Independence Not The Same As Freedom

US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland: “As you know, we support the right of peaceful, non-violent protest around the world. That said, India is a democracy, and we count on India to exercise appropriate democratic restraint in the way it deals with peaceful protest.” This was a comment about Anna Hazare’s protest against corruption with fasts starting August 16. Imagine, if that statement had come when we were still fighting for independence. Every political party would have welcomed it and quoted it over and over again. If that were about Egypt or Libya the Barkha Dutts, the Rajdeep Sardesais, the Sagarika Ghoses, the Arnab Goswamis, the Rahul Kanwals would be calling it a statement from God herself. Now that we are an independent republic every party condemns it citing our constitution and what not. And the same politicians will cite our constitution. The very constitution they frequently trample. The very freedoms they deny to ordinary citizens.

Our cricket teams still have many tags of Kings and Crowns. Punjab Kings, Royal Challengers, Rajasthan Royals or Chennai Super Kings! How do you explain that? If you really go by the last CNN-IBN poll that suggests people would still vote for UPA if elections were held today, you’ve got to believe this is an idiot nation. I'm sorry to say this, but only a nation of idiots can really vote for the UPA again in current circumstances. As I write this, Rajdeep Sardesai is busy with Ramchandra Guha wondering why the South is never properly credited with our independence movement. Huh? North, South, East, Centre, West – when will Rajdeep stop trying to divide the nation? And this is his Independence day special! This I-day, some news anchors sacrificed their usual attire for sarees and kurtas. That's right, for one day in your life you can be Indian, they seem to suggest.

The truth is always a loser when the context is removed. Nuland made that statement given recent events in our nation. Killing agitating farmers, lathi-charge at peaceful, sleeping protesters at Ramlila grounds, setting conditions for protests by Anna Hazare & Co., banning movies and books, like the one called ‘Aarakshan’ by Prakash Jha. Stupid banning of a book on Gandhi by the Gujarat government, banning a book on Shivaji by Maharashtra, banning Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie. Imposing strange conditions and telling you how you can protest. Independence is not the same as freedom. Independence is not the same as liberty. Independence is not the same as ‘we were born free’! Looks like only wild animals are really born free.

Land grabs, farmer suicides, black money, Swiss accounts, Italian heads of ruling parties, an untruthful news media, a divided nation. One is almost tempted to quote the Billy Joel song “We didn’t start the fire”. The true hero, the common man is yet to taste freedom. Taste this dosage from a gutter mouth called Manish Tiwari, spokesperson of the Congress party: “.....consists of "armchair fascists, overground Maoists, closet anarchists...lurking behind forces of right reaction and funded by invisible donors whose links may go back a long way abroad". In short, he has described Indians for you. Such contempt for ordinary men and women in a democracy can only be held by fascists themselves. If this continues you may sooner or later have that midnight knock on your door. And instead of severe condemnation our media rejoices and delights in the controversy of this filth.

Sample these translated lines from the PM's I-day speech and see if they reflect any learning at all:

"Key to winning battle against corruption is for the nation to unite

There can’t be any slip-up in vigil in the fight against terrorism

13/7 blasts have proven we need to tackle terrorism"

There hardly seems to be any wisdom gained in all the seven years of his rule. Do yourself a favour. This I-Day don’t listen to speeches by morons. Instead listen to the concept of freedom from Steven Spielberg’s movie ‘Amistad’. That’s a true story about smuggled slaves from Sierra Leone defended by a former US President, John Quincy Adams. 

The text of that great speech can be googled and found anywhere on the net. We really don’t need a constitution to tell us about our freedoms. We don’t need a constitution to confirm land should be given to the tiller. We don't need a constitution to tell us how or what to think. The mother of all democracies, England, doesn’t have a constitution. In the petition by Prakash Jha the Supreme Court must seriously strike down any ban on freedom of thought or expression, once and for all. We now have the most corrupt and the most dangerous government ever ruling this nation. When ordinary people are called ‘fascists’ you know your freedoms are dead

Freedom is bigger than the concept of independence. This I-day, for change,  please listen to a different speech.

