Dear Indian media, there are others apart from US elections

This post is born out of frustration. About reporting in the Indian web and electronic media. With the US election scheduled in November, everyone was busy reporting on the tiny details of the two candidates. Where Obama spoke, where did Romney have dinner, how their wives felt, etc. Hell, on the last two days, the reporters went into a kind of frenzy, reporting every step the two candidates took, that Obama cried during his final speech and many more. Now, most of the netizens will not be able to point out on the map, any of the cities or towns these two campaigned in. So, why are these elections so important to hog a major portion of the news space in India? Do we have no other newsworthy matters in hand?
Stephen Harper, Canada's prime minister, chose to visit India at perhaps a wrong time. Because our media was not interested in bringing to us what Harper had brought for the country. Our media felt that it is of more importance for Indians to know who the next US president is! So, nothing was in the prime time about Harper's visit to India. Nor was anything reported about his security personnel rejecting Indian measures and shipping in their own security limousines for Harper. Who is going to find out the truth of why this happened? When a visiting dignitary has to bring in his own security vehicles, is he being snobbish or is our government guilty of inadequacy? But of course, this doesn't matter to our media. What is more important news is how Obama cried in his last campaign speech.
Forget this negative part. The Harper government signed a few agreements with the Indian government. Of these, one was setting up a research programme with three Canadian universities and the IITs in the area of clean water technologies. But we know nothing of that! More importantly the two governments signed an agreement where temporary Indian employees working in Canada and temporary Canadian employees working in India and their will not have to contribute towards their social security or pension plans. This allows both, the companies and their employees, to save costs incurred on things whose benefits they wouldn't have ever received. Do we know of this? No, but we do know that Obama cried during his last speech. Doesn't matter if many Indians working on-site have been crying for years on the unjust contributions they have to make to the US social security system, when they are not eligible to receive any benefit from it.
We cheered Obama when he came to India and hailed him to take the nuclear reactor deal forward. But nuclear reactors run on uranium, which will not come from USA, but from Canada as it has one of the largest reserves of uranium. But we do not yet know at what stage is a deal for uranium supply with Canada? And what did Harper's visit achieve in that direction? We will have to read Canadian newspapers for that because our dear media was busy dissecting why Romney lost and Obama won! More importantly Canada wants to sign a free trade agreement with India. What will this agreement cover? What is the Indian government's view about this agreement? No we won't know of that till our media finds time from reporting how democrats and republicans will never reach any agreement because each controls one house of the US government.
Seriously, I am tired of this minute-by-minute updates of all that doesn't matter to our country. How do these affect India? In almost no way. Romney or Obama it doesn't matter to us. They don't do us any favour. While India has been purchasing military equipment from the US firms through its tax payers' money, the same are given to our western neighbours as part of aid to "fight terrorism". And why cheer Obama who has, during his campaign, talked of India only as a job stealer through outsourcing? More importantly, why not cheer Harper, who has given Indian employees on Canada their fair dues?  What I am seriously tired of is the Indian media. They have their own ideologies and iron-cast agendas. They won't budge from that. The nation's interest is secondary. That's why we saw more headline space for Sandy, compared to Nilam. In the web media it appeared as if Nilam had just kissed the Indian coast while Sandy rammed through the USA. New York's preparations where highlighted throughout, but not Tamil Nadu's. And of course, they conveniently missed the fact that the same Sandy had caused far more devastation in poor countries like Haiti and Cuba, which face crop loss too. But alas, they weren't having elections where the state was ruled by an opposing party to the president.

Indian media and the National Film Awards

Considering some of the free time I have got now-a-days, I have begun spending some of it to analyse some of the views of Justice Katju and P. Sainath. "Why so?", would be your question. That is because they both present a view that is many a time completely ignored in mainstream media, especially the electronic one. The more I view news channels, the more am I beginning to believe that the Indian media lacks the necessary depth, rigour and commitment to educate the Indian public in issues relevant to India.

While there are a lot of isses, which the media doesn't give proportional coverage, I will restrict myself to the field of cinema. The Indian National Film Awards are a tribute to the best of Indian cinema, which spans across more than eighteen languages (excluding local dialects). Awarded every year, by the President of India, these are considered a pinnacle of achievement by many in the industry, as the nominees have to compete across the entire spectrum of Indian cinema, rather than be restricted to a particular language(s).

The regional Indian cinema has been at the forefront of meaningful entertainment, frequently combined with conveying important social messages and practices. Especially, cinema in Marathi, Malayalam, Bengali (or Bangla) and also in Tamil, Telegu and Kannada, has been active in these areas. What Bollywood (or mainstream Hindi cinema) considers as 'parallel' or 'experimental' cinema is a proven track for good (and reasonably commercially successful) cinema in regional languages. The enormous variety of such cinema provides a huge opportunity for the media to build products around this cinema and improving the knowledge of the general public about this area. But the media still basks in the glory of Bollywood. New, for the media, could range right from Vidya Balan winning the National award to whether Salman and Katrina are still together.

The media, which devotes a lot of time running programmes about the Oscars and give a minute-by-minute update of the ceremony, has done nothing to bring forth the procedures of the National Awards. The task of the jury is not yet known to us. How do they judge cinema of languages which they may not know at all? What movies are nominated for the awards, how is the nomination and elimination procedure? How is the jury selected, in the first place? For the media, their task begins only after the awards have been announced. If anyone from Bollywood has won an award, then run endless programmes about that person and the movie for which (s)he received the award. But, at the same time, regional cinema winners are completely ignored after their name and award has been announced. E.g., Vidya Balan winning the award (and she deserved it) received extensive coverage in the print and visual media. But, what about Girish Kulkarni, who won the best actor award? How much mention did he get, compared to Vidya? That too, when his movie (Deool) has showcased the dark (and economic) side of religion and religious beliefs. The movie has also won the President`s golden lotus award and award for best dialogue. Similarly of other films like Byari and others. While the media gave extra wide coverage to A. R. Rahman receiving the Oscar, how much do we know of Neel Daat and Mayook Bhaumik, who won the National Award for best music direction? Or about Anand Bhate and Rupa Ganguly, the best playback singers?

I do not intend to say that news media should screen such movies. But the print and electronic media can definitely bring forward the artists who have at least been nominated for such awards. Of course, Bollywood has a marketable value, far higher than regional cinema, but then shouldn't the media help in furthering the cause of regional cinema and also, help inculcate and improve interest in good regional cinema? Similarly, the government of India to is at a fault that it hasn't been able to create an environment and viewer interest like the Oscars have done. The government should also pro-actively help develop interest and curiosity in the National awards so that the 'market' for such cinema improves.