JOURNALISM OF COURAGE ARUN SINHA STYLE
Why does Arun Sinha feel so threatened that he has dubbed the Goan Observer
a cancer that must be cured by a careful operation for the removal of the
malignant part of the otherwise healthy media? BY RAJAN NARAYAN.
WHY HAS the Editor of The Navhind Times, Arun Sinha, who specializes in
writing odourless, colourless, flavourless editorials, been so vehement
about Goan Observer - presuming he is referring to Goan Observer in his
editorial Taxi Press which appeared on Tuesday, November 21? Why does Arun
Sinha feel so threatened that he has dubbed the Goan Observer a cancer that
must be cured by a careful operation for the removal of the malignant part
of the otherwise healthy media? It is typical of the journalism of
cowardice that the likes of Arun Sinha practise that he does not have the
guts to name the Goan Observer or the highly corrupt retired or serving
member of the All India Civil Services who might have been in his days being
chased by the CBI and repeatedly sought the shelter of the main stream press
to protect him.
It would be obvious to those who have read the GO report on how the
prosecution was prevented from appealing the order of the Childrens Court
Judge dismissing the case of molesting a minor that Arun Sinhas attack is
provoked by the fear that the case against him will be reopened. It will be
recalled that GO had reported that the Chief Minister vetoed the unanimous
recommendation of the Prosecutor, the Chief Public Prosecutor, the Advocate
General and the Law Secretary that the grounds for dismissal of the case
against Arun Sinha were questionable and the decision should be challenged.
DISMISSED CHARGES
THE Childrens Court had dismissed the case against Arun Sinha, who had been
accused of molesting his minor maid servant on two grounds. The Judge had
opined that while he was satisfied that the evidence produced before him
gave rise to some suspicion, it doesnt amount to grave suspicion against
the accused. Consequently it would be fully within his right to discharge
the case. The Judge added that in exercising his jurisdiction under Section
227 of the Code, the Judge under which the present Code is a senior and an
experienced Court cannot act merely as a post office or a mouthpiece of the
prosecution but has to consider the broad probability of the case, the total
effect of the evidence and the documents produced before the Court, any
basic infirmities appearing in the case and so on. This however does not
mean that the Judge should make a roving inquiry into the pros and cons of
the matter and weigh the evidence as if he was conducting a trial. On the
basis of the statement made by the victim girl, I am of the view that her
statement gives rise to some suspicion but the suspicion is not grave enough
to justify further proceeding with the trial against the accused. I
therefore am satisfied that there is no prima facie evidence on record for
the purpose of framing of charge against the accused for the offences under
Section 364 of the Indian Penal Code.
CHILD LABOUR
IN respect to the charge of employing a minor the Judge stated, the records
of this case clearly indicate that the victim girl had completed 14 years of
age. This being the position, the provisions of Section 7 (6) (c) of the Goa
Childrens Act 2003, cannot be invoked in this case. I therefore find that
there is no prima facie evidence on record for the purpose of framing of
charge against the accused for the offence under Section 7 (5) ( c).
The Judge also held that there was no prima facie evidence on record for the
purpose of framing charges against the accused for the offence under Section
8(2) of the Act. As on the basis of the statement of the victim girl, it is
not possible to hold that the accused had sexually touched the body of the
victim girl with the use of any body part or object.
The NGO, Childrens Rights in Goa, represented by its Director, Venicia
Cardoso, has filed a Criminal Revision Appeal in the Bombay High Court at
Goa on August 25, 2006, on the grounds that the order of the Judge
discharging Arun Sinha was erroneous because the Court failed to appreciate
that there was a good prima facie case disclosed against the Respondent No.
1 (Arun Sinha) on the face of material on record under Section 354 of IPC.
That the Court failed to see that prima facie case against the Respondent
No. 1 (Arun Sinha) is also made under Section 7 and 8 of Goa Childrens Act
2003. That the Court failed to appreciate that the prima facie case is also
made out against the Respondent under Section 374 of IPC.
