Special Article
BEDI’S BURDEN
Just the other day, anchor Rahul Kawal of Headlines To-day, a TV channel, was grilling Arvind Kejriwal pressing him hard to comment that Kiran Bedi, ‘did in fact committed a wrong’ in the “L ‘affair Air Ticket’. But Kejriwal, a former IRS was too slippery for the over-smart Rahul Kawal. These anchors, whether Rahul Kawal, or Karan Thapar, or Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt, Sagarika Ghosh or Arnab Goswami of Times Now, are all very intellectually endowed. They do carry a wealth of knowledge to their job, but unfortunately they are also very over-bearing. Although they are supposed to be interviewing the given person, at a time, they, more often than not, do not allow the other person to complete the statement. They keep bombarding them with all kinds of questions, to be continuously one-up, on them. It looks, many times, that they are trying to show off their professional prowess, rather than contribute to a serious content output, for public domain.
In the case between Rahul Kawal (RK) and Arvind Kejriwal, anchor tried his very best with absolute impertinency to corner Kejriwal to succumb, but failed royally to upstage Kejriwal. In the event Kejriwal ended up saying “You are trying for a BREAKING NEWS but I wont let you have it”. An exasperated RK gave-up, to switch over to other questions.
Yes. This brings us to the witch hunt, the media is carrying on with the help of the ruling party, the Congress and all those disgruntled persons like Swami Agnivesh and others. Even former Supreme Court Chief Justice Verma is on record having said “unacceptable”. The news report “Ex-CJ hits out at Kiran Bedi”, has stated that “Claiming money which one has not spent was unacceptable and more upsetting is the justification given by the ex-police officer that she was spending for a cause”.
According to Kejriwal “it was a technical error”, and there have been too many unsolicited responses from across the media spectrum. “Congress ridicule Bedi’s offer to return money” was another from the wisdom pot of joker Diggy Raja, the Congress General Secretary. See how Diggy’s logic is at work. Responding to Bedi’s offer to pay back, probably not a correct response from Bedi, Diggy has reportedly stated “This means if the corrupt people returned money, they too will be absolved of their crime. Then why has A. Raja been kept in jail. Raja also returns money and comes out”. This logic is silly, to say the least. First of all, comparison is very wild. 2nd ly Digvijay Singh, General Secretary of AICC, and therefore, his party, has now publicly admitted that A. Raja has made money illegally, and this statement amounts to contempt of court, when the court is still estimating the loss, if any, due to A. Raja’s actions of commission and omission, and whether there is a fool proof evidence to fix A. Raja for illegal gratification or corrupt practices and that he is an active participant. The last word on 2G scam is still far away.
Fortunately most Indians realise that it is the ‘dirty tricks deptt’ of the Union Government that is at work, which tried to besmirch the name of Bhushans & Kejriwal earlier, but failed. Mercifully, the leader of the movement against corruption Anna Hazare, does not think so badly about the Bedi episode. ‘Anna defends Kiran, slams Gang of Four’ was a report, which exonerated Kiran Bedi and instead blamed some obscure ‘Gang of Four’. The report didn’t say who are these four, and reportedly neither did Anna clarify. By hindsight, it could be surmised as ‘Kapil Sibal, Chidambaram, Digvijay Singh and Manish Tiwari, the bombastic Congress spokesman’.
Anna’s above defence, around mid October, should have closed the issue, ‘once and for all’. But that was not to be. This Headlines To-day, probably a Tehelka spinoff, continued to fish in the troubled water, even as late as mid-November, when it cornered Arvind Kejriwal in an interview, obviously for a ‘BREAKING NEWS’ on the ‘L ‘affair Kiran Bedi’. But smart and intelligent that Kejriwal is, the HT anchor ran for cover only to shift to other issues, after failing to overcome Kejriwal’s counter pressure on the anchor.
