Union Budget 2017 got into controversies much before it was presented. The government had advanced the session by a month citing that the move will make the process efficient. The objective was to move the Budget exercise early so that all ministries, government-owned entities, and others concerned get their sanctioned amount before April 1. Coincidentally, during the initials months of the year, the nation will also witness elections in five states – Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur. This has led to resentment in opposition parties which have been arguing that budget may give unfair advantage to BJP in all these states. The opposition wrote to President and Chief Election Commissioner, however, the dates remained unchanged.
Today, while the date controversy was still into the air, E. Ahamed, an IUML parliamentarian from Kerala passed away. Mr. Ahamed suffered a cardiac arrest during the President’s address to the joint sitting of Parliament on On 31 January 2017. This created buzz in media to start discussions on possibilities of delay and adjournment of the budget session. However, like always, Rajdeep Sardesai surpassed people’s expectation,
At 7:21 in the morning, Rajdeep was ready with his narrative.
Breaking: question mark over budget after sitting MP E Ahmed passes away. LS speaker to take final decision
— Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) February 1, 2017
Within some time, he also broke the news that union budget will be postponed by a day.
People have tasted this kind of sensational journalism by Rajdeep in the past. Rajdeep is not a journalist who carry a great reputation among his peers. When senior journalists started questioning his hurried conclusions, he deleted this tweet.
FM is already in Parliament with budget in leather brief case? Hazards of competitive TV journalism? Will he still postpone? https://t.co/rsEm0naCWC
— Prabhu Chawla (@PrabhuChawla) February 1, 2017
Meanwhile Rajdeep was doing more interesting things on Television. When I switched to India Today, I saw Rajdeep asking his panelists, ‘An MP has passed away. Will it not be insensitive to present the budget today?’ Within next 30 minutes I heard him using the word insensitive more than 10-15 times. By 10, Rajdeep had a fair idea that Budget is not going to be postponed. Scared to face public humiliation, he started playing with words. ‘If the budget is not postponed by a day, it will certainly be postponed by a few hours,’ asked the clueless Rajdeep.
After seeing that he is still on a slippery wicket, Rajdeep changed his gears to anti-BJP stance. He called a BJP spokesperson and asked him to agree that government is under pressure. Then he called a NCP leader to ask whether the budget session should be delayed by a day or not. During the same time, he was smartly digressing from the core discussion by questioning the intent to have an early budget during an election season. The panelists on his show looked perplexed because Rajdeep was mixing incoherent arguments to create illogical narratives. When the panelists told him that never before the date of budget is shifted, the clueless Rajdeep started talking about possibility of setting new tradition. During the same time, he also talked about ire of opposition which BJP will have to face due to insensitivity.
I couldn’t tolerate it more, so I changed the channel. Later when I checked twitter, Sardesai was preaching opposition and trolls.
By insisting parliament be adjourned for a day, is oppn going by emotion rather than logic? #UnionBudget2017
— Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) February 1, 2017
Let’s not make this hindu Muslim please. Make it about propriety: obituary followed by budget https://t.co/SlJIDnQ91u
— Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) February 1, 2017