REVISION PETITION
THAT the conclusion arrived at by the Court that criminal recourse as
required under Section 354 is not disclosed is erroneous. That the
conclusion of the Court that the ingredients of Section 354 of IPC are not
proved is incorrect and improper. That even assuming that provisions of
Section 7 and 8 of the Goa Childrens Act are not attracted in the present
case, the Court ought to have tried the Respondent (Arun Sinha) under
Section 374 of the IPC. CRG has stated in its petition challenging the
discharge of Arun Sinha that the lower Court judgement and order is
erroneous, bad in law, illegal, incorrect and improper and therefore the
State of Goa should have filed an Appeal or Revision against the judgement
and under Section 34 of Goa Childrens Act but has not chosen to do so. The
Revision petition, besides making a plea for setting aside the order of the
lower Court, also seeks a direction to issue a warrant of arrest of the
Respondent No. 1 (Arun Sinha ) during the pendency of the Revision.
People living in glass houses, particularly senior editors, who claim to be
model journalists should conduct themselves in a manner not just to be above
suspicion but must be seen to be above suspicion. By taking resort to
innuendo instead of having the gumption or the guts to mention the Goan
Observer and naming of the various people he has slandered in his editorial,
Arun Sinha has only exposed his contempt for journalistic ethics. Not to
mention the fact that he is a cowering coward who is unwilling to confront
the truth about himself.
When good and honest and honourable men are falsely accused they have no
hesitation in approaching the media. The retired IAS officer referred to by
Arun Sinha in his editorial did not approach the main stream media to
protect him. He approached the mainstream media of which I was then a part
of, to expose the slander campaign being carried out against him by some
vested interests who were unhappy about his rectitude while he held a senior
position. He had even supplied relevant information to the press and
requested them to publish it in case vested interests managed to make false
accusations in the press against him. Unlike Arun Sinha, he did not resort
to a vicious campaign of anonymous emails against sections of the media
including Goan Observer who reported the fact that he had been accused of
molesting his minor maid servant.
For the information of Mr. Arun Sinha, the officer concerned was completely
exonerated by the CBI of the false complaint, after a preliminary enquiry.
All that the Goan Observer article on the Arun Sinha case objected to was
executive interference to subvert the judicial process. The question is why
is Arun Sinha so agitated and nervous about the possibility that the order
of the Childrens Court will be challenged and the case may be reopened.
We do not create reports merely to provide sensation to the minds of the
reader. We do not resort to creative journalism. We practice the
journalism of courage. Unlike Mr. Arun Sinha we have never hesitated to
mention names. We are not afraid of mentioning names because we are
confident of our facts. We do not bend let alone crawl unlike the Arun
Sinhas of the world. What distinguishes us from so called mainstream
journalism is that we are not vulnerable to pressure either from politicians
in power or from advertisers. Because the objective of Goan Observer is to
tell the truth and not make money. Public interest and not profit is the
rationale of the Goan Observer.
Thank you Mr. Arun Sinha for the back handed compliment All art lies in the
writing craft. Just as a successful politician relies on a good tongue so
does a thriving taxi pressman rely on a good pen Ones conmanship draws from
his oratory, the other from his inky acidity. We will leave it to the
readers to decide whom these words apply to.
TAXI VERSUS TONGA
BY MANOHAR SHETTY
THERES one sure way of ruining your English - read the editorials in The
Navhind Times. Prepositions routinely go haywire and the definite article is
regularly misused, imbuing the language with a peculiar North Indian
flavour. The punctuation is sometimes eccentric and the general tone is of
one habituated to an ivory tower. Local issues are often blithely bypassed
to accommodate burning national and international issues. Unless, of
course, the issue is the Editor Himself. Then the Editor Himself responds
with alacrity and a give-away defensiveness. An editorial in The Navhind
Times of November 21, 2006 is a case in point. Titled Taxi Press, the
editor Arun Sinha (I assume since he is the editor, he writes the editorials
- or at least most of them) fires a broadside at the black and yellow
publications, clearly in this case the Goan Observer. The editorial implies
plainly that the editor Rajan Narayan (without naming him directly) can be
hired by the highest bidder for serving personal ends. Such
newspapers, says Sinha in his inimitable fashion, are creating reports
merely to provide sensation to the minds of the reader. Further, Sinha
implies that Aravind Bhatikar, a highly respected and upright retired civil
servant, is highly corrupt and that he may hire the services (read the
services of Goan Observer) to snipe at someone who might have refused to
help him get a lucrative project. Again, Sinha has not directly named
Aravind Bhatikar, but the libellous nature of his motivation becomes
abundantly clear to any reader who has read Bhatikars article called
Camouflaged Delays for Political Expediency which appeared only a few days
earlier in the Goan Observer of November 18.
