By Ranjona Banerji
Happy New Year to all at MxM!
Tradition dictates that this, my last media column for 2023, should look back at the year and provide some insights and nuggets of wisdom…
Did anything happen this year that made the media and its ardent followers any wiser?
Did we cover ourselves with glory as we delved deep into some global scandal of earth-shattering proportions?
Tragically, I just can’t remember any such event. Either local or global.
Women wrestlers started a protest in January, complaining against sexual assault by the president of the Wrestling Federation of India, Brij Bhushan Singh. The athletes included the best of our crop of award-winning wrestlers, men and women.
We didn’t really hear about this much in January. Why, you may ask…
Rather, you may not. Because Brij Bhushan Singh is a BJP MP. And that is the same old story which has been repeated ad nauseum over the past 10 years in the Indian media.
In March, we had some clue of what was going on… well, the increasing distress of the wrestlers was matched by the decreasing media interest in the plight of women who have been sexually abused and assaulted.
You know the drill. Protect the party and life will pour incredible power and riches on you. Maybe a selfie or two as well.
In May reports began trickling in of massive social unrest in the state of Manipur. Where is this place, you may ask. It is in the north east of India. When I say reports, I mean from families and friends of people affected by the violence and arson. The media, you ask once again, as I suspected you would. Lessons still not learnt after over 10 years.
Manipur is a state ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party. A famous “double engine” state which guarantees special privileges for the development of the state and its residents. This includes complete media silence when the state goes through turmoil and civil war. The policy is unique in its masterstrokiness: you are left alone to carry on with your violence and destruction and civil disruption, without any outside interference at all. Uncontained violence from May to December, that is something of a progress record which few governments can compete with.
Over the past few years, we have consistently admired the media in western democracies for being so brave and for speaking truth to power and criticising their governments and politicians.
Until on October 7, when Hamas fired rockets and sent fighters from Gaza into Israel. From there on, the western media went into an anti-Palestinian pro-Israeli frenzy of mammoth proportions. Horrendous stories of Hamas atrocities got enormous traction. Whispers that these atrocities were exaggerated were clamped down upon and the war cry of “But have you condemned Hamas” rang through the “civilized” first world, with the media frothing and fuming at the bit that any person should dare speak for Palestine.
Since October 7, we have learnt that many of those stories were total fabrications, the beheading of 40 babies, the rape of women, the number of deaths themselves. Israel’s armed forces itself killed at least 200 Israelis which they blamed on Hamas.
As of now, at least 20000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces. Settler violence has increased in Gaza and West Bank. The United Nations has lost at least 100 human rights workers to Israeli fire. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, as of December 23, 69 journalists and media workers have been killed by Israeli forces, 62 of those Palestinian.
The western media remains untouched. So much like the Indian media over the last 10 years.
If anything else of import happened this year, please forgive for not remembering it. Did it make you happy that the media was doing its primary job of exposing those in power? That’s all I can wish for us in the coming year.
Don’t laugh.
Happy New Year. See you on the other side.
Ranjona Banerji is a senior journalist and commentator. She writes on MxMIndia on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Her views here are personal