Opinion Anna Domini

That was before news blew up about possible bugging in the finance ministry,and before a India-Pakistan foreign secretary meeting served as a peg on which to hang a “we can never/should always be friends until/without discussing 26/11” debate that could have taken place at any point in the past two years,and probably did.

But before that,I was beginning to worry. News TV had soap-like cliffhangers. Tune in tomorrow: Will Justice Hegde ever get to finish his illegal mining report? Will India’s PIL-filing ever recover from the Bhushans’ extended TV time? And you tuned in the next day,and there they all were again,the People’s spokespeople,and you knew the answers were trending towards no,and no. One started to feel really news-starved.

How can you wall-to-wall news TV with Team Anna,who are only five people,though they sound like — sorry,speak for — many more? Well,only if the programmes are solidly repetitive. So NDTV,on Monday,ran a special edition of Left,Right and Centre in which Team Anna “explained their stand”. Nice,except for the fact that CNN-IBN had been running Ask Team Anna specials the previous week,which pretty much satisfied any thirst to hear citizen journalists asking Arvind Kejriwal questions. Or actually,people asking Anna Hazare questions — followed by Kejriwal saying “no,no,what he’s trying to say is….”,and then explaining what Kejriwal would like Hazare to think as Prashant Bhushan smiled beatifically alongside.

In any case,Ask Team Anna manages to sound like the leading lights of Civil Society taking agony-aunt questions,perhaps based on Hazare’s stated principles of social reform. Q: My neighbour had drinks last night and didn’t invite me,what should I do? A: Tie him to a tree and whip him. Q: I feel I am listless and unmotivated,what’s wrong? A: You are watching too much cable TV. Stop doing so,unless Team Anna is on. Assuming we ever get off.

At one point on Left,Right and Centre,Kejriwal interrupted himself to say: “First of all,it is not a fight between us and them. It is not like there are two teams and we are at war.” (This would have acquired more strength if he had not just said that “we” would “fight it out to the end” if the Cabinet took “their” proposal instead of “ours”.)

“But it seemed like that for the past two weeks,” said Nidhi Razdan,indulgently.

“That’s unfortunate,” said Kejriwal,“that the media tried to project it like that.” When Arvind Kejriwal begins to think that you have presented him as too much of a counter-government insurgent,you should perhaps reconsider your framing of the issue.

Of course,even if the anchors,or shows,ever get over the Lokpal,there’s no guarantee the guests will. On Thursday’s News Hour the CBI’s exclusion from the right to information was being discussed — by a panel that,as is mandatory under Times Now Regulations For Anna Domini Year One,had one member of Team Anna,Kiran Bedi. After various people had unburdened themselves of their News-Hour-worthy outrage,Arnab Goswami turned to the Congress’s Renuka Chowdhury,for her comments on whether defence-related corruption warranted watering down the RTI.

Chowdhury had asked the cameraman to set up outside rather than inside,and consequently seemed to have spent the whole time thinking “How on earth can it get this hot?” Her mind must have been wandering,because she went from zero to outright belligerence in a couple of seconds,entering this,the first Lokpal-free discussion on Times Now for ages with: “You know,Arnab,first of all… I want an answer from all these eminent panelists,who lokpals the Lokpal?” There’s no moving on,for anybody.

mihir.sharma@expressindia.com