Saturday, May 13, 2023

"Why do anchors and their guests behave like ghouls at a post-mortem when their patient is still alive?"

"Why do anchors and their guests behave like ghouls at a post-mortem when their patient is still alive?," asked Mukul Kesavan, a historian, novelist and political and social essayist.

Mukul Kesavan, in his article titled "BJP-bin Dakshin" in The Telegraph online, reviewed the way anchors at different TV channels were covering the live election results of the Karnataka Assembly yesterday. He specially cited a moment during the Karnataka results show when the Congress’s leads dropped to 113, a bare majority. According to him the oddest reaction to the Congress’s brief slump in the leads was Rajdeep Sardesai’s bizarre outburst on the India Today channel. "Sardesai took it upon himself to chide the Congress spokesperson, Congress leaders, and party workers for a) not working hard enough on the ground to ensure a substantial majority and b) for celebrating prematurely," he wrote.

However, when it became clear that the Congress was all set to comfortably cross the majority mark, most anchors changed their tune and started praising the Congress's overall strategy. Kesavan termed the election coverage as 'T20-style' and asked: "Why do anchors and their guests behave like ghouls at a post-mortem when their patient is still alive?"

Read the full article here.