Stupid hacks and India’s bid for 2016 Olympics

I seriously cant weigh up my sense of frustration every other time i watch Sekhar Gupta, Swapandas Gupta, Chandan Mitra and of course maudlin Barkha Dutt and their counterparts appear on screen, giving their opinions on various issues. Off-late, i have felt that these hacks and their visual media counter parts hijack any issue of national interest in their favor and of course a lot people who watch these shows, take them and their opinions for granted.

Mind you, all these buggers have an agenda and they are very committed to their cause.  When i saw Abhinav Bindra, the sole gold medal winner for our country in Olympics and Sekhar Gupta, Chandan Mitra and Abhishek  Singhvi sitting together and debating in NDTV about our supposed Olympics bid for 2016, i was quite interested to see, what these hacks were blathering.  And in no sense they failed to arrest the ever increasing disgust in me towards them. The so called audience for the debate was also pathetic, mostly for all the debates, that is the case of  “audience”.

While Abhinav Bindra , as any other sensible sports person in India made very good sense when he argued that we need to invest those millions which would go in to the construction of  world class stadiums, arenas, fly-overs and airports in to our sports system to better it and create a system which is well-working and raise the standard for our sports from grassroots level.

The sole politician who appeared on the show, went up in arms against him saying that bidding for Olympics and creating a good atmosphere for the promotion of sports is not mutually exclusive.  Yeah, not mutually exclusive! But for the past 60 years or so, the sports policy in the nation has not been inclusive at all. Everyone knows that  and how badly we had to play up our sole gold medal winning performance in Olympics to cater to our inflated egos.

The hacks went a bit further in their arguments, they said we should bid for Olympics, you know why?  Yeah, we will have good roads, fly-overs, airports and stadiums that will come up.  I wonder if Olympics is all about sports or about wonderful stadiums, arenas, over head metro railway lines or an airport.

Sekhar Gupta and Chandan Mitra were very lucid about their opinions. It doesn’t matter, if we will be able to get more than a gold medal or not, but the bid should go ahead because it will make way for good “infrastructure”. Yeah, these hacks will be vying couple of adverts from these construction magnets .

Isn’t “infrastructure” a very fond of word for these kinds who appear on TV? Yes, it is important, but are we looking at making over-head railway lines that are made on war-footing negligence that buckle and kill several or are we looking at infrastructure that is part of some sensible development pattern?

It is very clear these hacks and their hidden agendas prefer the former way.   They prefer it because, contracts are made with their buddies in the industry who will provide these hacks with adverts which will pump up their profits and of course death due to the negligence/corruption is another opportunity to increase their media share, isn’t it?  To an extent these days,  some of these hacks are terribly subservient to contractors and the filthy rich who after all help their survival.

Anyway, it was very interesting and eye opening to see Sekhar Gupta and Chandan Mitra making their priorities very clear by vying for the contractors. They hardly seem to be bothered about the condition of sports in India. They attributed its pathetic state to the inefficient sporting bodies. Yeah, very easy. It is an easy excuse they make in our country and with that argument they can completely forget about sports and  channel their  interest towards bids for Olympics  and sorts, because they know, if at all Olympics come to India, they can make a meal out of it, even if we win medals or not.

Abhinav Bindra is not a very assertive person, he along with another journalist made their point, that we need to pep up our system so that we can have a decent show if at all we are to hold such an event.  ( Or he couldn’t be assertive with the likes of  Sekhar Gupta and Chandan Mitra, who are conditioned “debate masters” around) He looked like, he wanted to scoot from there as soon as possible.

These hacks who continually appear on our prime time television is the biggest hazard to our integrity and sane opinions that we carry around . They are able to form opinions that is being rallied around by idiotic masses who follow them. They are able to neatly spin our sensibilities so that it conform their hidden agenda, as in this case, Sekhar Gupta and Chandan Mitra tried to bat for the contractors and infrastructure industry.

The audience seemed to have completely immersed in the idea of Olympics happening in their city, their dreams of 8-lane roads in which their cars might zoom without incurring dents and scratches, snazzy airports and some even went up to the extent of asking, if we will be making a lion’s den as China made bird’s nest. Ha, i don’t think i need to say anything more.

We sadly forget the plight of innumerable youngsters who take to sports out of their willingness and some out of necessity (It can earn them a govt job!) We as a nation needs more respect towards these youngsters who are trying to cut a career in streams that are not at all lucrative in our nation. If we have that respect, what we should do is to cater to their interest, help them to achieve more, an Olympic bid is not the right way.