chennai Television

This is ridiculous. Was Priyanka visit to Vellore to meet Nalini sponsored by Times of India? How else will you explain that it took nearly a month to unravel a true story about a movement of a high security person to a sensitive cell, to meet a convict, accused of abetting assassination of an ex PM of our country.

The Junior Viketan, Nakeerans and Kumudams have a lot to explain of their colossal failure to bring out this news. The Dozen plus TV channels of the state must be dozing….
Even the vernacular presses of the state both English and Tamil should be ashamed. What kind of Journalism is this? First most of them are not able to find out Priyanka’s visit to Vellore, second one Newspaper gets the news [obviously leaked by the Government for ulterior motives], and it continues its investigation, waits for the grand release of its chennai edition and then publishes it. The motive of TOI is not to give us the news but to use the news to get more readers. That is why I suspect whether Priyanka was a willing partner to this.

Definitely Karunanidhi knew she was coming and why she was coming, because her security is his concern too. Some or many of the Jail staff would have seen her there or known about this. To keep the matter hushed for so long is not good news for our democracy and what kind of press do we have.

Times of India has clearly exposed the impotency of the media in chennai so far. But it did not do any great service to journalism it just exposed the deficiency in it. It must have paid loads of ‘M’ to the Jail and to the sources to keep it tight till it revealed. Even after a RTI is filed in a court the news has not been picked by others is a big shame. By choosing to ‘time’ news as sensitive as this, is a mockery of journalistic ethics and there could not be fair play in getting it postponed for so long.

And regarding the visit itself, I do not understand Priyanka. Is she suffering from some psychological disorder or trauma because of her father’s death, that her doctor advised her to sooth her nerves by meeting the only alive convict? Or did she try to find out some thing new, which CBI and police could not find for so many years? Or is she trying to be a lady munnabhai? If she thought it was so personal and wanted to keep it a secret she could have by saying no comments when queried whether she made the trip. She is entitled to do so. But she revealed that yes she did and she did because she wanted to find out why a good man was killed. This clearly reveals this is a publicity stunt well planned and executed and released in an appropriate time Well probably she wanted to splash news that Rajiv was a good man, nothing else she revealed new.

The Opposition AIADMK had accused DMK’s hand in helping Nalini; it had even shown video clips raising questions on why Karunanidhi gave a directorial chance to a man closely related to her. They also asked whether ‘He’ hand a hand in the plot itself etc. What happened to her nerves then? Just for a question, if the present government was involved some how, will it not stage-manage the visit by briefing Nalini properly? And if she was a hardcore sympathizer of such an enormous crime does she need a briefing to manage herself in front of an immature giggly daughter of a murdered man seeking sympathy?

What she asked and what answers she got is not news to me as the whole episode sound like a practical joke played by Priyanka, sponsored by TOI and DMK jointly as an April fool gift to the nation. The news got postponed by 14 days and the fooling may take a few days longer.