Missing what matters

You don’t say! Darius Nakhoonwala It is an open secret amongst journalists that edits are waste of space. Far too few people read them to justify the importance accorded to them. And now with the proliferation of newspapers, their importance has fallen even further, and they serve no real purpose because of the simultaneous proliferation of ¿columnists¿, many of whom write what in the past would amount to no more than a letter to the editor. Another reason for the diminishing of the editorial¿s relevance is the inability to tell what is important and what is not. The "come on, yaar, write something" approach has always been there – after all something of great public importance can¿t happen every day – but now it is more in evidence. Result: trivia gets written about in an edit while truly important developments don¿t. An excellent example of this came last week over the introduction in the Rajya Sabha of the Constitution (108th Amendment) Bill providing for one-third reservation of seats for women in Parliament and the State Assemblies. I thought most major newspapers would write about it. Only a handful did. The readers should ask the editors of their preferred papers why but I suspect they will not get an answer. The Hindu was able to put it in perspective best. "… must be understood in the context of the bill¿s failed journey through three successive Lok Sabhas. Bills tabled in the upper house enjoy a longevity unavailable to those introduced in the lower house… a progressive measure on women empowerment has had to wait for a decade for being brought again before Parliament, and that too in near battlefield conditions, is indeed a sad commentary on 21st century India… Just how tortuous the next steps can be is underscored by the fact that it will be examined by what is currently an all-male Standing Committee on Law and Justice." It then explained why nothing had happened so far. "What better proof of the power and muscle of the OBC lobby in Parliament than the fact that the bill has been successfully blocked all these years... None of the usual obstacles to the women¿s bill seems to have been cleared as yet." The Hindustan Times was the other major paper that wrote an edit on the bill. But it took an odd tack. "More than anything else, the annual noise made about the Women¿s Reservation Bill is a tiring affair. Everyone makes the ¿right noises¿, knowing well that it is a token gesture that allows them to be politically correct without having to do the hard work of pushing for real gender equality." So? "…we wonder whether such behaviour, which included ludicrous moments like the formation of a ¿protective ring¿ and someone being ¿manhandled¿, was worth pushing for something that is a red herring." Red herring? Sir, do you know what that term means? It means a false trail. And then this: "Policies that aim to correct the prevailing gender disparity are welcome. But the Women¿s Reservation Bill is not one of them." How do you know, Sir? The miscellany in the other newspapers included diatribes against George Bush¿s views on what was causing the rise on global food prices (no one mentioned the incidental fact that Bush is right); Sethusamudram (myth as reality); and Myanmar. Is it any wonder that people don¿t read edits? .