During a press conference in 2009, Sikh journalist Jarnail Singh threw a shoe at then home minister P. Chidambaram who was seen to be defending the Central Bureau of Investigation’s exoneration of Jagdish Tytler, indicted by fact-finding commissions as a key facilitator of the 1984 anti-Sikh violence. Singh was arrested but then let off. Subsequently, he fought and won an election and became an MLA. However, his day in the sun still remained that one act of defiance.
On May 14, 2021, Jarnail Singh died of COVID-19-related complications. He was one of more than 4,000 people who died on that day, according to official statistics. However, unofficial estimates put the death toll in the country was much higher. Jarnail Singh’s story is significant especially in the light of the obsequious manner in which a section of the Indian media treats the current regime, especially the prime minister and the home minister.
Jarnail Singh. Photo: PTI
The fact that merely a decade ago, a journalist could not just ask difficult questions to a top minister but could go as far as to do what he did, seems surreal now. For the past seven years, the Indian media has largely carried the version of truth conjured up by the government, and as things stand right now, there does not seem to be any desire for change. From Republic TV to Zee News (whose owners are close to the Bharatiya Janata Party) to Aaj Tak and Times Now (whose sister newspaper dropped an op-ed by Jug Suraiya for reasons that can only be described as fear on May 14), some of the country’s largest news channels have been creating narratives overshadowing the issues that matter.
Also read: Jug Suraiya’s Column That Was Dropped From Times of India’s Print Edition
Travelling in Jarnail Singh’s shoes
Going back to Jarnail Singh’s moment in the spotlight and the media universe back then, the shoe-throwing incident was not just an aberration. There were other instances too. Within a few years of the Jarnail incident, Suresh Kalmadi, a Congress MP at the time, was heckled in Pune by rival BJP and Maharashtra Navnirman Sena corporators and the same year, the then finance minister, Pranab Mukherjee’s son Abhijit was taken to task by Arnab Goswami on live TV, in one of the first viral momenta on the Indian internet.
To figure how much our media landscape has changed, imagine a Muslim journalist being able to ask the current home minister about the 2002 Gujarat riots or the Sohrabuddin-Kauser Bi fake encounter, or say Union minister Nitin Gadkari being heckled in Pune or Jay Shah (Amit Shah’s son) being grilled by any news anchor in India. Leave aside the fact that none of these men will ever willingly come into the firing line, if you think that any journalist or news channel which gets access to them can even have the audacity to think of doing this, then there’s a bridge to be sold to you. While we are living through perhaps the worst crisis in India since independence, the media has found it difficult to even cover that with integrity.
In light of Big Media’s genuflection, it has fallen on the otherwise indifferent international media to take note of the horrific unraveling of the COVID-19 tragedy in India. This does not mean, however, that the prime minister has given up his claim on his version of the truth.
Over the second week of May, many obscure and newly established websites like ‘The Daily Guardian’ ad ‘Australia Today’ published articles decrying the naysayers and singing the song of the dear leader. While there was not much substance in these defences, the articles were still retweeted with enthusiasm by multiple ministers.
In India today, the peoples’ means to accurately assess their leader’s actions have been snatched away by Big Media either fudging the truth, sharing a specific version of the truth, or outrightly lying. How will we even agree on one truth? Especially when the media has only amplified the prime minister’s word as the gospel truth? The signs of cult are all there and have existed for a long time, from treating disagreement as treasonous to asking people to reject modernity in some way and accept traditional beliefs (in this case the Hindutva beliefs) as the way forward, to employing newspeak (making secularism a bad word).
Also read: An Answer to ‘if Not Modi, Then Who?’
In fact, on closer examination, the great love affair of India’s largely Hindu middle class with Modi starts to look a lot like an abusive relationship with a cult leader.
The most prominent sign of this abusive nature of our relationship is the oft-repeated line, “If not Modi then who?” This is an internalisation of the thought that no one else will “love me like this person does”. By accepting certain abuses in the name of ‘policy masterstroke’, these supporters have also ventured into that same route which reflects in their notion of there being no other alternative. Many have convinced themselves that they deserve exactly this behaviour.
Just notice how a section of society is readily willing to accuse themselves and other citizens of bad social behaviour and absolve the government and its leader. Some of them have even accepted the idea of paying for the vaccine, when they know people in far richer countries are getting it for free. Earlier, they were willing to stand in queues during demonetisation or explain away the price rise in petrol as an exercise in restraining the usage of automobiles. This is a pattern of abuse described as learned helplessness, where a person starts to behave as if they are completely incapable of changing their current situation.
Also read: BJP Furious as Top Gujarati Poet Blames ‘Naked King’ Modi for Corpses Floating in the Ganga
Jarnail Singh achieved fame during a period in India’s history when perhaps many of us felt open to being critical of the government, where a journalist and his shoe shared the spotlight with the most powerful of the country. His death comes at a time when even fantasising about questioning the government seems like a thought crime.
He died on a day when the Delhi Police arrested 17 people on charges of circulating posters critical of the prime minister. The poster asked, “Why were the vaccines that were meant for our kids sent abroad?” – a question that none of the pliant media organisations have even bothered to ask. He died on a day when one of India’s largest newspaper the Times of India decided to not print a satirical op-ed which was critical of the prime minister and the home minister.
The news of the journalist’s sudden demise was a brute reminder of how far we have come and how long it might be before things change. Rest in peace, Jarnail Singh, and shoe.
Raj Shekhar Sen is a management consultant based out of San Francisco specialising in cyber security and privacy regulations. He also writes as a freelancer on politics and runs a podcast on politics.
