Firstpost.com’s Tariq Engineer written article – ‘MS Dhoni should have thought twice about doing business with Sahara’ published by the website bellies an overbearing. The website a waterhole for many of self proclaimed intellectuals like me, though has always been highly opinionated, bigot, and sometimes hopelessly lopsided; still had some window of interactivity which probably with Reliance at its new and seemingly imposing masters has been eliminated.
The article instigated me to write my comments on the article and its author’s obtuseness but found that the comment section has been closed and even if you want to write something it is now moderated – meaning guarded. With this I feel the website stops to breath for the very soul for which it was created – free opinions and sometimes news sharing. The surfeit publishing of Reliance industries every feats to a level of looking like an internal journal says the rest.
Leaving this here, and going back to quench my thirst of sharing my views on this article, I have now decided to steed on a arduous journey to sustain with, called blogging. I promise that I will be more often on the blog with something interesting to share.
To start with everyone had his/her likes and dislikes. R Jagganathan, who was the editor of the firstpost.com and now (due to and in order to serve the masters will) is Editor-in-Chief of the entire Network 18 & TV18 Media Empire of Mukesh Ambani, is fetish for pushing down people’s throats his likes and dislikes for select individuals. R Jagganathan or ‘Jag’ is Bombay University – Economics graduate, who though have spent much time in media and in the profession of journalism, but personally, if you know him, he has imbibed little from it. He always had these dogmatic biases, which amusingly changes with on which square of the checkerboard he is standing or rather placed on.
One anecdote of this warrior of pen will elucidate what I mean. Indrajit Gupta, Editor of Forbes India (a Media 18 publication) was shunted out for not obliging the demands of ‘You Know Who’, First Post was merged with Forbes India into one entity and Jag parental guidance extended to Forbes India. The records say that on February 2013, R Jagannathan began the series of meetings as part of the planned integration process of Forbes India – “Glancing at a sheet of paper he had arrived with, Jagannathan yelled: ‘You’re doing it wrong. Forbes is about the wealthy. It’s about right-wing politics. You guys are writing about development and poverty. If you guys don’t get it, I’m going to make sure that you do.” This explains about the square of the chess-board on which Jag was sitting. Only things left inconspicuously implicit by Jag was that he was not talking about ‘all’ wealthy and powerful people who should be promoted in his publications but only a set of preselected ones. Rest should be poked to balance the imagery of the media house.
The willy band of journalist writing for Firstpost.com (who like Big Boss contestants, if ever blinked on the fame horizon but are surely dwindling in the light of their own ego, have a bearing that they are Bhachchans of their field; hence should be respected and revered) tow the Jag commandments which comes with the appended hate and love list. The commandments have become holier with Jagganathan growing with his daunting faithfulness from a little tommy to the bull of security of the house of ‘M’ for Media (You know Who).
Tariq Engineer, who was Jag’s deputy, is one such star journalist with ‘shorter than an over’ stints each with plethora of sports websites or as a stooge for editorial policy heavy foreign media outlets in India. All his assignments were of sports and with no worth mentioning experience of either Business, finance or legal beat in journalism.
Though the sketch of these two gentlemen may look harsh and Jagganathian, but in fact is the true slant and inclination of their intellectual trajectory, which I thought is important to mention so that one can understand the mind behind the fingers typing the mentioned article. It is true that the article has annoyed me not much that it was against Dhoni or Sahara but the sheer lack of knowledge and sense that these fingers have portrayed.
Hockey is the national game of India, we all know, like we know not very far back, the sport was in abysmal condition. When in Delhi people have seen the stars of the national sport hurdled into DTDC busses and lodged in dingy hotels near Delhi railway station. Those were the discouraging days of Hockey. The benign eye of the proclaimed prime supporter of Sports in India, Subrata Roy Sahara changed it all for hockey like he did for other sports. Foreign trainings, attractive incentives and with efforts of Dr Narender Batra, seed promoted Hockey India League. All as a CSR effort as claimed by Sahara, Dhoni’s ‘Ranchi Rays’ franchisee is one of such moves to bring eyeballs to this league and hockey in India. It might not get a high of IPL level but will certainly help in raising the profile of Hockey League in a league frenzied Indian sports market. Reliance who is promoting Indian Soccer League is also in the race of League mania and which could be a reason of this ‘Jagganathian’ punch.
As for Sahara’s battle with market regulator, it would be safe to say that Tariq Engineer or Jagganathan are the least equipped people to comment on it leave alone flinging their opinion. The complex issue marred with policy flip-flops, adamant stands, and judicial interloping needs in-depth understanding and scrutiny of financial milieu and legal knowledge to start with. The study of the matter does not castigate Sahara of any wrongdoing but in fact is a matter of affording SEBI with powers to those territories, which were earlier, dealt with by Ministry of Corporate Affairs. Even this debate swings between correctness Integration and over powering SEBI or over burdening SEBI beyond its statutory powers.
Even the incarceration of Roy is a matter of debate among the jurists. Without cause, charges or conviction how anyone can be put in jail is a matter, which can have, lasting effects on the legal fabric of the country. The almost eight months of Roy’s detention were also the uneasy period for Indian jurisprudence. If precedents were drawn (which is already mandated under the Indian Constitution) then jails will see more people who will not even know why they are in jail but still will be languishing in it.
Beyond this, to what anyone will vouch for is that Sahara is still a big conglomerate and enjoys a good reputation with its investors, customers, employees or associates having no complaints to make even in these testing times of the group and its Chairman. Media reports place these stakeholders in the tune of billions and millions. Jagganathians should at least consider this fact before the rant.
As for Dhoni, who recently ascended to the position of the most liked Sportsmen of India, the stint of the most successful Captain of India ever with world cup trophies standing as witnesses for it, need no testimony from unscrupulous nonstarters like Tariq Engineer or people with blinkers of vested interest like Jagganathan. At the end, for Dhoni I would like to invoke Martin Luther King – Junior’s words that – “In the end new will remember not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
Captain MS Dhoni is morally, logically and also business wise in good company, by all means.
