Even those of us most open to criticism do feel a measure of discomfort when they are criticised. An experience at constantly being criticised, therefore, always comes in handy. That is an area where politicians have plenty of experience.
The views of the upper middle-class citizens of the metropolises about the peripheries are frozen in time. Even the most marginalised of communities (class, not religion) are keen as mustard now. They know their rights, even if their demands pass through the refractive process of caste identity politics (which, too, is undesirable but not as bad as it is made out to be.) All constituency politicians have to sing for their supper in this brave new world. Again, it isn’t a perfect world and much needs to be rectified, but the impression of a “feudal” (whatever that word even means in 2017) lord demanding his homage of votes from the plebs is almost completely out of the picture, even in the boondocks, what to speak of third-tier urban areas. There is a reason famously ill-tempered politicians like Jhang’s Abida Hussain will almost never make it to an elected berth again. Those times are over now.
The politicians – used to being thrashed, not just on talk shows, but also in their very constituencies, by working class wisecracks attending their rallies for fun – handle criticism better than the bureaucracy, the business community, the judiciary, the military and, coming on to the topic, the media.
Till very recently, there was an omertà within the media, with an unspoken assumption that other news outfits won’t be mentioned, be the news good or bad. That all went out the window when the behind-the-scenes tapes of the infamous Mehr Bukhari/Mubasher Lucman interview of real estate tycoon Malik Riaz took place. The omertà went out of the window and the rest of the channels started gleefully running the footage of the Dunya gaffe. Then came the massive ARY-vs-Geo wars, which continue till this day. In between, came Bol-versus-everyone-else.
But the news media is still relatively shielded from criticism. As a result, when pundits or anchors are actually confronted with critcism, they either have deer-in-the-headlights moments or are combative to the extent of going on a tirade.
Below is a clip of Mehr Bukhari’s program on Dawn News (online readers only) where Punjab minister Rana Sanaullah was one of the guests, as was the PTI’s Ali Zaidi, who was there by video link.
As the debate took place, Sanaullah suggested that perhaps there should also be a television program that puts some of the talking heads in the dock as well. Bukhari said yes, there should be. Sanaullah responded by saying that wasn’t a possibility since she would have the backing of the likes of Malik Riaz. A cold cut to the quick, yes. But nothing politicians don’t face on a daily basis.
She cuts off Ali Zaidi and says to Sanaullah, that an investigation had, indeed, taken place on that incident and that she had been cleared by the agencies. The same agencies, she said, “who had beaten you up.”
This was a rather bizarre line of argument. But before getting to the argument itself: regardless of what Sanaullah had said to her, since this was a case of actually being hauled up by the spooks, incarcerated and thrashed about, it shouldn’t be pointed out gleefully. A sensitivity to physical violence trumps whatever point-scoring she was meaning to achieve.
Now, on to the lack of logic itself: she she wasn’t saying that the same agencies that cleared him also cleared her, so he should believe her. She was saying that the same agencies that had roughed him up had cleared her name, so he should believe her. The bizarre argument clearly didn’t make sense to Sanaullah, who pointed it out. Well, they are the ones who beat him up, he said, so he won’t hold them in high regard, of course.
Which, Mehr Bukhari said, should be breaking news on the TV channels, at least on Dawn News. That the Punjab law minister did not hold the country’s agencies in high regard. The channel, of course, didn’t run that as a news headline. Nor did it run another one of Rana Sanaullah’s statements from months ago as a lead headline: that action against sectarian terrorist organisations would be tough because the deep state had been complicit in harbouring them. The journalist in Bukhari should be more concerned with statements like those rather than how to apply ointment to her thin skin.
Post-script, apropos of nothing, a blast from the past: Mehr Bukhari: Ye sawal nahi kar saktey kyunke planted lagega….matlab planted toh ye hai, lekin lagna nahi chahiye….