Media Over Hype

I was watching a TV news channel showing “special coverage” on revelation of Terrorists’ plans in India. After every news item, the clipping for this upcoming “special program” was flashing in a very sensational way claiming some hindi phrases meaning “terrorists’ plan revealed” & blah blah. With genuine curiosity, I started to watch the program but to my disgust, I realized soon that it was totally an over hyped program as there was no concrete proof or facts on which that program was based. It was all on the basis of some assumptions & suppositions, for e.g., nowhere the program used statements like, “humein yeh pata laga hai… (We came to know about this), rather the whole language was humein yeh shak hai ki or humara ye anumaan hai ki… (We assume that, we suppose that…). To add to that they were showing stuffs like, “we think that some famous people like Tendulkar, Amitabh Bachchan etc. might be on terrorists target” or “we think that terrorist can target some premier organizations like X, Y, Z”!!! I mean why are they flashing those assumed targets on Prime News Channel? I think this way they aren’t showing their capabilities rather they are giving more ideas to terrorists & anti-social elements. Even if terrorists wouldn’t have thought of such targets, then too by revelation of such assumptions & hypothesis publicly can give clear hints to terrorists about people & organizations which can be targeted. Also it creates unnecessary chaos & fear in the minds of general public working in such organizations. Its good to make public aware of the facts so that everyone can be alert but unnecessary sensation creation & over hype by media is doing more harm than good to public.

Media over hype has become a raging fad these days. There are so many examples where media presents the story in such scandalous way that it gets on to my nerves. Rakhi Sawant kissing Mika??? Did that story need so much of time & coverage on all news channels? I was personally irritated to the maximum level possible by seeing those clippings again & again on all news channels. That story was totally absurd & never deserved such an attention by media at all!!!
The story of Prince, it was indeed very bad for the kid & his courage to survive in that pit was really praiseworthy. All of us wanted him to be rescued & nobody would like any such tragedy to happen to such a small kid, but what was the need of all those hype of direct telecast by news channels, showing some unnecessary interviews, then some channels announcing free education to the kid, some announcing cash rewards etc. etc. etc… Suddenly all such channels decided to cover it soooo extensively & announcing such huge rewards!!! Wasn’t that too much??? I wonder if all other poor kids who would be in Prince’s neighborhood might have got inspired to fall in similar pits so that they can also deserve such media attention & huge rewards from channels & politicians.
Another over hyped coverage which comes to my mind right now is “Aishwarya Rai-Abhishek Bachchan” matrimony alliance prospects. I can’t forget all those interviews by pundits discussing their horoscope details & news correspondents talking so intently to those pundits for the kundli matched details. That was so melodramatic & so over hyped by all these news channels. I think if Aish & Abhishek would have been watching TV that time, then such coverage would have made even them switch off the TV immediately.

Media is meant for making public aware of the right news & happenings in the environment. It is meant for making people knowledgeable & informed of their surroundings. Almost all the news channels are available 24x7 now with an intention to provide us the right info anytime of the day, but I think despite their good intentions, now-a-days most of the time such news channels are messing up their good work because of this over hype & too much sensationalism. As they say excess of anything is bad, in the same way all this overload from news channels is just resulting in their loss of image & increased doubts on authenticity of the info provided by them.