Now coming to the ‘L ‘affair Air Ticket’ of Kiran Bedi, all media privy Indian’s know that she claimed Business Class ticket, while she travelled economy. Prima facie, it does appear a ‘wrong doing’. Arrangement for Business class is agreed in advance, once the hosts make a request for a resource person (RP) depending upon the status of RP. Once it is agreed when bill is sent, it is paid. No questions asked. It must have been going on for a quite some time. There are times RPs are paid handsomely for their services, which Kiran Bedi claims that she didn’t charge any money for her services. In the case of Bedi, she is entitled for special discount as Gallantry award winner. Of course these benefits are normally used for personal reasons, without any bar for non-personal reasons, as long as, the person is same. Hence, it was a legal entitlement. That she suffered voluntarily the discomfort of a Mahatma Gandhi class for a larger cause should have been applauded, instead she was put on the dock by the so-called intellectual luminaries. These luminaries never compromised their ego trips of travelling first or business class at someone else’s cost. It is the hurt, that Kiran Bedi walked away with greater glory, that has irked these high strung gentlemen, which has resulted in this out-burst. The fact that she was not personally benefitted, unlike A.Raja, of Diggy joker, was not given the benefit of consideration by these so-called opinion makers. She was an honest and sincere police officer on government pay-roll with no other additional source of income for her to create assets to keep doing social reach out programmes. She is an exemplary person, Indians should be justifiably proud of. Instead it is the plain and simple jealousy that keeps pushing these civil society gentlemen juries to pass a judgement, of Bedi being guilty. She was only using her entitlements, and by physically suffering the voluntary denial of comforts, she is raising some money for her altruistic activities. So where is the issue? Of course the sum, in all fairness may be ‘pittance’, as compared to the shockingly humungous zeroes that accompany every case of sleaze that rocked the media space in recent times, from across the national spectrum.
In all fairness media must say sorry to Kiran Bedi for having caused the completely avoidable hurt to the lady by this unceasing vilification campaign.
Personally I think she should not only, not refund the money thus saved, but should continue doing it, and besides even demand fee for her services to be receipted by her NGO, India Vision Foundation. Her co-trustees must help her come out of this controversy stronger rather than disapproving her of such ostensibly questionable actions. Indians can afford to lose her detractors, rather than Kiran Bedi. India and Indians will be poorer by her absence in public life, if she is forced to quit the public space by attempting to malign her fair name.
J.Shriyan
ISSUES & CONCERNS
Just the other day, anchor Rahul Kawal of Headlines To-day, a TV channel, was grilling Arvind Kejriwal pressing him hard to comment that Kiran Bedi, ‘did in fact committed a wrong’ in the “L ‘affair Air Ticket’. But Kejriwal, a former IRS was too slippery for the over-smart Rahul Kawal. These anchors, whether Rahul Kawal, or Karan Thapar, or Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt, Sagarika Ghosh or Arnab Goswami of Times Now, are all very intellectually endowed. They do carry a wealth of knowledge to their job, but unfortunately they are also very over-bearing. Although they are supposed to be interviewing the given person, at a time, they, more often than not, do not allow the other person to complete the statement. They keep bombarding them with all kinds of questions, to be continuously one-up, on them. It looks, many times, that they are trying to show off their professional prowess, rather than contribute to a serious content output, for public domain.
In the case between Rahul Kawal (RK) and Arvind Kejriwal, anchor tried his very best with absolute impertinency to corner Kejriwal to succumb, but failed royally to upstage Kejriwal. In the event Kejriwal ended up saying “You are trying for a BREAKING NEWS but I wont let you have it”. An exasperated RK gave-up, to switch over to other questions.
Yes. This brings us to the witch hunt, the media is carrying on with the help of the ruling party, the Congress and all those disgruntled persons like Swami Agnivesh and others. Even former Supreme Court Chief Justice Verma is on record having said “unacceptable”. The news report “Ex-CJ hits out at Kiran Bedi”, has stated that “Claiming money which one has not spent was unacceptable and more upsetting is the justification given by the ex-police officer that she was spending for a cause”.
