As readers of News Today are aware, V and his media pal, are all regulars in these columns and we have steadfastly chronicled, though with much consternation, not only the rise of the brigand but also the parallel rise of the brigand media as represented by the likes of the latter.
Looking at the Veerappan saga from the standpoint of the present, it is now pretty obvious that more than the escapades and exploits of the brigand, it is the spectacular scoops of the brigand media that have caught public attention and added so much spice to the entire episode.
In fact, come to think of it, while poor old Veerappan is back to square one, on the run, not even able to carry on his chosen vocation of felling trees, poaching and killing, thanks to intrusive cops on his trail, the brigand media, which converted this elusive poacher into an exclusive stuff, seem well ensconced in perpetual security, what with abundant riches -five hundred crores, if jungle tales are to be believed – at their disposal, the very constitutional press freedom to protect them and an ever eager band of professional bretheren to back them to the hilt, at their beck and call, and for a few liberal helpings of biriyani too.
In short, we are not sure if it pays to be a brigand, but it certainly pours on those who tail them, armed, not with guns mind you, but with video cameras.
Gramaphone records can be trusted to remain His Master’s Voice for ever, but not human beings. More so ambitious and avaricious journos for whom the pursuit of a journalistic career is for a larger goal of attaining prosperity, sinful though, not to speak of the incidental fame showered by a gullible public, but sponsored by the all-knowing mediamates, who each has his or her own personal agenda.
Though it was always the long arm of Veerappan that plucked out the yellow from amidst the normally red journos, it was paraded as if the latter had mastered and even patented the jungle terrain and the track that led to the brigand ‘ s lair. The brigand did not mind this assault on his ego because he nurtured this strange hope of getting amnesty despite murdering in cold blood more than a hundred humans, not to speak of countless pachyderms.
The spate of junkets by these chosen journos to the jungles during the last five years is not only forest folklore but also the toast of the civilised world with a ‘ State sponsored ‘ satellite TV, going to town as well as to the thickets to bring out the brigand ‘ s side of the story. The brigand media made it out as if the country does not deserve to exist if it does not grant amnesty to the brigand, who was only taking lives and felling trees in self-defence and it was actually the law and not the outlaw, that was in the wrong.
All very well and according to the brigand ‘ s blueprint. But when the promised surrender cum amnesty package started eluding him as he had been eluding the STF, the brigand started realising that he was being taken for a ride in his own den and by his own mercenary media, whose pen, he believed, was mightier than the guns of his hooded-lums. And while the fortunes of his visitors swelled, he remained a fugitive.
Enough even for a saadhu to turn militiant, and more so for an inflammable bandit, who immediately sought to enhance his value – nuisance value, really – by walking away with a popular matinee idol in the dead of night. He then announced that he had turned a new leaf and become a Tamil militant, fighting for the cause of Cauvery, Tamil prisoners in Karnataka, a statue for Thiruvalluvar bang in the middle of Bangalore etc, etc. The routine rituals unfolded, with the State abdicating in favour of a plenipotentiary emissary and then later succumbing to the seductive viles of a rank chauvnist, all in full public glare and under the auspices of the very free press.
Knowledgeable journos who have today thought it fit to protest apparently against POTO, but more particularly the detention of a reporter by the Karnataka police should instead ponder over certain self-evident details that had eluded their critical eye all these years. They are once again falling into the familiar trap of a perceived assault on press freedom dictated by a paranoia of the police, the usual whipping boy.
But should they continue to remain blindfolded willingly and refuse to see the sordid truths lurking behind the voluble shenanigans of a journo, now on the run? Does it not seem apparent to the larger journalistic fraternity that the affinity between the brigand and the brigand media went much beyond matching moustaches? How is it that their otherwise alert inquisitive instincts always go to sleep whenever a member of the brigand media, particularly V ‘s first favourite pal, becomes a suspect in the eyes of law, as he rightfully should be? Is pressing for a brigand ‘ s freedom also part of press freedom?
Or are these journos, whose links with the brigand clearly went beyond the normal professional calling, above the law of the land? Are these brigand mediamen fighting to protect their news source or income source? Should national security and peace of the people be sacrificed at the altar of press freedom, particularly that of such dubious buccaneers and fortune hunters for whom the media is nothing more than a respectable camouflage to cover their shady activities?
Indeed the rise of Veerappan from a routine poacher to a larger than life criminal persona owes it totally to the brigand media. Having rendered such sterling services to the nation these journos now want the State to protect them as it had done in the past, from all evil eyes.
But unfortunately for them the present is much different and so the past is coming back to haunt. Hence their keenness to take refuge under the secure shadow of press freedom. The media is certainly larger than this motely group whose prime interest now is self-preservation.
The larger media willy-nilly acquiesced in the march of fame and fortune to these men who never took any of their bretheren into confidence in their so-called journalistic sweep-stakes. Should the fraternity now compound its crime by trying to also halt the march of nemesis that is seeking to catch up with the members of the brigand‘s media?
| POINT OUT : Karl Marx must be turning in his grave, that is, if he is still lingering there, at the sight of his ideological progeny converting his simple dream of the rule of the proletariat into a draconian dictatorship of ditto! — T R JAWAHAR |