If there is an increase in rape cases don't blame the police. Blame the media.
The Times of India seems to be under heavy pressure. In the weeks to come it will have to face stiff competition from at least two other publishing houses and it is preparing itself to face it. Almost daily, as it were, it is announcing launch of new sections, like Times International, Times City and two full Sunday pages - Book Mark and Culture Curry. For months it had been happy dropping book reviews and reviews of theatre, films, art, music etc and gained the distinction of being anti-intellectual. Now it is suddenly waking up and it is going to be fun watching it fight its new adversaries.
Sex sells
Among them is Hindustan Times which wants to fight The Times of India on its home ground, Mumbai. It has stood its ground on its own home territory, Delhi by taking recourse to soft pornography. Not a single day passes without Hindustan Times publishing some lewd pictures of semi-naked women inviting being addressed as the Pornographic Daily of India. As if to justify its stand on the New Morality, its Sunday magazine issue of May 22 published results of a Brunch-CFore survey on pornography. The names of its Sunday magazine is Brunch and Brunch has discovered to its delight that "watching and enjoying porn is no longer taboo". According to its cover story "sex sells because people like you and me buy it (and) the raunchier sexier and kinkier, the better".
Brunch ran a survey and, says the journal: "Before you put on your mask of hypocrisy and shove the magazine into your private collection, here's some data to ruminate over: About five out of ten Delhiites watch pornography at least once a week; about six out of ten Delhiites like to watch porn while having sex (and) women prefer more kinky sex as compared to men". And the magazine quotes Dr. Yogendra Singh, a social scientist as saying: "it is not alarming at all. An interest in pornography has always existed at the subterranean level in our society. However, now with increased social mobility and urbanisation, society is finally coming out of the closet".
According to Dr. Singh, the popularity of pornography can be attributed to the "breakdown of the joint family system" and the "rise of individualism". And the paper adds: "Today one can watch a sexy video without the fear of mother-in-law walking in on us" and Dr. Singh himself is quoted as saying: "Earlier there was no concept of privacy in a marriage. A couple could never dream of having their private time within a household. Today it is different. Couples can do what they want without guilt or shame". It is, no doubt, to encourage this, that Hindustan Times is feeding its readers with a daily dose of under-dressed women. Obviously this is paying the paper in full measure. It has been reporting higher sales.
And no doubt, when it brings out its Mumbai edition, it will indulge in its philosophy in even greater and more shocking measure. Which will be a challenge that other papers will also have to accept in order to survive. The theory behind all this is that about 75 per cent of today's population is between the ages of 18 and 35 and the presumption is that people in this age group have no particular desire to read serious stuff, such as analytical articles, critical commentaries of political events and so on and will be quite happy gazing at semi-nude pictures - and the kinkier the pictures, the longer the gaze.
Writes Brunch quite candidly: "The greatest revolution in pornography today is its mass availability and accessibility. Porn has moved out of a few segregated public spaces, seedy bookshops and triple X theatres and become ubiquitous on the web, on cable and in neighbourhood video shops. It's everywhere if you look for it". Including, one imagines, in the pages of HT City. Brunch, it would appear, strongly recommends pornography. It quotes a Consulting Psychiatrist, Avdesh Sharma as saying: The more accessible the material, the more people there will be to consume it. And as the consumer base widens, there will be that much more effort to cater to individual quirks and tastes", as, no doubt, in the pages of HT City.
Brunch itself says" "So, if it is kinky you want, well, it is kinky you get Sometimes people seek out porn simply because it feels good to be in a state of sexual excitement.Sometimes they use it to be entertained, or to be distracted from work. More often than perhaps assumed people don't use it because it feels good but because it make them feel better". Brunch gives every excuse for handing out porn in HT City pages.
Mahesh Bhatt, the film director is quoted as saying: "Even our bhajans and spiritual texts have poetic references to pornography. Our current 'value' system that shuns sex is leftover baggage from the Victorian era. Even our Shiv tantra is all about the pleasures of intercourse. So let us not blame the media for all the sex..." So the media wants to be exonerated and Mahesh Bhatt has given the reason why. Our bhajans are pornographic, so what's wrong if our media excel in it? One suspects that Mr. Bhatt's knowledge of bhajans is somewhat limited but let that go.
Brunch says that Mr. Bhatt "unabashedly uses titillation to sell his movies". One must always have a good excuse. And Geeta Govinda is as good an excuse as anything else, even if Geeta Govinda is not a bhajan. What it all implies is that once Hindustan Times comes to Mumbai, it will have no hesitation in resorting to porno to sell itself. And presumably all other papers will follow suit though The Asian Age does not require much prompting as it has been in this business for quite some time.
Matter of routine
Another newspaper to be obsessed with soft porno is Deccan Chronicle which has now apparently acquired an additional 67 per cent stake in Asian Age Holdings Ltd. for a consideration of Rs. 17.1 crore, taking its total holding in the media company to 90 per cent. Hyderabad-based Deccan Chronicle Holdings Ltd. already holds 23 per cent stake in AAHL. Now, the acquisition of Asian Age will transform DCHL into a national player with presence in the large advertising markets of Mumbai and Delhi in addition to the presence in Kolkata, Bangalore and London".
What all this presages is increased reference to sex in our regular dailies as a matter of routine. The truth of the matter is that our media has no vision and has less interest in providing moral leadership - or, for that matter, leadership of any kind - to the public. With pornography publicly sanctified, there will inevitably be a spurt in rapes. The warning must be give: if there is an increase in this phenomenon, don't blame the police. Blame the media. A section of it is out to destroy the moral calibre of the country. Coming to think of it, Mumbai's gutters are cleaner than some of the columns in our national newspapers.