According to Kejriwal “it was a technical error”, and there have been too many unsolicited responses from across the media spectrum. “Congress ridicule Bedi’s offer to return money” was another from the wisdom pot of joker Diggy Raja, the Congress General Secretary. See how Diggy’s logic is at work. Responding to Bedi’s offer to pay back, probably not a correct response from Bedi, Diggy has reportedly stated “This means if the corrupt people returned money, they too will be absolved of their crime. Then why has A. Raja been kept in jail. Raja also returns money and comes out”. This logic is silly, to say the least. First of all, comparison is very wild. 2nd ly Digvijay Singh, General Secretary of AICC, and therefore, his party, has now publicly admitted that A. Raja has made money illegally, and this statement amounts to contempt of court, when the court is still estimating the loss, if any, due to A. Raja’s actions of commission and omission, and whether there is a fool proof evidence to fix A. Raja for illegal gratification or corrupt practices and that he is an active participant. The last word on 2G scam is still far away.
Fortunately most Indians realise that it is the ‘dirty tricks deptt’ of the Union Government that is at work, which tried to besmirch the name of Bhushans & Kejriwal earlier, but failed. Mercifully, the leader of the movement against corruption Anna Hazare, does not think so badly about the Bedi episode. ‘Anna defends Kiran, slams Gang of Four’ was a report, which exonerated Kiran Bedi and instead blamed some obscure ‘Gang of Four’. The report didn’t say who are these four, and reportedly neither did Anna clarify. By hindsight, it could be surmised as ‘Kapil Sibal, Chidambaram, Digvijay Singh and Manish Tiwari, the bombastic Congress spokesman’.
Anna’s above defence, around mid October, should have closed the issue, ‘once and for all’. But that was not to be. This Headlines To-day, probably a Tehelka spinoff, continued to fish in the troubled water, even as late as mid-November, when it cornered Arvind Kejriwal in an interview, obviously for a ‘BREAKING NEWS’ on the ‘L ‘affair Kiran Bedi’. But smart and intelligent that Kejriwal is, the HT anchor ran for cover only to shift to other issues, after failing to overcome Kejriwal’s counter pressure on the anchor.
Now coming to the ‘L ‘affair Air Ticket’ of Kiran Bedi, all media privy Indian’s know that she claimed Business Class ticket, while she travelled economy. Prima facie, it does appear a ‘wrong doing’. Arrangement for Business class is agreed in advance, once the hosts make a request for a resource person (RP) depending upon the status of RP. Once it is agreed when bill is sent, it is paid. No questions asked. It must have been going on for a quite some time. There are times RPs are paid handsomely for their services, which Kiran Bedi claims that she didn’t charge any money for her services. In the case of Bedi, she is entitled for special discount as Gallantry award winner. Of course these benefits are normally used for personal reasons, without any bar for non-personal reasons, as long as, the person is same. Hence, it was a legal entitlement. That she suffered voluntarily the discomfort of a Mahatma Gandhi class for a larger cause should have been applauded, instead she was put on the dock by the so-called intellectual luminaries. These luminaries never compromised their ego trips of travelling first or business class at someone else’s cost. It is the hurt, that Kiran Bedi walked away with greater glory, that has irked these high strung gentlemen, which has resulted in this out-burst. The fact that she was not personally benefitted, unlike A.Raja, of Diggy joker, was not given the benefit of consideration by these so-called opinion makers. She was an honest and sincere police officer on government pay-roll with no other additional source of income for her to create assets to keep doing social reach out programmes. She is an exemplary person, Indians should be justifiably proud of. Instead it is the plain and simple jealousy that keeps pushing these civil society gentlemen juries to pass a judgement, of Bedi being guilty. She was only using her entitlements, and by physically suffering the voluntary denial of comforts, she is raising some money for her altruistic activities. So where is the issue? Of course the sum, in all fairness may be ‘pittance’, as compared to the shockingly humungous zeroes that accompany every case of sleaze that rocked the media space in recent times, from across the national spectrum.
In all fairness media must say sorry to Kiran Bedi for having caused the completely avoidable hurt to the lady by this unceasing vilification campaign.
Personally I think she should not only, not refund the money thus saved, but should continue doing it, and besides even demand fee for her services to be receipted by her NGO, India Vision Foundation. Her co-trustees must help her come out of this controversy stronger rather than disapproving her of such ostensibly questionable actions. Indians can afford to lose her detractors, rather than Kiran Bedi. India and Indians will be poorer by her absence in public life, if she is forced to quit the public space by attempting to malign her fair name.
J.Shriyan
ISSUES & CONCERNS
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