Right-Wing Fantasy Journalists

Tavleen Singh is a prominent journalist and sometimes also appears on TV discussion panels. Here are excerpts (in blue) from an article “The enemies within” in the Afternoon Despatch & Courier (July 28, 2011). The excerpts are produced in a rearranged order and not in the same way as they appear in her article: 

A TELEVISION show may seem like an odd place to make a profound political discovery but this is what happened to me last week. I agreed to appear on Nidhi Razdan’s show, left, right and centre……. So on Monday of last week she decided that the two most compelling subjects were the corruption charges that currently surround the chief minister of Karnataka and, more puzzlingly, the lessons India can learn from the massacre in Norway.  Her guests in the NDTV studio in Delhi included Nirmala Sitaraman, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s spokeswoman, Shoma Chaudhury, editor of Tehelka and a British journalist of bleeding hearted liberal disposition. I was in a studio in Mumbai listening to the discussion on an earphone and participating when Nidhi gave me the chance to intervene

It was when we got to the second topic of the day that I found myself horrified by the discussion that went on in the NDTV studio in Delhi. Nidhi led it by saying that Anders Behring Breivik represented right wing terrorism and that this was something we needed to deal with in India as well. By this she meant Hindutva terrorism and within minutes she had everyone, including the spokesperson of the BJP, agreeing that all terrorism was bad and that it should not be linked to any religion.

One has come to expect NDTV to be a mouthpiece for the Congress and the Left. Nidhi Razdan does not attempt to camouflage anything. That Shoma Chaudhury or the foreign journalists that NDTV usually invites follow NDTV’s line of discourse is also not surprising. The surprise is always the unusual eloquence with which journalists who claim to be right-thinking also try to camouflage the truth. Tavleen Singh here has attempted a clarification in writing which she could not get the chance to do on TV. But try and recall all the BJP spokespersons, the Swapan Dasguptas, the Kanchan Guptas and their likes and you will find them doing the same thing. On one hand they will claim to be critical of the left and the media delusions but when they do appear on TV, they become the very spokespersons they criticise. Seriously, terror has no religion? Whether it’s a BJP spokesperson, or Swapan Dasgupta or Kanchan Gupta or any other so called right-thinking journalist, you will find them all agreeing. What exactly is the reason for such doublespeak? Let’s read a bit more from Tavleen Singh:

In the cause of the jihad against India these groups have killed hundreds of innocent Indians in temples, bazaars, hotels and even hospitals. Does this compare with the two or three terrorist incidents we have seen that involved Hindu terrorists? Yet, not only do our leftist intellectuals make this comparison but so do important politicians. The Home Minister said last week that he thought the BJP was targeting him in the 2G spectrum scam only because he was investigating acts of terrorism that involved leading members of the RSS. As for Rahul Gandhi’s mentor, Digvijay Singh, he has hinted on more than one occasion that he believes that it was the RSS who organized the attack on Mumbai.

Shoma of Tehelka then went into a passionate dirge about ‘innocent’ Muslim boys rotting in Indian jails and about how only when it came to jihadi acts of violence was an act of terror linked to religion. The consensus among Nidhi’s panelists was that Hindutva terrorism was  more of a threat to India than Islamist terrorism with the British journalist pointed out that someone as clever and informed as Rahul Gandhi had informed the American ambassador, as reported by Wikileaks, that he was more worried about majority communalism in India than about any threats from across the border.

In vain did I try pointing out that the reason why jihadi terrorism was linked to Islam was because it was the terrorists who called themselves holy warriors for Islam. In vain did I try reminding my fellow panelists that the jihadi groups committing acts of violence in India were created by the ISI and that this meant that they had the might of the Pakistani army behind them. Nidhi’s panelists, led by the very verbose Shoma, were convinced that ‘saffron’ terror as it has come to be known was the biggest threat to India. While listening to them I realized, more than ever before, that India’s biggest enemies are Indian opinion makers and our leftist intellectuals.

