TV DEBATES

Today India has some twenty 24-hour news channels and all of them organise TV debates on regular basis on the latest developments. It is a very healthy trend as the voters at large get the stand of different political parties right from the mouth of the authorized spokesmen of the concerned parties, adding authenticity to their statement till it is rebutted by a still senior party representative.

I am almost a regular viewer of some major debates for their better intellectual level. I ignore debates on blind-faith, minor issues and those being intentional and parochial. However, I do not appreciate the time management of such programmes. When election comes, the EC makes allotment of time to the political parties based on their strength of representation in the legislatures. So does the Speaker of the Lok Sabha when some important debates including no-confidence motion are on the floor of the House. But in the TV debates, the most vocal and noisy panelists eat away the time of their decent counterparts. The spokesmen of RJD, JDU, SHIV Sena and NC having very limited representation, consume more time than the nationalist political parties.

The idea should be to send well educated, decent and convincing partymen on such channels. Unfortunately and perhaps intentionally they send members who are obstinate, loud, abusive and come without any serious homework. In Indian philosophy it is prescribed, “avidyo va savidyo va, sthoolkayah prshishyate” (meaning thereby that the Panditji may or may not be a scholar, but he must be heavily muscular to thrash the opponent if his own logic has let him down). I also remember a joke seen and heard in a Ramlila performance a couple of years ago. Ravan exhorts his demons to come out and attack Ram. The joker tells him, “Sir you go and fight and I, remaining  in Lanka will hurl such nasty abuses that out of shame Ram will run back ot Ayodhya”. Most of these spokesmen in TV debates just want to defeat the counterparts  by being shamelessly abusive.

These abuses and loss of temper are often perceptible when a panelist suddenly falls short of logic. If you ask the non-BJP participants to speak without any reference Modi and Gujarat riots 2002, they will be just reticent because they have no issue. The Congress, RJD, JDU, SP and some other parties are blatantly targeting Modi to appease the minority votes without ever thinking the danger of stirring the hornet’s nest and instigating polarization of majority votes. You ask the JDU spokesman as to how his party took 17 years to understand that the BJP was communal, he will talk about everything on the earth without touching the question. Immediately after being the Rail Minister, Lalu Yadav constituted an enquiry committee on Gujarat riots despite an enquiry was already going on under the SC orders. The result came quickly and automatically became infructuous. If the RJD spokesman is asked how is it that the Fodder Scam cases are still lingering for nearly twenty years, he will start beating about the bush. When Robert Vadra’s land scam in Haryana came up, the local Chief Minister constituted an enquiry which within a few days gave its report giving a clean chit to him. All these things get exposed before the public thanks to the TV channels. No party representative accepts that his party has committed any wrong. But the TV debates give an excellent opportunity to the viewers to smell the rat and make their own decisions.