Sunday Sentiments

by Karan Thapar

  “The problem with anchors.” This answer begins. “is that they have to sound as if they mean what they are asking. So even when the question is patently silly the voice behind it is full of conviction and belief.”

  Now, on the surface that appears to be a compliment. It’s like saying you make the most damned foolish question sound credible. The only problem is that the question itself is of your own devising. So, if you are asking it, you – and you alone – are responsible for doing so. In fact, the implication is that if you had realised it was a foolish question you wouldn’t have asked it in the first place.The fact that you did proves that you too are a fool.

  This is the sort of beguiling explanation most anchors usually find themselves initially agreeing with until it is too late. By then, it is so self-incriminating that all you can do is smile and slink off.

  However, it is the third response that is the most devastating. It floors me each and every time. Actually, that’s a euphemism; I’m knocked out by it.

  “The problem with interviewers.” This final answer goes, “is that they are all the same. They are argumentative and they always look aggressive. Why can’t you people be less of one or the other? Let the conversation be less argumentative or your manner less aggressive.”

  At first hand, even I would agree with that. It sounds so reasonable. So eminently sensible. But if you think about it, you’ll realise how deeply subversive the comment actually is.

  The first suggestion is that interviewers are both argumentative and aggressive by design. Yet the truth is they are not. The second is that their argumentativeness and aggressiveness is put on and can, equally easily, be switched off. But that’s not the case and it never could be. The final assumption is that both the person and the job he or she is doing requires that argumentativeness and aggressiveness be a part of it. No doubt that could be the case on some occasions but equally there are many when the opposite is also true.

  No, the fact of the matter is that some interviews require argumentativeness and aggressiveness and others don’t. This is determined more by the interviewee than the interviewer. To blame the latter for the outcome is a teensy-weensy bit like criticising the messenger for the message. Of course, we all do but that still doesn’t make it right.

  So, to return to the original question and to try and answer it personally: am I putting on an act when you see me on the screen? The answer is both yes and no. And that’s not being facetious or flippant but the honest truth.

  Of course, anchors are trying to convey an image. They all do. When they succeed, you don’t see it as an act because it has worked. When you see through it, it has not. But on both occasions, it is a performance. Or else, how do you account for the fact that an anchor can interview a friend toughly and carry on as a pal thereafter or be seemingly sympathetic with a person he actually cannot abide and then coldly ignore him once it is over?

  Incidentally, writing is also, if not equally, an act. But can you see through it? Try by reading this piece twice!

  7

  The Rakshas Explains

  Television does strange things to one. How you are seen at the other end of the box can be radically different to how you actually look. The first time I realised this was in London. It was 1983, I was a rookie reporter and I was at a friend’s wedding. Suddenly I noticed someone break out of the crowd of guests and head towards me.

  “Are you Karan Thapar?” The man asked.

  “Deny it.” My wife Nisha whispered. “Please deny it !”

  The temptation was too great and the thrill of being recognised too new. I puffed up with pride. I smiled and, trying at the same time to be demure, I assented.

  “How odd.” He commented. “On screen, you look tall and handsome but actually you’re short and ugly.”

  Nisha always felt that I should remember this lesson for the future. But, alas, one forgets. The other day at the squash court after another one of my disastrous defeats, I found myself being consoled by my erstwhile partner. Except that it was an odd sort of sympathy he was indulging in.

  “You know judging by your screen appearance, I thought you would be a tough opponent on the court. On television, you growl and quarrel with your guests. But here at the club, you give up without even trying. Yahan pe bhi honsle aur himmat ke saath ladda karo.”

  Most people who only know me from the screen believe that I interrupt a lot, listen poorly and am full of my own opinions. So when the George Fernandes interview found favour with the Government and was screened till the audience virtually dropped I found that my “normal” behaviour was now being pitted against my so-called performance on this occasion.

  It happened quite suddenly and without warning. I was at a dinner, chatting animatedly and no doubt full of my own views on the subject, whatever it was. I suspect the person I was talking to was fed up of listening. Perhaps she wanted to get in a word of her own.

  “Can’t you be a bit more like you were with George Fernandes?” She ultimately asked, her exasperation written all over her face.

  “Whatever do you mean?” I asked.

  “Well, with George, you listened and you didn’t interrupt. He got to speak almost as much as you did. Can’t you treat me the same way tonight?”

  In fact, the lady was both right and wrong. She was right about my not interrupting the Defence Minister and listening patiently but she was wrong to suggest that I interrupt others. I don’t. But the truth of the matter is that on television people re-create you in terms of how you first appear to them. So whether they like you or dislike you depends on that first impression. Thereafter, once it’s stuck, it’s impossible to change. So I’ll always be thought of as ladaka, aggressive and constantly interrupting even though I am polite and listen attentively.

  Of course, I don’t really mind. More often than not, I benefit from the mistaken impression. After all, who wants to be thought of as a wimp? But I’m not the rakshas most people think I am.

