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Magazine
MEDIA MATTERS
Polarised coverage
SEVANTI NINAN
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There are too many versions of the events taking place in Nandigram.
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Photo: Shanker Chakravarty
Challenging to cover: People in Nandigram protest the killings.
Why is Nandigram a media story? The reasons are several. First, even in Modi’s Gujarat, access to the scene of action was not denied to scribes the way it has been here. The International. Federation of Journalists (IFJ) issued a statement saying that the campaign to recapture villages in the Nandigram area had reportedly been accompanied by a sustained effort to curtail media access to the area. It said it fully endorsed the call by the Kolkata Press Club that the State government ensure the free movement and safety of all journalists. Subsequently the Calcutta High Court has had to ask the State government to provide security to the media and to activists to enable them to enter the area.
Second, there was, last week, the once-personable chief minister’s visceral response to a question from a Bartaman reporter on November 14. The paper, known for its anti-government stance, is not a favourite of the administration. Mr. Bhattacharya is reported to have said that considering the newspaper’s reportage over the year, another government would have taken action against it, but then he would not want to soil his hands by killing a mole. The original phrase is, “chucho mere haath gandha korbo na”. If you translate chucho (chuchunder in Hindi) as a mole, it does not quite get across the distaste intended. Bandicoot, is closer to it. The moot point is, a CM under pressure was moved to publicly call the press names. That does not happen very often.
Whom to believe?
Developing news stories are usually a challenge for the journalists and photographers tackling them. Particularly one that has been a story for nine months or more. But in Nandigram you have a story which has been quite a challenge for readers and viewers. The media is so polarised over it that all media vehicles simply do not read the events taking place there in the same way. So whose truth does one believe? Is the CPM the chief perpetrator of the current violence as the The Indian Express, The Times of India and The Telegraph among others have reported? Or is it the Maoists and the Trinamool as The Hindu has reported? Is it both, with each having its reasons, as Delhi’s new tabloid Mail Today has shown in its fly-on-the-wall reports? Is the Chief Minister really letting his cadres go in instead of the police? If so, and the Central Government is holding its peace, why is the media not making more of an issue out of it? And if the majority being killed are Muslims, why is that fact not being foregrounded in the reportage?
Two media vehicles in particular, The Indian Express and the satellite channel Star Ananda have been hammering away at the story, day after day. If their version is to be believed and indeed that of protestors ranging from Medha Patkar to Mrinal Sen, something is very wrong in Nandigram. Media baiters on the Right have been asking why the events here are not attracting the sort of media condemnation reserved for Narendra Modi in Gujarat. Why no Tehelka, they ask?
Damning stuff
The fact is, some pretty damning stuff is being written, it simply has not received the kind of attention the coverage of the post-Godhra violence in Gujarat received. Tehelka’s tie up with commercial television made its last month’s sting operation report far more visible than its coverage on Nandigram in its latest issue. Its cover story is called “Smash and Grab”. “What the CPM has unleashed is not a war for the control of Nandigram; it is waging a desperate and dirty battle for survival in its oldest fort”. There are three other fairly damning articles in the same issue. The Telegraph and The Statesman in Kolkata too have held the ruling party squarely responsible for events here. The former published a three-part analysis by Rudrangshu Mukherjee on the Communists’ use of violence. But yes, the Muslim angle has not been played up enough so far, except by The Indian Express which ran a first lead on the Nandigram victims’ mainly Muslim face. It is also a fact that when Narendra Modi incites violence in a public speech, it is picked up with greater alacrity by sections of the media than when Brinda Karat does so in West Bengal. The latter incident was reported by Bengali newspapers and documented by The Telegraph.
The events at Nandigram have uncorked many outpourings on blogs. Some berate the mainstream media and ask why Delhi’s star anchors have not surfaced in Nandigram. Documentary film makers have uploaded their videos onto YouTube. Filmmaker Anindita Sarbadhicari has a seven-part series here. Others have simply uploaded stories from Kolkata TV or NDTV or CNN-IBN newscasts. Thanks to these parallel channels, even when the mainstream media does abdicate, the truth does get out.
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