I have already stated many times over that the biggest threat to Indian democracy is from the media crooks. But Tavleen Singh has got it only half right. The opinion makers are not just leftist intellectuals but also the right wing or centre-right intellectuals and journalists. Except for routinely condemning statements made by Rahul Gandhi or Digvijay Singh I have yet to come across a single journalist who has clearly stood up and asked the government to acknowledge Islamic or Jihadi terror. The reason? Most of these journalists are now freelancers who have to depend on the likes of NDTV and CNN-IBN for survival. You cannot be foolish enough to bite the hand that feeds you. The US government does not talk about China’s human rights anymore and you can guess why. One will recall that it was a college student that had the courage to ask Barack Obama about Jihadi terror. And he managed to give a vague, twisted reply.

After I appeared on Nidhi’s show I received a small floodgate of tweets from twitterers who had seen the show asking if I knew where Tehelka got its funding from. I do not and nor do I care to speculate but what I will say is that most of Tehelka’s investigative journalism seems designed to prove that India is as failed a state as Pakistan and that Indian democracy is mostly a sham. It is a viewpoint that is beginning to get on my last nerve.

It is now being revealed that NDTV, CNN-IBN and HT got lucrative media contracts from the CWG organisers. So it’s natural that they were initially low key on the scams related to CWG when reporting it. Who was the one making the loudest noise about CWG? TimesNow, of course! And why? If the Times group had got the media contracts they had bid for it appears unlikely they would have gone after the CWG scams with the same vigour as they did in July-August last year and continued ever since. They would have been too busy then promoting a rosy picture about the games and the CWG organising committee. Are the right-thinking journalists any different?

There are a few stray journalists who care to state things as they are or as they see it. When it comes to confronting the central government with the truth about terrorism I doubt there are too many journalists, left right or centre, who want to take the risk. The main job of these journalists still is to be largely politically correct. In the recent case of TimesNow’s Arnab Goswami kicking and screaming over cops being targeted by Narendra Modi, not one journalist has managed to find the courage to stand up and write or talk about the deluge of nonsense that Arnab is attempting to spread. The only clarification to come was from Jaynarayan Vyas of the Gujarat government itself.

In principle all terrorism is bad. It does not take an Einstein to discover that. The question here is to acknowledge and respond to the biggest terror threat that confronts us. The government and the media would have you believe it is Hindu communalism. Unfortunately, there are only a few, like Subramanian Swamy, to confront it.

It is also in this context that a one-man party like Subramanian Swamy is leading an extraordinary fight against corruption and against Islamic terror. And he is not really a journalist. Those journalists who pretend to stand up for fairness and straight talk are the most misleading ones. You know the government stooges, the leftists when you see them in print or on TV but the really misleading ones are the right wing fantasy journalists. They are the ones giving credence to the chorus of ‘terrorism has no religion’. This ends up with polls like the ones CNN-IBN is currently doing to merely reiterate that falsehood.

TimesNow May Collapse Under ‘Arnab’ IMPACT

Update (August 12): This was originally posted on February 18, 2011. I thought sending a new QBox to Arnab to Impact the fall of Narendra Modi might help. Order placed. When the TimesNow kicking and screaming is over we will have elections soon.

Rarely a night passes without Arnab Goswami telling us how many questions he would ask. On the night of February 16, the day MMS finally broke his ‘silence’ and spoke to TV editors, Arnab gave us some interesting statistics. There were 16 editors and a total of 20 questions were asked. That is hardly a scenario that Arnab would have liked. I must mention though that it was extremely insensitive and discourteous of Harish Khare to have interrupted Arnab and tell him it was not an ‘interrogation of the PM’ and to show some ‘courtesy’. In this case it was Harish Khare who was being a jerk. After all wasn’t Harish Khare a part of the Times Group earlier? After wrongly snubbing Arnab he allowed Prannoy Roy to not only make a long-winded statement but wrap 2 or 3 questions into one to the PM. Well, Prannoy is from NDTV so that probably goes well with Harish Khare. But this is about Arnab Goswami.

