Voyage to the Moon

Watch the early trick cinema of Milies "The Voyage to the Moon"

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Bhopal verdict and media activism

June 7, 2010 will go down in history as one of the saddest days ever. For, it was on that day that the famous (or infamous) judgement of a Bhopal sessions court came out, after as many as 26 years. In fact, that decision was so disappointing that media all over India came out in the open to raise crucial issues relating to the tragic 1984 Bhopal gas leak and developments thereafter. Perhaps, never before in the history

of India have the media institutions were so united, taking a clear stand against the judgement. Even as one is happy at such developments, one, nevertheless, is dismayed by such boisterous media activism.

There may be many facets to these developments. It is a known factor that if media suffer from dearth of ‘big’ news, anything big has to be made bigger. Something similar is the case with the media activism following Bh

opal verdict. Secondly, media in the recent past have come under severe attack for being highly elitist and not giving adequate concentration for the common man. It looks as though media, especially the electronic media, want to redeem themselves of such a ‘misconception’.

Whatever be the case, media are doing a commendable job in discussing and debating the Bhopal verdict. In fact, they seem to overdo it. In the bargain, the distinction between news and editorial comments seems to blur. Each TV anchor seems to have his/her strong opinion about the issue which he/she utters with a certain amount of sentimentalism.

Despite all such drama by media, it is because of media that even the Government seems to have woken up to the tragic reality. Recently the government announced a relief package of 180 crores, besides assuring that steps would be taken to bring Anderson back to India. Would that be enough? Government needs to do more. Union Carbide and its parent company Dow Jones must be made to pay compensation for all the victims, including those suffering to this day. Also, it is the responsibility of those companies to clean up the defunct Union Carbide factory. Steps must be taken to pressurise through international agencies to make sure that they own up the responsibility, at least now after 26 years.It is in this context that one must relook at the traditional functions given to the mass media, namely, informing, educating and entertaining

As regards bringing about social change, many scholars think that mass media must not be burdened with such responsibility; social change does take place through awareness created among masses. Mass media have been traditionally accused of agenda setting. However, the recent media activism and the agenda setting by the media seem to have worked very well. Generating public opinion is an important role that mass media must play. And mass media, especially the electronic media, played that role to best results, even though they gave too much of the same thing over and over again.

The role to the mass media is only to bring about awareness and perhaps play a bit of persuasion role. It is the Government which must take notice of the issues and concerns raised by the media and act immediately. In this case, the concerns have been well articulated. It is time the Government acted with a certain amount of urgency.

Who is greater? Author or the script writer?

‘3 idiots’ film has broken all box office records as regards collections and profits. Part of the reason, one might say, is the kind of negative (or positive?) publicity it got due to certain mis-understanding between Chetan Bhagat, the author of ‘Five Point Someone’ which, it is claimed, has been adapted for the ‘3 idiots’ script, and the film’s makers. There is no mention of Chetan Bhagat’s name at the beginning of the film. Only a small name tag appears during the credits at the end of the film.

Has it all been done for greater publicity, one cannot be sure. However, both the parties have a point to make. If the story has been taken from Mr Bhagat’s book, due credit with royalty has to be given to him, which the director, Rajkumar Hirani and the Producer, Vidhu Vinod Chopra say, has been given. But Mr Bhagat does not quite agree. According to him, the

film is 70 per cent faithful to his book and as much credit has not been given to him. In fact, he says he has been overlooked deliberately.

Amir Khan and the ‘3-idiots’makers have a different point to make. According to them, even though the film has been based on the story of Mr Bhagat’s book, the script writer Mr Abhijit Joshi spent over three years to adapt it to a film narrative and hence it is apt that Mr Joshi gets his due. Whether the fact that Abhijit spent three years to make a script justifies the gross neglect of Mr Bhgat, the author, is further debatable.

Amir Khan and his team at ‘3 idiots’ have a point to make. Film is indeed a different medium altogether. It is a visual medium and the style of a novel can never suit the film medium. What novel says in a page, the film may have to show in just about 20 seconds. That is indeed a challenge. Further, film does not give much of a scope for imaginati

on like the novel, as the audience sees everything unfolding in front of them. They may interpret the symbols, but even that may not give much scope for imagination. In such a situation, it is indeed a hard task for the script writer to adapt a story to a visual medium and make the audience involve into it so much that they relate their own life experiences with the film narrative. Indeed, ‘3 idots’ achieves this to a very great extent, simply because the script writer has been very imaginative in his treatment of the story.

All the same, can the original author be neglected? Is it not true that but for the idea, the script writer can do nothing? For every art, idea is the basic building block and in the case of 3 idiots, the idea has come from Mr Bhagat. By acknowledging the idea borrowed from someone can never take credit away from you, even as you have created a wonderful script. So one finds it very odd, why one must shy away from accepting the fact that one is only the creator of ‘methodology’ and not ‘idea’?

