NEWS FROM EVERY CORNER OF THE WORLD

During most of our discussions at office on politics or economy, I keep wondering – now more frequently than ever – if I live in a different world. I am simply oblivious of most of the events being discussed vociferously. I quickly concluded that this state of oblivion is a symptom of some other stronger cause – a root cause. I leaned back and tried to understand what the root cause could be. After pondering upon this thought with a deliberate intention to avoid an attack of ‘Analysis Paralysis’ (or AP) – I have been a chronic sufferer of this critical disease, which fist attacked me during my education– realization dawned upon me that I have not been getting my daily dose of NEWS.

Although I tried my best, I could not escape a very mild attack of AP. I felt that the root cause actually should be being uninterested or being lethargic or for that matter, it could as well be being human. However, not belabouring further, I settled for ‘missing the daily dose of news’ conclusion. Soon my mind moved instinctively onto the next step of problem solving – Addressing the Root Cause. Immediately, I grabbed the newspaper lying next to me and tried to go through it. I felt that it was another impossible task and started exploring other alternatives.

Being a natural idiot, my natural choice was my dearest buddy with IQ levels of my standard i.e. Idiot Box – more fashionably called now Television. I wanted to have best of the Idiots so I purchased an LCD version of my buddy. However, I realized soon after my purchase that an idiot in any form (LCD/ LED/ Plasma/ CRT) is still an idiot.

I was surfing through the NEWS Channels. I randomly selected one Hindi channel, where some BREAKING NEWS was being broken open to the public. I was very happy. How fortunate am I? Tomorrow, I could contribute in the discussions at our office courtesy the BREAKING NEWS that a boy had accidentally fallen into a defunct bore well while playing near it as it was not closed. I will make others feel oblivious tomorrow.

I instantly became a fan of this channel and added it to my favourites – yes I have taken Tata Sky to add to the experience of viewing digital clarity picture on my LCD and also to make my life jing-a-la-la.

I soon became very appreciative of this channel. For the sake of people like me, this channel has been playing the BREAKING NEWS of this decade since six in the evening. By the way, you wouldn’t know that it was about quarter past eleven in the night then.

With obvious unforgettably encouraging experience, I changed the channel to another local NEWS channel. I was lucky again this was showing some other BREAKING NEWS. There was a peculiar scroll running on the bottom of the screen proudly proclaiming that ‘We are the first channel to broadcast this BREAKING NEWS’. I wanted to add this also to my favourites. However, it did not take more than an idiot of my sort to realize that this logic would turn all the NEWS channels favourite.

I also realized that the new generation, ever-more-responsible NEWS Channels – who have taken upon themselves the virtuous task of bringing important NEWS to the common man on time and from every corner of the world – are living up to their task. However, they haven’t taken ‘bringing important NEWS to the common man on time’ as serious a part of their responsibility as ‘bringing NEWS from every corner of the world’. Anyway, they have at least taken 50% of their task seriously, while many are happy not taking even 10% of their tasks seriously.