  8

  The Most Difficult Thing

  “What’s the most difficult situation you’ve ever faced?” I was asked the other day. I was waiting outside Priya Cinema when someone popped the question. I struggled to think of an answer but was unable to come up with one.Yet at that very moment — although I did not realise it — I was facing a situation similar to what the enquiry envisaged. It’s just that it hadn’t occurred to me. Wisdom takes a while to dawn.

  Now, albeit a little late, I know the answer. The most difficult situation is deciding how to defend oneself against a scurrilous and malicious attack. It’s the sort of thing that could happen to any of us. Should you dismiss it with the contempt it deserves but run the risk that some, may be even a few, will believe it if only because of your high-minded silence? Or should you rebut it vigorously and thus appear, although mistakenly, to have been riled or to have given it substance by your response? Either way you could suffer because neither way is a guarantee of sure-fire success.

  This academic dilemma became a personal predicament when last saturday a friendly minister in the government rang on my mobile phone.

  “Karan.” said the voice I shall deliberately not identify. “Are you aware of the campaign that’s going on?”

  “Campaign?” I repeated a bit bewildered. “What campaign?”

  “You know the letter and tapes that have been sent out?”

  “No.” I said. “What are they about?”

  “Well you, actually.”

  To be honest, the penny still did not drop. I don’t expect people to take me so seriously that they organise a defamatory campaign. The effort is hardly worth it.

  “What do they say?”

  But if my voice sounded enthusiastic, I soon realised my mistake. The minister was ringing to forewarn me. The previous evening he had received a package of documents and tapes designed to prove I was anti-national. It was delivered anonymously to his residence. No doubt, similar packages had been sent to others as well.

  This was delibe
rate, well-planned hate mail. The aim was to use my television programmes and previous Sunday Sentiments to prove I was pro-Pakstani, anti-Indian and a fifth columnist who ordinary innocent people should beware of. The only thing is that everything had been deliberately and blatantly distorted. Quotations were made up, situations concocted, omissions claimed, events or statements falsely described and all of this conveyed with a pernicious interpretation calculated to make me look reprehensible.

  The rum thing is that to target me the letter had to pick on two of my journalist colleagues as well : Dileep Padgaonkar and Seema Mustafa. They were guests on an episode of my programme Court Martial where, together, we questioned the Pakistani High Commissioner. Since this episode was part of the ‘proof’ against me, it had to include them as well. Thus, they became “pro-Muslim” and co-conspirators in defaming India.

  The letter reads, “It was clearly visible that Karan Thapar and his colleagues, Dileep Padgaonkar and Seema Mustafa allowed the Pakistani High Commissioner a free run and they carried his blatant lies in the programme. “Why was there not a single question in favour of India? Why was there not a single question against Pakistan?”The carefully printed blurb on the tape asks.

  The allegation is that through silence, improper questioning, subtle connivance and even a failure to rebut or interrupt we conspired to promote Pakistan’s interests and put down India’s. At first sight, the letter seems plausible. Except the details aren’t true. They are totally false.

  So now do you see my dilemma? Should I respond to the charges and end up taking them seriously or should I ignore them and thus permit a few to believe them? It’s an impossible choice but until I faced it I had no idea how difficult it could be. The questioner outside Priya might not believe my answer when I tell him that the most difficult thing in the world is deciding how to respond to an unfair and unjustified attack but I truly mean it.

  I do, however, have a small consolation. I think I know who is responsible. In this case, their sheer ‘efficiency’ has given them away. Long before the ‘package’ was sent to assorted ministers, emails saying precisely the same thing were sent to Markand Adhikari, who owns SAB and Space TV, where my programme Court Martial is shown. The emails match these anonymous documents almost word for word. More importantly, they were signed. The names were Mrs. Manjari Desai and Mr. Sanjay Singh. I am not sure if they are pseudonyms but I do have their email address. Mrs. Desai can be contacted at manjaridesai2000@yahoo.com. Mr. Singh at delhi_2000in@yahoo.com.

  If you should write to them, give them my love!

  Point of View

  1

  In Defence of Politicians

  “Poor you! I simply don’t know how you stand it.”

  It was an odd way to start a conversation and it took me aback.

  “Stand what?”

  “The politicians you meet and keep interviewing.”

  “Why?” I asked still perplexed. But the lady looked at me as if I was the one who wasn’t making sense. She puffed on a long cigarette, blew the smoke stylishly over her shoulder and turned to explain. We were guests at a party last weekend. She was dressed in large white pearls and a transparent skimpy saree. However, I shall be discreet and hold back her name.

  “They seem such ghastly people. They come across as selfish, quarrelsome and full of themselves.”

  Her vehemence surprised me. Whilst a few politicians may be like that, the vast majority are not. Of them, my opinion is very different. But that only meant I found myself locked in a long argument. It developed into a regular ding-dong but I’m not sure I convinced her. However, I did realise that television is partly responsible for conveying this false impression. Most of you who don’t know politicians judge by the way you see them. But the presentation is neither wholly accurate nor truly fair. Today, I want to make amends.