For a start, let me state clearly that Arnab is not as despicable as some of his peers from other channels. He just believes he has to set a record for the number of questions and then let Times Now outrageously claim that it has ‘impacted’ all the outcomes.

TimesNow Impact: Kalmadi sacked. TimesNow Impact: Darbari suspended. TimesNow Impact: Lalli (of Prasar Bharati) suspended. TimesNow Impact: Antrix chairman to go? TimesNow Impact: SMS fraud. TimesNow Impact: Sports minister acts for national swimmers. TimesNow Impact: Isro Deal cancelled. TimesNow Impact: Hosni Mubarak resigns. Oops! The last one was a tweet from somewhere. The other channels are just cheats who are repeating the ‘Impact’ claims of TimesNow. 

So if TimesNow alone can Impact so many outcomes I have started to wonder whether we really need a CAG or CVC or PAC or JPC. Such is the power of Arnab Goswami’s constant questioning. Exactly a year ago Arnab had just about asked 702,855 questions on TimesNow according to highly reliable sources from Fakingnews. Since that report, the Guinness Book of Records organisation has been keeping a watch on Arnab and have now reported that Arnab has set a world record of 1,000,000 questions. The most ever by any TV host or journalist in the world. Watch out for the ‘Breaking News’ about the Guinness Certificate on ‘Your channel’.

The 20Q Gadget specially made for Arnab by Firebox.Com

 The current information on TimesNow’s new strategy is that they are now planning to take the number one spot in ‘Breaking News’ ahead of India’s most loved and respected channel ‘IndiaTV’. And the trick is to keep asking more questions that have no answers and all silly answers can then become ‘Breaking News’. Take that Rajat Sharma! But in all fairness since TimesNow keeps telling me that it is ‘Your channel’ I have decided to help them in asking more silly questions that have no answers. I have sent a special 20Questions Machine to Arnab Goswami that might just deliver one answer on being asked those 20Questions. This is a gadget specially designed for Arnab Goswami who can’t seem to get answers despite so many questions.

I have only one fear. With the chances of the number of questions exponentially growing because of the gadget their ‘Impact’ would also be phenomenal. And I wonder if TimesNow itself will collapse under the Impact of Arnab’s questions. Wouldn’t that be nice?

CNN-IBN: Divide The Nation Polls - Terrorism

CNN-IBN carried another instalment of its series of opinion polls on August 11. This one was on terrorism. In the first two instalments IBN’s partner in this hobby, The Hindu, put out the complete data through PDF files on their site. However, in the last two polls (Economy and Terrorism) I have not been able to download the data files. Try downloading the data files at The Hindu’s site here and here. I guess CNN-IBN and The Hindu expected people to be awed and go gaga over these polls instead of being analysed in-depth. So now, you only have clips from their TV show to go by which are scanty in details on the questions, the respondents and so on. One word for their tomfoolery – BUSTED!

Anyway, before I get to this latest instalment on Terror one has to understand the minds that work behind such surveys and polls. Much of it looks like a political position already taken by  the heads of the organisations involved. Now read Rajdeep Sardesai’s anguished tweet over the right wing. I don’t know if I qualify as right-wing yet but here’s what Rajdeep tweeted:

“afzal on death row for 5 years, kasab for 3, but rajiv assassins on death row for 20 years. why no right wing anger? Gnight”

August 11, around 11.30 PM

That is probably one of the most boorish tweets to have come from Rajdeep. I also think Rajdeep was completely unaware how stupid his tweet and his thoughts are. Now, here is a media dealer who keeps shouting hoarse about a lot of things on his channel and yet it didn’t occur to him that he should be the one asking the Nalini question to the UPA. Having failed in that job miserably he thinks the right wing should be making those noises. So tell us Rajdeep have you, as a media dealer, ever asked that question to MMS, PC or Sonia Gandhi? Or have you asked that question on your channel? If not, make it a point immediately that your channel would want the same fate for Nalini as Guru. Having abrogated your responsibility don’t point fingers at some vague right-wing. You should be ashamed that you didn’t actively seek justice for both Nalini and Afzal Guru and then lament that people don’t care about others on the death row. Do you care?

