Media is a tool to dispense information, but it has ..........

I wrote this post at Human All Too Human Blog. Gautam helped me in editing this blog. Do leave your comments at Human All Too Human and not here.

Yesterday, I had been to a meeting with some friends regarding the challenges facing the IT industry, the story shifted to the traits of media in India.

Lets take a typical example of what they are doing now. When Sanjay Dutt was sentenced to jail, all the tv channels ran a live coverage of his movement from Arthur Road jail in Mumbai to the Yerwada Jail in Pune. In the same state, Maharashtra that is, where thousands of people who are committing suicide, they did mind covering this. The hot discussion was whether Dutt will celebrate his Diwali incarcerated or free?

Worse still, Times Now conducted a SMS poll on whether Sanjay Dutt should be acquitted or not? Crazy indeed. I don't understand why there is a court then? Some ran a story asking whether Sanjay deserves prison after imparting Gandhijiri to the people after Munnabhai. Isn't it completely insane? For the sake of TRP, they are just telling whatever they want. Times of India ran an article whose purpose I am yet to understand.

Whenever a natural calamity or accident happens, TV channels race to show the debris and injured. They believe showing people dripping with blood is an excellent coverage which precisely isn't. Never do they make an analysis of why it happened. Constructive journalism has almost vanished off in Indian Media.

In the events of 2007 listed by CNN IBN, one of the events was Bipasha Basu kissing Ronaldo, Sanjay dutt getting sentenced and lot of other crap. It seems the development of high-speed interceptor missile, Advanced Air Defence by our DRDO is a lesser achievement compared with Bipasha kissing Ronaldo. There is not a single event which shows the challenges faced by India. They seem to show all is well, which is were the purpose of Media fails.

These days they are even influencing the decisions by the court by conducting sms polls on what the people think and putting pressure on the judiciary itself. Why do these people give an opinion provided they don't know the facts about the case.

It doesn't end there, the stories which deserve a mention, issues which require attention are never mentioned. For a state to be successful, media must be rational, it must act as a tool to dispense information not as an entity to influence decisions.