers.” These blogs are widely-read and respected for the perspectives they bring and the value they add. Also some of these blogs have been around since the early days when blogging was not even known, and they have evolved really well. They’re very open to discussions if you care to look at their comment spaces. Which defeats your points about unworthy criticism, freedom of speech, and elitism.
It is admirable to take a stand and stick to it but it doesn’t mean you should be loyal in persisting with foolishness.
30. January 2009 - 3:28 PM
Er, i searched “Undie TV NDTV’ in Google and found your blog among the first page:)
So they should sue you!
30. January 2009 - 4:24 PM
I wish my blog was alive. I would have criticized Barkha Dutt too. And I will repeat what Mr Kunte said, she is a complete idiot and should try and find another career, because she sucks at this one.
30. January 2009 - 5:21 PM
“YOU ARE SELF SERVING, MYTH PERPETUATING SHALLOW JOURNALIST BURKHA DUTT”
ARE YOU GOING TO SUE FOR AIRING MY OPINION. IF YOU DO YOU ARE WORSE THAN EVERYBODY THINKS.
30. January 2009 - 6:39 PM
On second thought, Mr Kunte made point and then on assumed pressure offered apology. Now this could be a master stroke . The point I am making is that Mr kunte made his point which is not far from truth and it stung. Now the apology is irrelevent as many of us more than agreed with Kunte’s opinion. the more this piece is censored more popular it will become and who knows little ripple in pond may become tsunami.
30. January 2009 - 7:27 PM
That word alone would give Ms. Dutt a reason to drag Kunte to Court, which Kunte probably have realized either on his own or after a meeting with Ms. Dutt’s lawyers, which is why he apologised.
“Ms.” Dutt but no salutation like “Mr.” for Kunte. One wonders why.
30. January 2009 - 9:09 PM
This is an outrage. It does not matter whether Barkha is a dork or not, an idiot or not, or a sage or not. All that matters is that the blogger chose to exercise his freedom of speech, in the spirit of the law, and Barkha and her employers showed themselves to be cowardly ninnies, unable to bear the criticism.
31. January 2009 - 12:47 AM
I read this loony Sanjukta’s reply on facebook inviting readers to visit her blog which supports Barkha’s actions. And she says ‘Oh btw, I’m not doing this to increase traffic to my website’. Yeah right!! Can spot a guilty conscience when I see one.
Excellent rebuttal by Sandeep for her flimsy arguments.
31. January 2009 - 1:26 AM
I remember Barkha Dutt threatening to take the Indian Naval Chief Admiral Suresh Mehta to court if he did not retract his statement regarding death of soldiers during the Kargil war due to Barkha Dutt’s reporting. I presume she is jittery of being pinned for her antics during the Kargil war.But then these stalwarts in indian media comsidered themselevs to be above the law unlike ordinary citizens.
31. January 2009 - 6:00 AM
Haha.. that “lone dissenting voice” was perhaps an attempt at astroturfing. I do agree that nobody is beyond reproach and Barkha Dutt/NDTV should not have gone on the offensive just because they were maligned.
31. January 2009 - 3:46 PM
Bloggers routinely have severe disagreements with each other but I’m yet to see a case where they’ve intimidated one another with stupid tactics like sending legal threats.
That too has happened in the past month in the Malayalam blogosphere over a post related to religion.
31. January 2009 - 7:40 PM
No, seriously, why are you providing publicity to this female? Obviously, she is either stupid, intolerant, blog-whoring or Barkha Dutt herself!
2. February 2009 - 3:00 AM
Sandeep, can you please forward the dossier(Rand Institute’s factual dossier on the Mumbai attack) to me. I really want to read it. Love your posts, have blogrolled you.
2. February 2009 - 3:05 AM
Goofy Mumma,
Please send me an email offline for the dossier. My contact info is right at the footer of this blog.
2. February 2009 - 10:52 AM
Did you see Prannoy Roy interview Pervez Musharraf immediately after Kargil? This was a time when all of India was so outraged that even a cub reporter from India could have put Musharraf on the defensive. Instead what does Prannoy do? He cowers throughout the interview, his body language that of a sycophant, feeling deeply grateful for being granted precious time with his master. Prannoy tentatively side-steps Kargil (!), bringing it much later in the interview, and even then, giving it a mere token mention, before moving on to CRICKET!!! He asks Musharraf about which cricketers he would like to have if India and Pakistan were to have a joint cricket team to take on the rest of the world. Prannoy seemed more interested in knowing Musharraf’s choice of crickers than in knowing why Musharraf did a Kargil. It was bizarre. Instead of having Musharraf shift nervously throughout the interview, it was Prannoy shifting nervously. That one interview was sufficient showedme the mettle that Prannoy and NDTV is made of. NDTV’s claim to fame was that it was one of the first to bring snazzy graphics to Indian television through the show ‘The world this week’. That’s ALL it has ever been, a snazzy graphics vendor. NDTV doesn’t deserve to be called a respectable NEWS company. It has no journalistic character, as has now been proved through the NDTV-Barkha Dutt fiasco.
3. February 2009 - 4:06 AM
What fragile basis to support ms.dutt?
There are no basis at all!! after killing soldeirs at Kargil she was not satisfied, she also got many hostages and policemen killed at the mumbai fiasco.
And to top it all she goes after a defenceless blogger! what a pity ms.dutt, I pity on your meaningless existence, you are as human as we are, donot forget that.
5. February 2009 - 5:37 PM
Barakha Dutt and NDTV and her supporters are unfortunately acting like Ram Sena in Mangalore or MNS in Mumbai. It is sad to see when the reporters get talked about and have the arrogance to call others “rubbish”. Which is perfectly allright. Let her go after the admiral now
Unfortunately this hubris of pathetic journalism has to be suffered.
Sanjukta/Barkha have opinion and good one…unfortunately delusions of righteousness have marred many good ones.
23. February 2009 - 12:46 AM
@sunny: what is your age son? how much do you know about pronoy roy?