Not Modi vs Rahul, the fight is Modi vs misinformation for now

July 14, 2013
Ahmedabad Gujarat Politics


By Japan K Pathak

Ahmedabad, 14 July 2013

The Times of India has today published clarification on its June 23 story headlined “Modi in Rambo act, saves 15,000”.

To know more about the entire controversy around June 23 article click here.

In recent past, main stream media is responding to Mr. Modi in a strange manner! Modi never claimed he rescued 15,000. The Times of India however published a front page story claiming that Modi rescued 15,000 in Rambo act. The story didn’t quote Modi or anyone to support the version. Then Congress and majority of media started attacking Modi over this 15,000 claim that Modi had never made! Later the ToI correspondent claimed that it was Anil Baluni, the Uttarakhand BJP spokesperson who claimed so. Baluni reportedly sent a legal notice. Now the Times of India published clarification today.

A few days back, Modi spoke to Bihar BJP workers on phone through audio bridge technology. Modi didn’t name Nitish Kumar in his entire talk. He didn’t ask party workers to teach Nitish Kumar a lesson. But next day in majority of newspapers the headlines quoted Modi as saying so! The official release by BJP mentioned that Modi had asked party cadre to teach lesson to Congress. But our main stream media put Nitish’s name instead of Congress! And like every time, the main stream media first float a spin, and Congress quickly picks it up. The hit job enjoys extended tenure this way.

Last week, when Reuters asked Modi “Do you regret what happened?”, Modi replied :I’ll tell you. India’s Supreme Court is considered a good court today in the world. The Supreme Court created a special investigative team (SIT) and top-most, very bright officers who overlook oversee the SIT. That report came. In that report, I was given a thoroughly clean chit, a thoroughly clean chit. Another thing, any person if we are driving a car, we are a driver, and someone else is driving a car and we’re sitting behind, even then if a puppy comes under the wheel, will it be painful or not? Of course it is. If I’m a chief minister or not, I’m a human being. If something bad happens anywhere, it is natural to be sad.

And then entire mainstream media and anti-Modi politicians(Congress etc) started amplifying a misinterpreted version that Modi compared some community with puppy! This went on and went on on TV first and later in print on next day! Clear nonsense! Isn’t it?

Then the next day the author of interview Sruthi Gottipati tweeted that Modi’s remarks were poorly contextualized in papers and TV debates, and asked to read the original interview. But later on she deleted her this tweet!!

Till the time, Modhwadias of the world continue to float their own kinds of versions.

And don’t we have enough past examples?

The best way to understand India’s most mis-understood politician Narendra Modi is regular connect to Youtube where his hundreds of unedited videos are present. The other option is to connect with a few dozen regularly updated handles run by vigilant youths on twitter. The third option is regular touch with handful of websites including Modi’s own website and few other news websites.

But the major question is, how many people have access to online world? The mainstream media is far more influential!

The fight ahead of the Lok Sabha elections is not between Modi and Rahul, but between Modi and misinformation campaign. In next few months we shall see series of attempts to paint Modi as highly controversial, partly nonsense and largely a harmful person. Modi has successfully won such perception battles in Gujarat through ‘go direct to the people’ approach, but India is a war.


#Japan K Pathak

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