By Alok Jagdhari
Indian media has betrayed the nation… The sense of betrayal is clearest when we compare the conduct of Indian media to that of media in the US. Both nations are unfortunate enough to be ruled by incompetent proto-fascists. The only reason the US may escape the clutches of its nincompoop is because the media in the US has upheld the finest traditions of its role in a democracy.
Here are the 10 main differences:
1. From day 1 the US media kept track of Trump’s lies. When a journalist at HT tried it in India he was fired. By a corrupt and complicit management.
2. From day 1 the US media kept track of Trump’s wild election promises and relentlessly pursued him about them. One example is the border wall promise. Did any Indian media keep up a drum beat about 15 lakhs in bank accounts?
3. The US media constantly fact checked not only the lies of Trump but the lies uttered by his press secretaries, his political allies, his cabinet officials, his white house staff, other Republicans. Did the Indian media ever fact check anyone in BJP or RSS?
4. The US media absolutely excoriates their own members in Faux News, Breibart, etc who gave air time to Trump’s lies. Does anyone in Indian Media have the courage to call out their own propaganda monkeys?
5. The US media didn’t allow the Trumpets to slander Dems like Indian media has participated in the persecution of RG and other opposition politicians. They learnt very quickly how they had been duped into slandering Hillary Clinton and absolutely shut down the attempts to slander Pelosi (before mid terms) or any Dems in last 4 years. The media in the US played a stellar role in conducting exhaustive investigations into the misconduct and corruption inside Trump’s mafia, as well as by debunking the fake news being planted by Trump’s cabal about the opposition, most notably Joe Biden. Their role in exposing the corruption by Trump in trying to slander Biden with the Ukraine smear absolutely fell flat. On the other hand, Indian media has been hand in glove with Modi’s corrupt cabal in unfairly tarring the opposition.
6. The media in the US has asked tough questions from Trump about issues of governance – there is a minute by minute scrutiny of his response to coronavirus, to the rising death toll, to his covid-19 denial, to his efforts to undermine the scientific evidence and community. Indian media has instead participated in an elaborate charade to pretend there is no virus. They cheered Modi on in his unscientific propaganda about थाली and दिया. And now are actively participating in distracting attention from the pandemic and economic collapse to use stupid pointless scandals as the laser pointer to distract an Indian voter that already suffers from lack of object permanence.
7. The US media has focused a 10,000 watt spotlight on Trump’s diplomatic failures and foibles. Like the fiasco with North Korea. With Iran. The Paris Accord. Disastrous relations with the EU, etc. Indian media, on the other hand including NDTV, behave as Modi’s Propaganda Ministry by hiding all failures and faking defeats as victories.
8. Indian media spends all its time questioning the opposition when the opposition challenges the ruling dispensation. It not only hides Modi’s failures and provides cover for disasters, but aggressively questions any opposition figure that cares for Indian nation or public and dares to question Modi and Shah.
9. The Indian media is totally complicit in fanning the flames of bigotry and violence. The starkest contrast is in the treatment of the lynchings in India vs the Floyd killing in the US. Indian media has spent all of last 6 years hiding the facts, never bothering to hold the government to account, all the while cheering on RSS anurag thakur kapil Mishra etc.
10. The US media introspected about its own role in the rise and the election of Trump. And they brutally exposed their own shortcomings. And then they went about making amends. Indian media doubled down on its love for fascism.When the history of this time is written, the two biggest enablers of fascism in India will be the Supreme Court of India and the Indian media.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this article are the personal opinions of the author. AlignIndia does not take any responsibility for the content of the article.
Alok Jagdhari is a Financial Services Professional who lives in the United States. He studied at IIM-A and has a degree in Economics