Monday, June 21, 2010

The Hundred Day Questions...

Question 1:

On the evening of March 4, NDTV website had this headline "Modi Godman Sex Scandal" and presented to us a slideshow of Swami Nithyananda. Now, if you are wondering what the headline and the slide show have anything to do with each other - here's the link. The Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi once launched a book by Nithyananda and apparently said he is a follower. Nithyananda was embroiled in a "sex scandal" and since Modi is a follower, it became "Modi Godman Sex Scandal" !!!

Mails and messages on twitter that day made sure that the page was removed. However, I was more keen in knowing why such a headline crept up in the first place. What kind of journalistic practice allows a national channel to have such a headline on its site? Barkha Dutt, Group Editor,said she will look into it, but hasn't really done it I guess. For the past 110 days, I have been asking her "Any update on followup of "Modi Godman Sex Scandal" headline on NDTV site on the evening of March 4.Thank you".

The initial idea was to not give up till an answer came. However, well meaning folks on Twitter have advised that concentrating only on a couple of questions makes it difficult to bring up other such headlines of sections of the media. Following up on any question for 100 days is good enough way of trying to expose their lack of interaction when it comes to correcting their mistakes, at times.

This particular blog post will continue to add all such "hundred day questions", and try to keep a record of their lack of response over a period of time. Also, this means the followers on twitter don't get bored with the same questions after 100 days ;-) ! More to follow soon :D!

Question 2 (Day 100 today, June 30th):

This was the question: "Day100 Hi @BDUTT @vikramchandra @prannoyroyndtv Is NDTV planning to clarify on the "summoned on March 21"fiasco raised by d CM of Gujarat?".

A childish response and the whole background of this question has been documented here.

5 comments:

Ashok M Kini said...

the vested interest of ndtv and ibn needs to be exposed. Do you have any idea of how it can be?

CodeNameV said...

Kudos to your perseverance. I think I have a lot to learn from this effort. Respect _/\_

Perseverance. Period!

kppradeep said...

thanks for your efforts. We need to expose these "SECULAR" people. They think politicians need to get "Yes you are secular" certificate from these jokers/Congress party which does not have any shame in calling itself secular after having alliance with muslim party in kerala

VOXINDICA said...

As I have said in a tweet, words like “objectivity” & “subjectivity” are inadequate to describe the predilections of the Indian English p-Sec media. The word “bigoted” would be more apt to describe them. However what bodes ill for the Indian democracy is not only the media’s proclivity – which might be explained away as its subscription to a particular political-ideological philosophy - but its direct participation in the political process as “power-broker”. This was revealed by the secret documents of the CBI posted by “India’s National Newspaper” on its website and which it willy-nilly removed later. Both media’s participation as “power-broker” and the willy-nilly removal of the secret documents by “India’s National Newspaper” were none too altruistic. They removed any checks and balances that the media can have on the powers-that-be by design not default.

prashhanthkpp said...

Hats off to your patience in relentlessly pursuing one of the most recent of the abundant *fatal errors* of NDTV. While media houses are presumed to be circumspect in their focus of bringing out genuine and TRUE news to the public, abiding by the hackneyed phrase *media ethics*, NDTV remains insistently far from it. That it remains a fact that directives from 10JP is but NDTV's surviving kit is needless to say. They have eschewed any *moral & media ethics* for the mere sake of propagandist news making.

Therefore, to obtain an answer or clarification from NDTV as an entity or from its various anchors individually seems a distant mile away.

Nevertheless, we are behind you in your pursuit for impartial and indubitable News Reporting standards!

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