In praise of silence... Why shouldn't ministers be protected from dead children?

By Anand Mazgaonkar*

is supposed to be India’s cleanest city—of course, according to Central Government data, and given its stellar track record on transparency, accountability, and data integrity, it must be treated as entirely reliable. Therefore, any news about deaths due to water contamination must not be allowed to find its way into media outlets.

After all, what are 13–14 deaths? BJP governments have brazened out far worse—demonetisation, the Covid tragedy, oxygen shortages, farmers’ deaths, Dalit rapes, mob lynchings, Ajay Mishra Teni, Kuldeep Sengar, Brij Bhushan, et al.

Anurag Dwary, the journalist who insisted on pushing the Minister to answer questions about children’s deaths and thereby forced him to lose his cool, is completely at fault. Journalism cannot be about burning issues or poor people’s lives and deaths. It ought to be about whether the Prime Minister cuts his mangoes or licks them (remember that doyen of journalism, ? Aam kaat ke khate hain ya chaat ke?). If the offending journalist Anurag Dwary forgot Akshay Kumar’s shining example, he should at least have been conscious of the fact that he is an employee of . If Anurag Dwary is going to defy post-2014 journalistic norms, he should be stripped of his microphone, just as policemen are stripped of their belts wherever they lack political patronage.

The Nation ought to be told what is happening to journalistic ethics and norms. One day suddenly turns on the government over , Sengar, and Ankita Bhandari. The next day Anurag Dwary is concerned about deaths in Indore? Where is all this headed? Why is it spiralling out of control? Journalists today, courts tomorrow. And who knows—Gyanesh Kumar may suddenly discover his spine too! What ideas will that give Messrs Nitish and Naidu?

All journalists who obtained their journalism degrees before ’s India achieved independence in 2014 ought to be derecognised and thrown out of their jobs. They can take ’s help (remember that journalist in Amethi?) if they don’t know how to do it. Or why haven’t they yet thought of the bright idea of sending a bulldozer to Anurag Dwary’s residence? They only need to convince themselves that Anurag Dwary is actually Altaf Hussain Dwary. Only those with degrees in or should be employed by .

Being only a State Minister, poor does not even enjoy the luxury of engineering distractions—diversions like Balakot or Pulwama. If these are unable to take any of the steps listed above, they should at least grant Mr Kailash Vijayvargiya the same privilege as Prime Minister Modi: no journalist interface, no press conferences. If even that is not possible, they should at least provide Vijayvargiya with Z+ paramilitary protection. And if the Z+ personnel are busy with Modi, , and , they should at least give him three-layer security of goons. It ought to be Mr Vijayvargiya’s constitutional right and privilege—equality before law—that the Modis and Shahs so richly enjoy.

Amen.

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*Social activist

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