In case Rajdeep forgot,  it was Rajiv’s own family member, Priyanka Gandhi, who met Nalini to seek solace. In case Rajdeep forgot, the Indian right-wing didn't coin the term 'Global Jihad'. Rajdeep has found a place in many of my posts but I thought it would be a good point to remind him of what I think of Nalini. And here are excerpts from some of those posts:

The Scum Of All Spheres

What if Pakistan did hand over the remaining 49 wanted persons from that list of 50? What exactly would our government do? Afzal Guru and Nalini (Rajiv Gandhi’s assassin) are still comfortably lodged in jails.

‘Terror’s Creed..’: MorePoppycock From Rajdeep Sardesai

Killers of Rajiv Gandhi are still in jail. Ajmal Kasab continues to dance around Indian courts every week. Now that, I suppose, is resolve for you……..It is the serious ineptness of the UPA in allowing killers like Afzal Guru or the killers of Rajiv Gandhi to defy justice that spurs anger among citizens

Islamic Terror, Government &The Indian Media

So let’s understand what the 3 stooges have said. The first stooge, PM talks about resolve. Resolve is usually shown by messages or by action. There is neither any message nor any action. Afzal Guru still continues to live in some jail. Killers of Rajiv Gandhi are still in jail.

There, Rajdeep, patriotic Indians are not biased like our media to distinguish justice for terrorists. In fact, the killing of our Prime Minister is as much a war against us as the attack on our parliament. And it is polls like the ones CNN-IBN is doing that attempts to divide the nation with dubious leading questions.

That bit done, let’s get back to CNN-IBN’s dubious surveys. Behind all the silly percentages, not backed by raw data, the only conclusion that Yogendra Yadav came to was “People say terror not linked to religion”.  Frankly, that is a line any lame duck politician will give you free of charge. Why spend all the money on surveys unless it’s free funds? And really, one had to go and ask BJP and Congress workers about their perceptions on terror? That’s really cool. CNN-IBN gets guys from BJP and Congress almost every day on their show. Where’s the need for this exercise?

Historically, terrorism was born out of religion and intolerance. Now, if all the wise men and women at CNN-IBN, CSDS and The Hindu are those who have supposedly read history then they live in denial. Not so long ago there was terrorism by IRA and PIRA in Northern Ireland/UK. The objectives were political but the motive was religion. Surveys that don’t even ponder the political motives of terrorism are usually conducted by ‘useful idiots’. Islam is not just a religion but also a political doctrine. The conquest of territories, conversions, belief in supremacy over other religions are all part of the political and religious agenda. The only religious group to have any influence in the UN is the ‘Organisation of Islamic Countries’ (OIC) who collectively attempt to pass international laws on blasphemy and such religious beliefs. That our media consciously spreads untruths is now out in the open. Don’t claim it to be ‘journalism’ anymore when the only motive is money, money and more money. The best part is getting people like A. Owaisi of MIM to debate terrorism. How clever is that? Groups that are violent against writers like Taslima Nasreen. And terror has no religion?

Rajdeep’s anger at the right-wing is understandable. I think he finds them too intelligent and far too capable of expressing themselves truthfully against CNN-IBN and their close relatives at NDTV, HT and so on. His deputy editor is credited with coining the term ‘Internet Hindus’. Far from seeing it as an affront the right-wingers wear that tag proudly. Not something she would have anticipated. The politicians’ constant endeavour is to divide the nation in every possible way. They wouldn’t have succeeded but for the help of media crooks.

At the very best Yogendra Yadav’s article “People say terror has no religion” might win an essay contest in some primary school or maybe the UN. But if truth were the measure, it fails miserably. These are media-lessons on how to divide the nation.

Sanjiv Bhatt In Arnab's Kangaroo Court

I had already suggested ‘Padma Shri awaits Sanjiv Bhatt’. I guess that is not enough so a higher award for this courageous cop may be in order. If Teesta Setalvad got embroiled in fake cases of her own affidavits the media needed a new hero against Narendra Modi. Well, looks like they’ve found one.