Both have a point; but the ‘3 idiots’ think tank would have not lost much (except of course a few more bucks they made due to the undue publicity) by adding that one extra name at the beginning of the film.

Telangana issue as discussed in the media

The struggle for Telangana state in Andhra Pradesh, spearheaded by the Telenagana Rashtra Samithi president T S Chandrashekhar has become a highly debatable issue across the nation, especially in media circles. The struggle, however, has taken an ugly turn, as the leaders are trying to play on the emotions of the common man, thus polarizing the whole state in terms of geographical and community divides. The historical unification of states based on language in 1956 may have had its limitations, but it was the best method possible those days and has been a major success in several states in the South. The leaders in Andhra across political parties, though, are raking up the whole issue to get political mileage and strengthen their base.

The entire episode has been the staple food of the media in the last couple of weeks. In fact, media, especially the electronic media, were chewing the Hedley … over and over again, much to the annoyance of the viewer. It is a forgone conclusion that the US will never extradite Hedley to India. Besides, it is also alleged that Hedley may have been an FBI informer and he can embarrass the US in more than one terms. Here was a clear case of dearth of news and media went all over Hedley making him the most important person of the world for quite many days.

So, the Telangana ‘power struggle’ came as a saving grace for the media and they were too happy to gobble it before anything could be decided through proper channels. For days together reporters got stuck in Hyderabad, more precisely, near Osmania Univeristy and doled out stories after stories of the ‘struggle’. Every single move and almost every breath TS Chandrasekhar was recorded. Some reporters even took courage to send him to a coma, even as he tried to speak. But no channel, no newspaper, seemed to do an analysis and take a firm stand. Media looked more confused than the politicians themselves. It is true media are not the ones to give solutions. But powers that be can draw a lot from media when they make decisions. TV channels were busy showing the violence than going in depth. What they were looking for, it seemed, was some excitement and not so much an effort to find a solution, making leaders aware of the ramifications of a crucial decision.

Indian media seem to be struggling when there is ‘dearth’ of news. When nothing ‘big’ is happening, they seem to be lost and find it difficult to appease the audience. This is struggle is mainly due to the fact that media today have termed only certain events, happenings and developments as newsworthy and not others. Scores of developments taking place as regards agrarian crisis, doubts, famines, floods, communal discord, corruption etc do not seem to get enough media attention. Even if they do, follow up is hardly to come by. In the bargain, viewers are left high and dry as they have to struggle to keep their heads straight reading, viewing the same stuff day in and day out.

Media need to at least seriously consider the well being of the viewer.

Media loves to mock the ‘austerity’

So these days media are giving far too much attention to the austerity drive of the Congress Party. What began as an expectation of all ministers (as said by Pranob Mukherji) ended up being an expectation of only Congress MPs. Of course, the likes of Rahul Gandhi did endorse the whole idea and followed it up by actually practicing it by traveling in a train. So did Madam Sonia, who traveled in an economy class. However, there were the likes of Shashi Tharoor who got some unsolicited publicity with their cattle-class controversy.

Be that as it may, are the media going overboard? There have been series of discussions and debates on the issue. One wonders whether so much precious time should be wasted on an ordinary subject as this. Is it not a personal choice of people, as expressed by a panelist on NDTV? The larger issue, according to many thinkers, is the widespread corruption which is far greater an evil than anything else bogging down this country.
Nevertheless, some feel that our leaders must set an example for people. They must lead by example in being austere and simple, even if they have excessive wealth. Others feel this is sheer hypocrisy. One needs to question how our leaders are able to afford luxurious residences and travel. All that is, no doubt, a reflection of wealth amassed thorough unjust means. That is, of course, a serious issue to address. You are trying to save a pie and gobble up a shark. It looks ridiculous. Media do not seem to be addressing this issue adequately. Their whole concentration seems to be to make a mockery of the austerity drive and laugh at those who have thought of it. They are not so much concerned about the melee eating into the vitals of our political system. They consider the austerity drive as tokenism. Fine. But if a leader is sincere, media have the responsibility to recognise it. There have been several leaders who are practicing austerity much before the whole issue came for discussion and debate. There is no hypocrisy there. These leaders know that they need to be people’s servants and not bosses.
It is true that austerity becomes ridiculous when our leaders have so much wealth. here are others who might even argue that if our leaders are able to perform and can deliver, no one really needs to care about their austerity. But even when one has wealth one can consciously choose to be austere. One may be rich; but the question is whether one can feel with the life situation of common people. Can he/she be as simple and humble like simple people?
Should leaders be austere? Should they set an example to their people? The answer lies in how a leader approaches his/her position? If he/she thinks that being leader is to be superior and domineering, then austerity does not sound good. But if a leader considers himself/herself a representative of common people, austerity, though symbolic, can definitely be a path to connect with the masses.