It happened on TV

Dr. Death injects the bedridden man with a lethal drug. Man dies. Jack Kevorkian is arrested for murder. Crime and punishment. Over and out....

Dr. Death injects the bedridden man with a lethal drug. Man dies. Jack Kevorkian is arrested for murder. Crime and punishment. Over and out. Not exactly. The murder8217; was a mercy-killing and conducted in the presence of a TV camera. Subsequently, the recorded videotape was shown on CBS, an American television channel. Gentle ladies and gentlemen, both inside and outside the fourth estate, are wagging their fingers not the dog at the errant TV channel for its callous exploitation of human death. Naughty, naughty.

On Thursday evening, we saw the news, oh boy. And though the news was rather sad, we just had to look: the remnants of two trains lay inert, entwined in a mangled embrace of death. A dead arm hung from one upper berth, a pair of bloodied feet peeped out from below, stilled eyes in a blotchy face stared into blankness, crushed bodies lay waiting to be excavated and lined up beneath white, bedsheet flags.8220;Train Collission as DD would spell it 8212; More than 100 feared dead8221;.

Six affiliated CBSTV stations refused to telecast 60 Minutes, the offending programme with the Kevorkian saga. But frankly, why be queasy, shocked or morally outraged by the sight of one man, who by all accounts wanted to die, being rather painlessly and passively put to sleep when many more bloody, repulsive acts and tragedies are telecast? What8217;s one more death, murder on the tube of plenty?

The colours of Nalini Singh8217;s saree make for a more vibrant discussion.Exit Poll, DD1. There was a great deal of black, with a sizeable strip of yellow and a dash of purple. Quite a combination and extremely distracting from Singh8217;s rather sobering pronouncements on the fate of state governments. The Exit Poll was more and less the same as on previous occasions. More accurate, so people say. It was certainly more up-to-date with three readings at 11 am, 2 pm and 5 pm. A novelty. It was less interesting because other than Madhya Pradesh, the predictions were anticipated.

One shot defined the live show: Singh andexpert Arun Nehru had their backs to us, their eyes on the enlarged TV screen, while psephologist Narasimha Rao seated beside them, opened his mouth into a glorious yawn.

Perhaps we like poet T.S.Eliot, had 8220;seen the arms already8221;. There8217;s an inevitable sameness to the coverage of the elections in the media that creates a sense of deja vu. Wasn8217;t it yesterday that we had Yogendra Yadav and Rahul Dev at Doordarshan Janadesha and Prannoy Roy, Sopariwala, Rangarajan, Sardesai at STAR News Assembly 8217;98?

Asking tired, old questions about defections, ticket distributions, alliances, what the polls foretell8230;Wasn8217;t it just the other day, that the losing party8217;s spokesperson said like V.Naidu, 8220;it is early days yet8230;too premature to commment8221;? Wasn8217;t it just last March that we travelled to state capitals and talked to local politicians, visited party HQs in Delhi and talked to national leaders? Stared at graphics, looked at voting patterns, swings8230;.On and on it rolls as the reels of afilm.

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It8217;s lunch time, Saturday; 12 hours of coverage remain. There have been a few new touches: Doordarshan went it alone, though the faces were the same; STAR had a Hindi presenter throughout though Jairam Ramesh and Arun Jetley were still there. DD8217;s sets were different: leaves appeared to be growing in the backdrop! There8217;s still time for more changes.

Miss World 1998 DD1. The wrong girl won. Miss Israel was easy on the eye but not hot on the spot. Miss South Africa looked like a multi-racial mix-up and spoke better than the others; Miss Brazil was the best of the rest with a cheeky mole on her8230; left8230;shoulder ah! and Miss Malaysia8217;s cheekbones alone should have ensured her a higher standing. As for Miss France, she was so tall and brown, she looked a bit like a tree trunk a compliment in these eco-friendly times. As for Miss India, she wore so much make-up nobody could rightly see her face.

Okay, okay. So this is a media not beauty column. Mr. S S Gill, former CEO, had stopped suchshows. They8217;re degrading to women, they8217;re flashpoints for fleshpots. He hadn8217;t witnessed DD8217;s coverage. It was real coy: there were commercial breaks when lovely ladies were playing beach badminton ?! and satellite breaks every time the camera dwelt upon a firm, fine physique in a bikini. That was every second second; maybe the satellite blinked at the sight of so much female flesh. Thank god for Boyzone.