On August 9 evening Arnab Goswami scooped an interview with Sanjiv Bhatt. The first round had Arnab questioning Bhatt about his hobnobbing with Congress leaders, getting Blackberry from them, emails that were exchanged and so on. The hilarious part came a little later in the evening at 9pm on Arnab’s Newshour when he again had Sanjiv Bhatt and a panel to discuss the suspension of Bhatt by the Gujarat government or to be more specific Narendra Modi as media would insinuate. Sanjiv Bhatt came to the discussions with his lawyer Iqbal Syed. With his lawyer? Yes! That’s right, hahahhaa!

‘Hello Arnab, you know me, now meet my lawyer please’! Isn’t that nice? Now what else would Arnab want for his Kangaroo court? Barkha Dutt and Rajdeep Sardesai must be writhing in anger that they couldn’t manage to do this on their channels. The lynch mob isn't out there on the streets anymore, it's there on TV channels in the form of news anchors.

Imagine, a supposedly honest cop, a whistleblower, possessing great regard for truth and his own convictions turns up at a TV panel discussion with his lawyer. And Bhatt has made a statement these are desperate measures (his suspension) by a desperate government. Bravo! By now the Congress spokespeople are all over the place. Ambika Soni stated “everybody knows what is happening in Gujarat”. Yes we do, it is that terrible police state where all freedoms have been suspended and it’s a state where there is virtual emergency. Of course, in case you missed it, the tainted Teesta Setalvad got her chance to be on TV again and shooting off her mouth.

Okay, all that is fine. Now, if you even remotely know anything about Narendra Modi you would also know that he is one of the shrewdest politicians around. He is not so dumb as to not estimate that actions such as those against Sanjiv Bhatt (and lately one against Rahul Sharma) wouldn’t invite accusations of vendetta politics. That he would be accused of hounding a cop who has filed an affidavit against him in the SC. That this would give the Congress and all the sickular media channels to again start hurling abuses at him. Is Narendra Modi that silly? Well, even if there is some grain of truth in the vendetta part I doubt he is nervous (as Arnab implies) and I also doubt if there is any legal loop-hole in the actions against Sanjiv Bhatt or Rahul Sharma.

Now, apart from being the CM of Gujarat and knowing well the Congress would use the issue to sidetrack many other issues would Modi be silly enough to undertake these actions? I doubt. This is also given the fact that Congress at the centre is in shambles over various issues of corruption and wrong doings. NaMo would hardly hand them an issue on a platter in such a situation.But the media thinks he desperately would.

In another case of fake encounters it was made out that Modi was a mass murder, ‘maut ka saudagar’. In an article today this is what S. Gurumurthy wrote in the Indian Express:

“That State (Gujarat) is the least sinner in fake encounters, just one in a hundred. Yet, its leader is vilified as ‘Mauth Ka Saudagar’ [merchant of death]. So, the selected State’s leader is the target, not fake encounters as evil. The State selected? Needs no guess. It is Gujarat, certified as the best governed, most prosperous. The leader targeted? Needs no mention. Narendra Modi, known as the cleanest, also the ablest. The National Human Rights Commission’s list of 440 fake encounters from 2002 to 2007 under inquest shows the share of Gujarat as just 5, almost the lowest. Uttar Pradesh tops the list with 231, followed by Rajasthan 33, Maharashtra 31, Delhi 26, Andhra Pradesh 22, Uttaranchal 19, Assam 12, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka 10 each, Tamil Nadu 9, West Bengal 8, Bihar and Haryana 6 each. More. At 7.25 am, on 8.8.2011, the NewX channel reported a further 120 fake encounter deaths in UP after 2007!

