Opinion How the game was played

Previously,news channels positively delighted in close ups of the dead. But although we saw injured CRPF personnel in hospital and bodies lying in an inert row,news channels spared us the gory details. Also,the coverage delved deeper than the headlines of the immediate massacre: While channels like Times Now and NDTV clearly “took sides” as Arnab Goswami said,against the Naxals,they also questioned the government and the home secretary,critically. They revealed difficulties Operation Green Hunt faced in its attempts to eliminate the Maoists — Headlines Today accompanied a CRPF unit in Dantewada on a fruitless operation. NDTV interviewed ordinary inhabitants of the villages combed by the CRPF. People described how security forces had brutalised them. CNN-IBN reported on NGOs and activists in the north east being rounded up for “anti-national activities” because they opposed “development” efforts such as the construction of dams.

Thus,beyond the rhetoric of discussions,TV news managed to convey a complex,multi-dimensional issue that just won’t go away.

India TV’s garment investigation provided the Shoaib Malik-Ayesha Siddiqui controversy with a new dimension,too. Since the proposed Malik-Mirza was revealed last week,we’ve seen more of Shoaib than we ever did on the cricket field. We’ve seen little of Ayesha S,barring her photographs with or without Shoaib,but we’ve heard her story till we could recite it. That the story has become an Indo-Pak affair,involving two established sportspersons,that there seemed to be more to it than met then eye,lent it a piquancy — irresistible to the media on both sides of the Wagah border.

The centrepiece of the coverage was Sania Mirza and Shoaib Malik holding forth (or should it be court?) at an open-air news conference on Monday. It followed a weekend of the Shoaib and Ayesha show with her allegations that he was married to her. What a tangled triangle. Sania Mirza tried to pin the media to the baseline with her verbal volleys,flushed and angry. An aggressive,suspicious bunch of journalists pounced on her and Shoaib’s every statement. For someone who has been a media darling till now,it must have been a harrowing experience for Sania.

Thereafter,news channels were abuzz with speculation that their wedding may not take place. By Tuesday,the will-they-won’t-they marry was reported as a favourite on the satta bazaar. The media was clearly enjoying itself and Sania’s plea to let the law take its course did not inhibit them: they continued to pursue the couple and the story.

This was a kind of Tiger Woods moment for Shoaib that was rubbing off on Mirza. Is that fair? No,of course not. But the relentless media coverage seems to have forced Shoaib and Sania (odd they have the same first and second name initials) to answer questions publicly. It may have also contributed to Shoaib’s divorcing Ayesha,as reported on Wednesday,for all his earlier protestations. Some of the coverage may have not looked good but this isn’t a beauty contest. It is the television news business where everything is fair game,set and match.

shailaja.bajpai@expressindia.com