  The problem begins with our television talk shows which encourage politicians to quarrel. It’s not that left to themselves they would be sedate and calm, reasonable and reflective, but that we’ve convinced them and probably entrapped them into believing that the fight is more important than the argument. The fault lies in the way such shows are conceived. They seek to portray the tamasha of politics — its theatre and spectacle rather than its content and substance. They generate heat but they don’t shed light.

  Unfortunately, most politicians willingly play along. Once the cameras roll, they slip into a role, perform to a preconceived script. The result is quarrelsome shouting matches which lead nowhere and are usually an end in themselves.

  This is tragic for at least two reasons. Firstly, it demonises politicians. In fact, it panders to the already widespread opinion that they are a base tribe. People readily accept what they see because it bolsters their already biased view.

  More importantly, it wastes politicians. The object of a television talk show is to inform and to learn. This can be done in many ways. By explaining issues, by discussing differing views, by seeking answers, by carefully analysing. But each of these require that we listen and to listen we have to care about what we hear.

  That’s where our problems start. Channel heads believe audiences don’t care about the discussion. They claim most subjects bore them. Worse still, they don’t think audiences can be made to listen. In their opinion, serious conversation is a switch off. Rather than risk that they blend it with drama. Create a storm in the studio and the thunder and lightening will hold the audience. It doesn’t matter that the atmospherics are simply a waste of time. Or that politicians are used as objects to laugh at rather than opportunities to learn.

  Fortunately, the solution is simple. It would follow automatically if we change our attitude to news and current affairs. So far, we judge by their ratings. We assume they are products for a mass market. But they’re not, nor should they be. News, and more so current affairs, are only for those who want to know and, dare I say it, care to.They are not vehicles for delivering eyeballs to advertisers. Yet when they are treated as such, it becomes inevitable they will be designed primarily to capture attention. That’s why channel heads are scared of demanding concentration and, instead, lure with cacophony.

  Yet we have producers, editors, cameramen and even anchors who could comfortably take on the BBC and CNN. We could easily deliver a comparable product for ourselves. The reason we don’t is because those who run channels either don’t trust the audience or don’t know how to differentiate it. They fear that if they make you concentrate you will run away and they don’t have the confidence to realise that if you do it won’t really matter.

  So this is not a case of getting the programmes we deserve. Clearly, we deserve better. This is a case of receiving the type of programmes our channel heads think we will accept. The question is: how do you change that?

  That’s the challenge the lady I met last weekend should address. Unfortunately, that’s also the bit of the conversation she found most difficult to follow. But I can confidently predict that if she succeeds, she will discover that most politicians are very different to the impression she has of them.

  Now, wouldn’t that be a pleasant surprise?

  2

  Oops, Excuse Me !

  What is a journalist? You might find that an odd question from an old hack. However, it’s prompted not by idle curiosity but a recent report on Star News. And let me not mince my words. The report disturbs me for it confuses the role of a journalist and transgresses the limitations of the profession.

  Last Saturday, Star reported on a campaign to catch snake charmers trading in endangered species. On the surface, it was a story that purported to show the media in a good light. Ecological protection is a cause we all defend.

  The problem was the Star team played a critical role in ‘deceiving’ the snake charmers. Had the reporter and crew not been there, the snakemen would not have shown up and, it follows, they would never have been caught. The fact that Star made a clean breast of this complicity in their commentary matters not one jot.

 
The snake charmers were led to believe they were being filmed on behalf of a foreign purchaser of snake skins and in due course, the client would show up to clinch the deal. The TV news team thus pretended to be something other than they were. But once the reptile catchers revealed the snakes in their possession, the police showed up instead, declared they had caught them red-handed and marched them off to jail.

  Now journalists are not policemen, do-gooders, moral arbiters or even keepers of the flame. Of course, on the op-ed page, we slip into these roles; but a Star news reporter is not an opinion maker nor is news the place for such functions.

  Reporters ought to tell stories as they find them. It’s in the objectivity of their account that so-called journalistic truth lies. If they tamper with it, no matter for how good a cause, they will end up telling a lie. And a lie in journalism is more than just an un-truth. It’s the erosion of credibility.

  Journalists are believed because their audience (or readership) holds them to be credible. In other words, they trust them. And when that trust breaks down, journalism ceases to be. That, after all, is the difference between a rag and a reputable publication. No one trusts a rag. You don’t believe what you read in it.The news, on the other hand, is only worth watching while you believe it. Here, credibility (or trust) is everything.

  I admit the snake charmer story is a small incident but it’s nonetheless telling. And I also accept most people would not care to judge Star News by it. Even I hesitate to do so. Yet the malaise at its core threatens the health of the entire bulletin.

  Let me explain.

  Journalists often expose situations. To do so they rely on information given in confidence. That confidence is everything, for many of those who talk want to help but are also anxious to avoid incrimination or trouble. That’s why journalists refuse to reveal their sources even up to and including the threat of imprisonment.