Yet,from 2006, the ‘secular’ media has been obsessed with, not the most guilty in encounter sins, but the least — Gujarat; and with only one of the 440 encounters — of Syed Sohrabuddin in Gujarat, none from the rest. Baying for Modi’s scalp, the media relentlessly pursued Sohrabuddin’s case, charged Gujarat with killing him [and his wife, Kausar Bi] only because of his religion. It made Sohrabuddin the poster boy of secularism, insisted on CBI probe to cover Amit Shah, Gujarat Home Minister then, and Modi himself. The judiciary too chose for CBI probe only Sohrabuddin’s case out of the 440 encounters. Later when CBI misused the court mandate, resorted to patent illegalities to fix Shah and target Gujarat and Modi, the media even seemed relieved. Interrogatories to ‘secular’ media on its role in the Sohrabuddin case are overdue. Here are some.Did the media even hint that, like Sohrabuddin’s in Gujarat, there were 435 other encounters outside, being inquired into by NHRC? No. And did it ever ask for CBI probe into them? No.”

There is a universal principle that Arnab Goswami, Barkha Dutt and Rajdeep Sardesai would do well to remember. IT IS USUALLY THE LOSER THAT GOES TO THE MEDIA. Check up history, check-up businesses and the principle will hold true. Teesta Setalvad talked about truth and justice for a long time. Now we know where she comes from and what her actions were. In much a similar fashion Sanjiv Bhatt talks about truth and justice.

In all the shrill noise that Arnab Goswami and others make not one, I repeat not one, has bothered to ask if the charges against Bhatt are true or accurate. If he has indeed been playing truant and is on illegitimate leave for 10 months. If those accusations are true then all this bullshit by Bhatt, Arnab and others will not wash.

I tend to call such people ‘washing machines of justice’ that wash nothing. These assholes don’t seem to realise that the more nails they drive in to Modi’s imaginary coffin the more popular he becomes. What next? Now are people going to bring their mom and dad to TV panel discussions? Arnab Goswami only exemplified what our media already is. TimesNow, NDTV, CNN-IBN, Headlines Today and some more are truly the real lynch mob in their own Kangaroo Courts.

CNN-IBN: 'Stupefy The Nation' Polls

Gallup is probably the world’s best known poll organisation. It is also one of the most trusted research organisations when it comes to opinion polls. But even polls by Gallup may sometimes not be an indicator of the grave impact of events. This is not to suggest that their polls are flawed or unreliable but that current events and trends may not have such an immediate and influential impact. Therefore, some poll results may end up being merely academic or a test of trivia. In the last dialogue in ‘All the President’s Men’, Ben Bradlee, editor of the Washington Post, chides his two journalists, Woodward and Bernstein, thus: “You know the results of the latest Gallup Poll? Half the country never even heard of the word Watergate. Nobody gives a shit.”  Richard Nixon became the only American President to resign office. That many major scandals since then would be routinely suffixed with ‘gate’ is an impact that could not have been measured by the poll conducted by Gallup at the time.

That’s right; nobody gaves a shit till it finally hits the ceiling. Has corruption hit the ceiling under Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi? Not if you go by the CNN-IBN polls, which is presently airing on a daily basis as ‘State of the nation’ polls. In contrast to the Gallup poll I've mentioned CNN-IBN is busy indulging in trivia when the shit has already hit the ceiling. Much of the poll is based on questions that can best be described as ‘trivia’ or if you’re in school you might get to answer a GK question of that nature. The man leading the venture is Yogendra Yadav. He has a record of sorts for polls that have gone terribly wrong and has ended up with egg on his face on many occasions. When this happens all too frequently one tends to suspect the motive and aim of the poll itself.

I call the whole exercise ‘Stupefy the nation’ polls. The second instalment of their polls is on ‘Corruption’ and here are some interesting facts from the poll. In the previous poll in which Rahul Gandhi was declared the most popular choice for PM, CSDS (who actually conduct these polls) had clarified that over 70% polled are from rural areas.  I’m no poll scientist but let’s look at some of the questions asked in this poll on corruption:

Q. Have you heard of these names? : A. Raja, Kanimozhi, Suresh Kalmadi, Dayanidhi Maran. And the max that have heard of them is 27% and those who actually know them is 22% If you look carefully, none of these are national level politicians in the real sense. Three of them are from a regional party (DMK members from TN) and one Congress member from Maharashtra. Well, why didn’t they ask about Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, P. Chidambaram or Praful Patel. First, has CNN-IBN given a clean chit to these people? Secondly, the more relevant question would have been if people knew about 2G, CWG, Adarsh and the actual scams rather than names involved in those. There is no need to preclude that only some individuals are involved in the scams as the poll does. This is hardly a popularity contest.

