news details |
|
|
| Rome burning, Nero fiddling | | Of cooked up statements, damp squib dinners | | Early Times Report
Jammu, June 4: As unabated string of human rights violations keeps the Valley perpetually shut and people corner the government, the state’s information department instead of ensuring factual and timely flow of information is cooking sundry statements from leaders praising the government and making desperate attempts to manage ‘good press’.
Notwithstanding the fact that no government in the past has earned such a huge support from the press like the Omar Abdullah government did and continues to get but the information department wants paeans sung for the government and facts ignored. The press, which reflects the public opinion, has been quite supportive of the Omar government as this regime shaped up in difficult times in backdrop of a vicious communal and regional tension last year. Chief Minister’s typical businesslike attitude is a major reason that press trusts his actions and wants him to take time for putting things at even keel.
As no press can afford to shut eyes on the ground situation, the ill advised information department is now adopting its own strategy to blackout the dark things and paint rosy pictures. Even as the Valley continued to burn for fourth consecutive day, there has been a tension of different kind in Rangreth area of Badgam. Instead of allowing the press to make its own judgment, the information department today carefully obtained a ‘joint’ statement from two Sikh leaders –Arvinder Singh Micky of Congress and Tarlochan Singh Wazir of NC –praising the Chief Minister and other people in the government for resolving the Rangreth Gurudwara issue between two communities.
It was apparently an ill-conceived strategy of the information department, as such pointed statements which are nothing but praise from first to the last sentence and purposedly coming from leaders of a particular community with added stress on Muslim-Hindu-Sikh unity trigger cycle of suspicion. “In their statement, both the leaders praised the Chief Minister for his positive role and the Muslim community in removing the misunderstanding, amply reflected in the slogans of Hindu-Muslim-Sikh bhai bhai that were raised by members of both the communities on the occasion”, said a cover up press note of the information department.
After a daylong of a tailor made press releases, an officer of the information department late this evening went on an extended PR spree inviting media persons over dinner at a local hotel. Mr Shyam Bijyal, the Joint Director of Information, was calling the scribes till as late as 9:30 PM requesting them to join his dinner. Such dinners in the middle of disturbed situations are though not seen in good taste but the officer was apparently of the firm idea to manage good press by dinner diplomacy. Eventually it turned out to be an embarrassing damp squib for him.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
