TELEVISTA
Playing cops, media style
Amita Malik

THERE has been quite a succession of human tragedies which have become crime thrillers on the small screen. A few of them have become of national interest. But the countrywide interest in the Aarushi tragedy has crossed all regional frontiers and has even pushed cricket aside as far as national viewing goes. There are good reasons for this. In cases like that of Jessica Lal, several outsiders were involved. In Aarushi’s case her whole family is not only involved but under suspicion. Her father is under arrest. Her mother is undergoing lie detection tests. It brings up the whole question of family relationships, of the bond, or lack of it between parents and children.

To add to the complications, there is a domestic servant, the first suspect, also found murdered. Perhaps the main reason for the viewing figures shooting up nationwide was best summed by a young viewer from the South. "It might have happened in Delhi, but to us teenagers, she seems like one of us, because teenagers all over India have something in common". A nationwide survey by a news channel got the same sort of answers from all over India— from Kolkata, Guwahati and Thiruvananthapuram.

Aarushi’s murder has become a real life thriller in which everyone seems involved, perhaps a tribute to human nature which does not have regional frontiers either. But the distressing part of media coverage is the sensationalism which has taken over. One channel found a house and rooms identical to those of Aarushi’s house, since the police has sealed it off, and tried to reconstruct the murder, finding out the extent of noise which can filter through closed doors and half-open and open doors.

It seems that the channels are no longer happy with the professionals doing all the investigations. They want to have parallel investigations of their own and, hopefully, beat the police to it. What this does to the family and friends involved and the confusion it causes in the minds of the public does not seem to matter. It is, after all, sensationalism that sells.

Coming over to a completely different field, I have been watching for some days the coverage of sport in India and in other countries. In India, it is only when the ball is in play that we are free of advertisements. One is not even given the time to see who is out, who took the catch or who the bowler was. Yet, in another place abroad, one was able to see that the viewer comes first. In India, as soon as a player is injured and the medics arrive to inspect the injury, ads take over.

Strictly speaking, the TV viewer is supposed to be shown everything that the person present at the match can see. So viewers are cheated of their due. Contrast the coverage of tennis in London recently. Rafael Nadal was injured during a match with Novak Djokovic. We saw the medics arrive. We saw Nadal take off his shoes and socks and show the medics exactly where his foot was hurting. We viewers were following it all with equal interest, because the match, which interested us, depended on examination of the injury and the doctor’s verdict on it.

We watched with anxiety as the player seemed uncertain about continuing. It was an important semi-final match. But after a little bit of hesitation, shaking of his leg and ankle, he returned to the court to play with appreciative cheers from the audience. Had it been Indian coverage, we would have seen the player getting injured and asking for medical help. After that, we would have had endless advertisements, and only when the player got up from his seat and walked to the court would our natural anxiety be given a chance.

A foreign cricketer, I think it was Ricky Ponting, recently watched a cricket match in India on his TV in his hotel room. He remarked afterwards that nowhere else in the world had he seen a cricket match so overwhelmed with advertisements that one was hardly able to watch the match with any degree of concentration or comfort. Yes, it is only in India that it happens. No authority, not even the Ministries of Sport and Information and Broadcasting, seem at all concerned over this encroachment on sports lovers’ rights, although they have the power to protect them.