The farce called development

As I write this, I can hear the various generators operating around my house here in Gurgaon. There has been no electricity here in last 12 hours and there are no chances of any reprieve either.
We talk about development in our country. Especially during the elections, most political parties want to attract attention of the middle class and upper middle class by warping about the development work which they have carried out or plan to carry out. For all other sections of society they have their tactics of regionalism, secularism and socialism. Gurgaon is soon turning into a financial hub of Northern India. A majority of its inhabitants are from the urban middle class. Gurgaon can boast of the maximum number of malls, sprawling office space and the soon to be launched Metros.
But the basic civic amenities are in the worst possible state here. There is no electricity for hours at a stretch. The roads are worse than those in villages. Every evening, the traffic jam is probably the worst of its kind and the law and order situation has plunged to a lowest possible level with murders and robberies taking place on almost daily basis.
I recently finished reading The White Tiger, in which Gurgaon was described as the closest possible replica of America in India. I hope that the author was only talking about costs of real estate and nothing else.
With elections in Gurgaon around the corner, I made an effort to look into the profiles of the incumbent MP and also the closest competitor. The present MP seems to have done nothing about the pathetic condition of the infrastructure in Gurgaon. Even though I am not too sure about the credentials of the his closest competitor, Dr. Sudha Yadav of BJP, but a quick google search tells me that the last time she was an MP, she made the best possible use of the MP fund for her constituency. These facts for sure can be misleading, but I will stick to the simple logic of not voting for the current MP because he seems to have done nothing for the 'millennium city' in last five years. Atleast it doesnt show. I guess this is what anti incumbency factor is all about.
I wonder, if cities like Gurgaon, which gets so much media attention is in such a bad state, with its local leaders doing nothing for it, what would be the conditions of the small villages and towns. Where is the Rs 2 crore per year MP fund going? Every year Rs 1150 crores is allocated to Lok Sabha MPs for development work in their constituencies...We need to know the where this money is going...RTI anyone??

Where is the Unbiased Media??

- Ankit Nagori

A couple of days back, I was watching an election TV debate on a prominent English news channel. There were representatives from all major political parties, and besides them, there were a couple of political experts and of course the anchor from the news channel. I generally enjoy such discussions because, they are pointed discussions and they bring out the best side of all the politicians involved. But that day, I didn't enjoy the debate. I was annoyed to watch it. For once, my belief on the phrase 'Unbiased Media' was shaken. There were many reasons to it. Lets look at them one by one:

1. There were 6-7 people participating in the debate. Out of which only one politician belonged to a separate school of thought. Rest six belonged to a 'secular' mindset. Why is it that no other politician from a similar school of thought was invited for the debate. It has become a trend to pit one politician from the so called "non secular" party against a combined force of 6-7 secular politicians. It hardly was a balanced debate. And the leader rightly lost his cool over this issue.

2. The political experts who were present there were extremely cynical in their views. But that too against a particular alliance. Its very difficult for a political analyst to have an unbiased opinion, but then why not invite 2-3 experts who represent diverse school of thoughts.

3. The role of the anchor is to moderate the discussion and bring order to the debate. Here, the anchor was playing his own part to sideline the leader who was already against 7-8 people alone. The anchor was clearly not being unbiased in his comments and closing statements.

These few points made me analyse the media space in the last few days. The Varun Gandhi issue has been grabbing so much media space. Why? Even if he is wrong, let it be. Let the law take its own course. Why is the incident being blown out of proportion. These thoughts made me more cynical towards my analysis and I realised that during last elections, news channel would go to villages, show a malnutrition child and ask us if this is 'India Shining'. I am sure the situation in those villages is still the same. But this time they are not going there and asking if this is "Bharat Nirmaan". News channels, especially the English Media is playing a very unhealthy role in these elections and its outlook is extremely biased against a particular alliance. This is a sad thing for a country which soon will be polling to choose their next Prime Minister. People should at least have access to unbiased and true reports and information so that they can take best possible decisions.

We all have a bias towards a particular party, but we media persons, cannot reflect our biased views in our reports. This is why, the need of a citizen journalism model is more than ever. In this article, I am not trying to take any sides, but I am just trying to express my disappointment at the irresponsibility which English News channels are showing.


Jai Hind!