Shailesh Kapoor: ChaubeyJi: The New Face Of Patriarchal Patrakaars

By Shailesh Kapoor

Unless you are living under a stone, you would be aware of a certain Bhupendra Chaubey having interviewed Sunny Leone on his CNN-IBN show ‘The Hot Seat’, and the consequent social media wrath he had to face. While the television and print media have chosen to ignore the said interview, it’s been fodder for digital media over the last week.

I have not seen much of Chaubey’s work. He’s not been an “in-the-news” journalist who begs to get noticed, for right or wrong reasons. In fact, the said interview was the first time I actually watched any long-form content featuring him.

From the name, I assume that ‘The Hot Seat’ is a grill-the-guest format, much like Karan Thapar’s show ‘The Devil’s Advocate’ that used to air on the same channel not too long ago. But how do you grill an entertainment industry personality who has no topical controversy around her? You do what Chaubey did: Take a vicious line of questioning about one aspect of her life. That she has been a porn star. Give it an Indian culture spin and you have a ‘story’.

One could say, what’s wrong with that after all? A few things.

To begin with, I think it’s highly unlikely that Leone knew the format of the show (I’m assuming it has one). The Hot Seat is no KBC or The Newshour, so when you come on it to promote a film, it’s just another promotional interview.

Chaubey came across as unprepared. I don’t think she has seen any of Leone’s film work, even songs or promotional videos, or tracked the box-office of her films, to know what her Bollywood impact has been. Leone has got a lot of press at the time of Jism 2 and Ragini MMS 2 releases, so research on her recent career would have been just a few clicks away. (Some other interviewers these days do the other extreme, where every other question starts with: “In a recent interview, you said…”)

He was also unprepared on his material in general. Those PornHub stats he rattled out seemed to be a text message from a confused intern sent during the interview’s filming.

But more than anything else, Chaubey came across as blatantly misogynistic. He applied a culture and values framework to steer the interview. A framework that probably exists in his head, and but was presented as if it was India’s official culture and values framework. Our politicians do this all the time. But Chaubey is a journalist, and should have known better.

In a subsequent blog, he defended himself, including a disclaimer that he hasn’t ever watched Leone’s porn work, and can’t even if he wanted to, because he has kids at his home (Never attended Logic 101?). Another page of that value framework on display!

Leone has gained significant support from various quarters, but this story is not about her. It’s about the existence of patriarchal mindset in our journalism, even if it’s in minority. (There are others in the Hindi media who have been guilty of similar misogyny in the past).

I’m not sure if the News Broadcasters Association has guidelines on moral conduct of journalists, especially in context of gender sensitisation. It may be time to consider the idea. Because it was embarrassing to see a male journalist tell a woman guest he has invited on his show, at a filming location of her choice: “I am wondering whether I’m getting morally corrupt because I’m interviewing you.”