In this revealing article, Bhatikar raises the issue of the child
molestation case against Sinha and points out step by step how government
officials and the Chief Minister Pratapsingh Rane prevaricated and allowed
the case to die a slow death and remain buried under a pile of paperwork.
Even a cursory reading between the lines reveals to any reader how the rule
of law can be prevented to apply to a person enjoying some influence and
political patronage in a small State like Goa . In this particular case,
wrote Bhatikar, the government is guilty of indiscretion and impropriety.
In response Sinha (and by implication his proprietors, publishers and
printer and other newspapers) vows to take a pledge to dismantle the taxi
press, meaning the Goan Observer since Sinha believes that it can be hired
like a taxi and must be prevented from spreading its inky acidity. Such
papers, Sinha denounces as a cancer we must cure by a careful operation.
He even ridicules the readers of such newspapers as people with no regard
to values. (Only readers of The Navhind Times have values!). These papers,
Sinha sermonizes, are very dangerous and unhealthy to the society. What
then of healthy newspapers which fall chronically ill and silent when
confronted with uncomfortable truth? However, continuing in his typical
lingo, Sinha concedes All art lies in the writing craft, a virtue not too
evident in his own newspaper. What we have instead is a colourless paper,
which causes instant indigestion on a daily basis at breakfast tables across
Goa , casting aspersions on a colourfuland courageousperiodical. Surely
this Model State deserves a high quality daily newspaper. Meanwhile, this
reader who has no regard to values would rather hitch a ride in a taxi
than in a ghoda gadi.
From: Mayabhushan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], "Mailing list for journalists of Goa
(India),in Goa, and who worked in Goa...." <goajourno@puggy.symonds.net>
To: "Mailing list for journalists of Goa (India), in Goa,and who worked in
Goa...." <goajourno@puggy.symonds.net>
Subject: Re: [GOAJOURNO] TAXI MEDIA (corrected)
Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 12:04:27 -0800 (PST)
Yaar rico,
Damn what Rajan writes, its how he writes thats fun.
Yaar, if its trouble, tension mat le. Dont bother
keying in the copy.Will pick it up later.
> Incidentally, which of your two former bosses would
> you believe? Both,
> in part?
Give me one reason, why I should be believing any of
these former bosses? Together they've killed a hell
lot of stories yaar and sniggered at others togther in
their edits. But this promises to sound really good,
when these two loco-nuts finally collide.
And ric, you dont often see Rajan reacting... Rajan is
the guy who makes the charge... Give him his due man.
He could inject formalin into a living body and then
cry hoarse claiming resurrection.
Bhushan
--- "Frederick \"FN\" Noronha"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Bhushan, I think an investigative journo like you
> already knows the
> answer to your innocent query :-) Unfortunately
> Rajan's GO is
> password protected, and available to subscribers.
> Will still try to
> key in the article, time-permitting.
>
> Incidentally, which of your two former bosses would
> you believe? Both,
> in part? An interesting media debate all the same.
> Manohar Shetty has
> also written an article in the Goan Observer on this
> issue. In the
> past, editors in Goa shared a cosier relationship.
> FN
>
> On 30/11/06, Mayabhushan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
> > Hi, has rajan responded to this TAXI MEDIA charge
> made
> > in NT? Does anyone know?
> > Bhushan
> --
> FN 9822122436 +91-832-240-9490 (phone calls after 1
> pm please)
> FLOSS, geeks, blogs: [http://planet.foss.in/]
>
> _______________________________________________
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> Goajourno@puggy.symonds.net
>
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>
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