That the judiciary is the last hope for the country’s people has been a long-established belief. The belief was further reinforced on Wednesday with granting of bail by the Bombay HC to Rhea Chakraborty, who was portrayed overzealously by a section of the Indian media as the prime culprit for actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death. It will be a matter of extreme satisfaction for all who keep faith on the rule of law that the horrendous episode has come to an end, justice has triumphed and most delightfully, the part of the media who engaged themselves in the ‘dirty game’ have ended up with egg on their faces.

Even if all movie-making processes in cine capital Mumbai are now under suspension due to Covid, there was no dearth of them on ‘certain’ TV channels throughout the period since the actor’s death. Their ‘war rooms’, day after day manufactured and released newer vilification episodes and without slightest of doubt, it has been the most-vicious slander campaign ever launched against any individual citizen in the propaganda history of the country. It’s not required to waste newsprint by naming those channels where these kangaroo courts were convened since the entire country has seen them all. While leaving it to the wisdom of readers to decode at whose behest this near-four-month national drama was staged, there shouldn’t be any major doubt regarding its underlying intention. It has been largely viewed as an attempt to divert public attention from the plethora of pressing issues the country is currently confronting with and failing miserably in most cases. And it’s distressing to notice that the section of media which played the role of ‘frontline warriors’ in this great propaganda exercise is among the ‘creamy layer’ of the trade, having enviable TRPs and public opinion-building capabilities. It’s also painful to observe how the social media was misused and how all limits were crossed. Avalanche of trolls with choicest of abuses against the women of the community Rhea belonged to has been unprecedented and will be remembered bitterly as an unforgivable offence of profound misogyny.

But thankfully, curtains have fallen on the case which will be a cause of deep discomfort to many. The 7-member team of AIIMS doctors (all seven have been unanimous) has completely ruled out the murder angle and based exclusively on scientific findings, has emphatically established it’s a case of pure suicide. While granting bail, the HC also observed that all drug-related charges against the accused, who has been witch-hunted by those ‘media judges’ are baseless.

Just as it’s true the whole of the media is certainly not backboneless, it’s equally true that a certain section is proving to be so. One can only wish this sycophancy ends soon. 

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Kenter Joya Riba

(Managing Editor)
      She is a graduate in Science with post graduation in Sociology from University of Pune. She has been in the media industry for nearly a decade. Before turning to print business, she has been associated with radio and television.
Email: kenterjoyaz@easternsentinel.in / editoreasternsentinel@gmail.com
Phone: 0360-2212313

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