The color yellow

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Messenger Shot, Bajrang Style

The arrest of an editor in Karnataka highlights the problems of the media, reports SANJANA

ON JANUARY 6, 2009 in a scene straight out of a 1970s Bollywood movie, six police vans chased down the car in which the chairman and director of Chitra Publications, BV Seetaram, and his wife were travelling in Udupi district, Karnataka. Seetaram stepped out to face a posse of 25 policemen seeking to arrest him in a two-year-old defamation suit against him. It is ironic that the policemen had forgotten to bring along the arrest warrant. [source: Tehelka]

This above Tehelka article was accompanied by the picture (T) above. Most of us have real life experiences of growing up in a police state, men in khaki can be ruthless. The picture had the tagline: Shocking treatment The police arrested Seetaram as they would a hardened criminal. 

We got curious, mostly about whether the man in the picture is okay.

This is what we could piece together, use the picture key in the above composite:

6th January: (A) The actual pictures of the man being arrested (source: The Mangalorean)

The Editors Guild of India today expressed shock at the action of the police in Udupi in handcuffing and parading B V Seetaram, the Editor in Chief of the Karavali Ale group, when he was produced before a court in connection with a defamation case. The president of the guild Rajdeep Sardesai and General Secretary K S Sachidananda Murthy in a statement have said that ''the Guild is surprised at the way the police chased Seetaram's car in Karkala at night in several vehicles and surrounded him, especially when Seetaram had been available in Mangalore in his office.''

8th January: (B) The journalist falls sick in jail, taken to another jail, then to a hospital (it is confusing, but essentially the "manhandling" was really the cops taking a sick man out in a wheelchair. Notice that in picture (T) and picture (B) the man is wearing the same shirt. (source: Daijiworld) 

9th January: (C) This is what interested us the most. Now the man is back in pink of health. He even raises his hand to show the handcuffs. Being taken to court, changed his shirt. (source: Daijiworld)

As you can see, this is really straight out of a Sundance festival low budget pretentious indie film. From start to finish, notice the presence of a large contingent of media. The arrest on 5th January seemed nothing like the terrible action described in the Tehelka report. The dude was all smiles, posed for various photo-ops etc., even gave an interview while the police patiently waited.

The incident brought so much pressure on the administration that the two constables who arrested him originally (A) were suspended. The editors guild is demanding to know why should a journalist be arrested like a common criminal. They are really special, as you know. The connection of Sri Rajdeep Sardesai goes deeper than his being the president of the guild. His trusted leutenant wrote a blogpost about the incident. 

It is funny that the incident which can allegedly precipitate a new spate of Hindu fascism had nothing to do with Hindus. The journalist, who from what we could gather from the web, publishes a tabloid of sorts. The recent trouble which eventually led to his arrest involves Jains. But to find that in Tehelka behind all the terrifying imagery of Bajrang dal men running amock, you would need a powerful looking glass.