Q. Who is more corrupt – Centre, state or local government? – Now, this is how they fool people by asking a question that measures degree of corruption between various forms of government rather than each government separately. How is the perception of which government is more corrupt relevant at all to the study? It’s like asking you a stupid question: Do you like milk, coffee or tea? Chances are your vote will be divided between the three. In contrast if I asked you if you are a regular coffee drinker or not you are likely to give a more definitive answer. This is nothing but wilfully clouding the issue of corruption to indicate that one is worse than the other and covering up the severity of corruption of each one of them. As a consequence the All-India perception of the centre being corrupt is 35% when the answer to a clear single question would well have been 82%. This is a good hobby to play around with numbers. Alright, so between Manu Sharma and Vikas Yadav you choose who is a bigger murderer.

Q. On Anna Hazare, Ramdev, Lokpal etc ….. How is this relevant at all except for knowledge of trivia or general awareness? And does awareness of these people or their attributes have any significance to corruption? Frankly, I am confident that a huge population from the sample wouldn’t know who Pratibha Patil is. Considering that a majority of the sample is from rural areas it is not even clear if they have access to TV, national newspapers etc. Then, questions about Lokpal etc. Well, if there is a question about Lokpal it would have been worthwhile how many know there is a ‘Prevention of Corruption Act’ or a comparison with it. On a question about the polls Rajdeep Sardesai had tweeted a message to the effect that ‘there is a universe outside of TV channels and Twitter’. That should tell you enough.

Q. Is UPA very corrupt, somewhat corrupt, not much corrupt, not corrupt? Of all the questions this one has to qualify as the most stupid one. Is there a degree of corruption that can somehow be justified or condoned? Is that what these researchers are trying to establish? So in all discussions you will be told about the figure that 28% think UPA is very corrupt. Which clearly attempts to cloud reality and actual facts.(Didn’t they also highlight Rahul Gandhi has popularity of 42% when the real public figure was 19% according to them?) Therefore, the basic message is not everyone really thinks the UPA is that corrupt. Get that? The joke around is that MMS must simply release the names of ministers who are not corrupt. That would be easier. This method of polling almost reduces the exercise to a movie review by a critic who would rate it from 1 star to 5 and reduces the seriousness of the issue of corruption.

When Ajay Maken tried to pin the appointment of Suresh Kalmadi as CWGOC chairman on the NDA the media went to town with his statement. Now that Arun Jaitley has completely destroyed and exposed his lies, the media looks like a fool as usual. The intricate nature of documents and forgery that are used are not easily comprehensible to a majority of our population. That makes it easier for the media to conduct fake and motivated polls to stupefy the nation. You never know, for all that matters the NDA itself might have bid for the CWG hoping to make a kill but then they lost power. The UPA came to power and made a killing with all the scams. There is no need to rate corruption by number of stars as the CNN-IBN poll attempts to do.

From Lensonews

In another poll by Lensonnews website one will find quite a different picture. That is mainly because that poll is only from 5 metro cities. But what Lensonews does is that keeps a clear focus on critical issues rather than trying to flavour the issues with some agenda. There are many issues that a government handles but some are critical to ordinary citizens. To confuse that by multiple choices or choices of degrees is a clearly dishonest poll. That poll also indicates Narendra Modi as a clearly popular choice for the next PM. But that can also be set aside as urban bias

CNN-IBN isn’t yet done with these polls. They will carry one segment each night till independence day. By the time they finish you might find it hard to remember what people’s opinions really are. And, of course, they will tell you Manmohan Singh is still an honourable man.