Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Thank You Ashutosh

 Gujrat pogrom was a watershed year in the history of free India.

Soon after those holocaust like events Teachers Association of AMU (called AMUTA) organized a seminar in Kennedy Auditorium in which many prominent journalists and social workers of India participated. It was very most scary period as scary as the events that unfolded during and after the demolition of Babri Masjid. Just a few weeks ago we had another round of unfortunate events. So to say every decade the largest minority of India faces the fundamental instability of democracy.

In that seminar one young speaker could be singled out for his energy, outspokenness and collection of facts. It is a quite singular effect when a journalist comes out with the facts that public ignores owing to their short memory. The journalist in question was Ashutosh. Among other things Ashutosh took Arif Muhammed Khan for task for all of his (confused) past actions. And Mr Khan had no option but to accept each and every fact drawn out by the journalist. It was phenomenal, performance like, presentation. One of the observations was that why did Mr Khan use the honourific Ji after Advani's name?

One can only pray for protection of the enthusiasm and energy of this reporter.

Here are some more things from his pen that appeared on p.7 of Urdu Roznama Rashtriya Sahara, dated November 21, 2011.
I had newly come to journalism. Ayodhya movement was on its peak. There had been riots in Benaras. I been sent to cover them. There was a chit chat with some active journalists there. They were saying that the new Ganga of journalism will now flow from Benaras. I was already in shock after seeing the riot reports, all of them were coloured in the extremist majority community colour, rumours were being cast as news in the name of reporting. After arriving from Delhi I many times tried to confirm the earlier reports, every time the administration told that this is far from the truth. The reports by the noted journalists were prepared with the objective of targeting the minority community to present them as the villain.  After returning I made a small box at which the owner of a newspaper became so angry that he complained to the editor. I only escaped because of the mercy of the editor.
Bravo and than you Ashutosh.