TELEPROMPT
Violence, death and defeat
Mannika Chopra

Television has shown us, sadly, that falling in love with the wrong person can cost you your life. The latest incidents of aborted young love in Jharkhand, and then in Muzaffarnagar read like something out of a primetime soap, Yeh Pyaar Na Hoga Kam, in which the Brahmin Abheer falls in love with the Kayasth Leher. But tragically, these incidents are not works of fiction. They are vignettes of a brutal social code.

It was the "unsuitable" relationship between journalists Nirupama Pathak and Priybhansu Ranjan which resulted in Pathak's untimely death in her hometown late last month. Whether she was suffocated to death by her own family, or committed suicide in despair, is not completely clear. But "the how" is immaterial. It is "the why" which is crucial. Increasingly, more and more young women are attempting to take their own lives as a reaction to the social control imposed on them by a conservative regressive patriarchal culture.

This week television taught us that the unnecessary death of young lovers is not simply a rural phenomenon or limited to Muslims living in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It is very much alive and kicking in our own backyard. The running theme linking all these global tragedies is the inexplicable desire to save family honour through blind loyalty to community and caste. Thankfully, to a channel, networks rose to the occasion, albeit sometimes with a knee-jerk reaction. It was a story that needed to be told and retold in poignant detail to create a sense of revulsion within viewers.

The death sentence given to Ajmal Kasab was expected

Honour, guilt and sin formed the background of NDTV's Big Fight, adeptly handled by Vikram Chandra. India TV, as usual, went over the top with its sensational dramatisation but that was only to be expected. Most channels sent reporters to Koderma in Jharkhand, and most were able to catch and question Ranjan on his late friend's relations with her immediate family. The picture he etched in gruesome detail was a family unhappy with the girl's choice. Hopefully, the media coverage will trigger a national strategy to deal with the problem. Better still. Perhaps a channel will start a national campaign.

Violence, death and defeat remained the recurrent theme throughout the week. The death sentence given to Ajmal Kasab, the lone survivor of the 26/11 carnage in Mumbai, was expected. It could not be otherwise; the inhumane atrocities committed by him went beyond redemption. That anyone could be so evil defied comprehension. Even then the explosion of jingoism, the ensuing hyper-tempo, and watching public prosecutor Ujjwal Nigam being felicitated with flowers and mithai after the sentence was announced were slightly disturbing. Most networks suddenly puffed up with malevolent energy.

India TV, along with Aaj Tak and Zee TV, went so far as to use a noose as part of their studio props while covering the story. All channels constantly looped the image of Nigam smilingly holding a brochure with the picture of a hangman's rope. The celebrations, which included dancing in the streets and the bursting of firecrackers, appeared at odds with the restrained grief shown by the families of victims who were being interviewed for their reactions. For the friends and families of the 166 victims, the sentence could have brought little joy.

Defeat came in the form of India's T20 debacle at the World Cup. But it took this unexpected loss in the World Cup for news channels to ruthlessly criticise Dhoni's performance as a captain. His press conference after India's loss to the West Indies was broken up visually into a litany of excuses by Times Now. Perhaps the channel has not heard one of life's guiding principles — that while you win some, you also lose some.