Delinquency on Aaj Tak, live

BY ALKA GURHA| IN Media Practice | 02/06/2015

A show with Smriti Irani descended into an ugly spectacle, seemingly by design.

ALKA GURHA watched in horror at this latest episode of bad taste. A grab the from show.

While flipping channels, I chanced upon Aaj Tak conducting a live question and answer session with Union Human Resources and Development Minister, Smriti Irani on June 1st. At the outset, I had a feeling that the show was a disaster in the making.

The members of the audience in the auditorium seemed disorganized and chaotic as they shouted and the behavior of the two anchors added to the fish market atmosphere. Each time the chaos reached a crescendo, the channel decided to take a break. It appears that a lot happened behind the scenes because it is reported that the police had to be summoned after the show.

The live interaction between Irani and the audience was conducted by anchor Anjana Om Kashyap and political editor Ashok Singhal. When I began watching the show, Irani was being heckled by a woman professor who had some grouse against the Delhi University Vice Chancellor.

At this point Smriti Irani was standing in the audience and not sitting on the stage above. As there was no seat for her in the audience, Kashyap asked her to sit on the stairs alongside her. However, Irani chose to stand in the midst of an angry audience and answer their questions.

Just when the minister had pacified the female professor, an agitated elderly male professor wanted to clarify doubts about the plight of PhD students. There was a lot of noise, microphone grabbing and heckling when Irani asked him to come and meet her a day after.

Soon disruptive elements in the audience began shouting and the anchors did not know how to pacify them. The questions appeared politically motivated and the supposedly educated students and professors present in the audience behaved in the most uncivilized manner. It is possible that some unruly political elements of different hues were present in the audience to cheer and jeer Irani but it was clear that the show was deliberately designed to create drama and outrage.

Worse was yet to come. After a break, when we saw Irani on the stage along with the anchors, the heckling and shouting continued. Tempers rose when Irani began narrating the recent incident where protestors (the IIT Madras imbroglio), according to her, had created a pyramid and were about to jump inside her residence, terrorizing her eleven year old daughter. To which Kashyap said that this was a law and order problem and that the Home Minister should have provided security. This is when some members in the audience began shouting, “Shame, Shame.”

And then it happened. Amid all the noise, Singhal asked Irani why Prime Minister Modi made her the HRD Minister despite her being the youngest minister and asked her about her educational qualifications. Since it was noisy and the audience was unable to hear this question, Irani paraphrased the question again, specifically addressing the women present in the audience.

When the audience realized that Singhal had asked Irani “Modi Ko Aap Mein Kya Khoobiyan Nazar Aayi?” the audience went berserk, booing him for his sexist jibe. Kashyap remained silent, perhaps because the question had touched a raw nerve with several women present in the audience.

The angry chants of what appeared to be either ‘Modi Modi’ or ‘Maafi Maafi’ became louder. As I watched in shock and horror, some members of the audience went on the stage and began heckling Singhal. Given the distant camera angle, I am not sure if Singhal was physically harmed but I did see Irani get up and rush towards him to protect him from the unruly group.

All in all, the show was a sorry spectacle that dented the image of the television media in more ways than one. If the idea was to manufacture drama by deliberately including disruptive people in the audience, the idea backfired. This was bad taste and bad television.

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