The Times in India

While I was sound asleep on the morning of March 12, 2014, I was woken up by my favorite alarm—the sound of the newspaper being shoved under my pillow. I woke up, picked up the newspaper, and as usual, started going through the headlines on the front page. And I thought, just thought, that I read Sunny Leone…Startled, I rubbed my eyes just to be sure that I was reading right.

And...I was right!

On the front page of the Pune edition of a widely read newspaper of the country was the news (?) Sunny Leone-II? American porn star is half-Indian. I read the piece and wondered what were the Times Of India people up to? I was not able to digest the fact that the personal story of some half-Indian American girl was being dished out to me on the front page of a prominent Indian newspaper! The story was jostling for space with other important headlines and was also drawing attention through Sunny Leone’s photograph!

The article described the financial plight of a young girl who had entered the porn industry (!) in America by choice to fund her education at a prestigious university in the U.S. The article went on to give up-to-date stats about the worth of the American porn industry, how much the porn film actors earn per session, and details about the college fees the girl needs to pay, apart from details of her family’s finances! The reporter also took pains to include the girl’s porn identity and her side of the story that made it clear that she selected the profession over all other because of the money involved and her own enjoyment!

Deep inside, I was infuriated. No, I did not want to play moral police and judge the girl. I wanted to assert my rights as a reader of news.

Why was this story on page 1 of the newspaper? Or better still, why was this story included in the paper at all? Was the story worthy of being called news? While this might be a topic of debate, I wanted to make my stand very clear. To me, it is not news because I feel the story is not relevant. For India and Indians, that is. While I am not sure of the practices that the TOI guys use to select news items, inclusion of this piece surely puts a big question mark on their ability to rationally choose from the available pool, as also on the journalistic standards of the country. True, I am no octogenarian who has witnessed the golden era of Indian journalism; I think I, as a consumer of news, should not be offered dirt early on in the morning.

Was the story included to show to us the moral degradation rampant in the west? Or was it included to paint a picture of the Obama administration’s failure? Or worse, was it included to incite our own young generation and show them that they are still way behind their American counterparts in devising ways of funding their education? I know not. Ah yes, was it included to remind Indian parents that things could get worse for them in the future and that they should be ready to handle a spiritually and psychologically malnourished generation?

I am still confused.

Was there a veiled agenda of certain people to assure the common Indian that things are better in India and that they are taking good care of our education system and women? Did the TOI people face acute dearth of news items of national or international importance because of which they decided to include this shining piece of their journalistic mediocrity? I think they would have done a much better and commendable job had they included the story of a local animal lover who regularly fed stray dogs out of his own earnings. In that case, I think, the space would have been very well utilized.

Or was it to inform the Indian movie lovers that they should expect, shortly in the future, to be treated by yet another half-Indian through the overt use of her body on screen? I failed to understand whether I was supposed to feel proud that yet another Indian, like Satya Nadella, was actually making waves in the U.S. and carving a niche for herself.

Was it to “inspire” our young generation to go out and “just do it” or was it to warn them about the dangers of the very expensive education system of the U.S.?

My mind, a common man that I am, failed to understand the agenda behind the article. I reminded myself about the International Women’s Day celebrations that were held only a couple of days ago. I reckon only the coming times will unravel the mystery in the form of another Bollywood dud that will leave a bad taste in the audiences’ mouth.