Journalism as a profession has been on a downward spiral for quite some time. The west has long known the pitfalls of the media industry, however, for the realisation to reach India, it took a little longer than expected. In the run-up to the 2014 general elections, most people realised that the partisan media that masquerade as neutral flagbearers of the truth cannot be trusted blindly.
Even though after the 2014 elections were won by Narendra Modi led BJP, the media seems to have lost all semblance of truth, some journalists continue walking around as paragons of virtue. They have been called out for their lies multiple times, and yet, their facade seems to remain intact, at least for the gang of elites.
This is the very reason that when “journalist” Saba Naqvi declared that she had been invited to talk on ‘ethics in journalism’, we at OpIndia.com just couldn’t stop laughing.
Delighted to be giving this talk tomorrow. pic.twitter.com/sCMGpHzmJX
— Saba Naqvi (@_sabanaqvi) October 8, 2018
Saba Naqvi has been invited by the philosophy forum of Hindu college for a talk in ‘ethics in journalism’. The poster also brands her as ‘one of the most important political analysts’. However, Naqvi’s relationship with the truth has been sketchy, to say the least.
In one of Arnab Goswami’s Sunday Debates, the conversation revolved around the hypocrisy of the ‘Lutyens Media’. Saba valiantly tried to defend her cosy coterie. When called out about how the Lutyens media outrages when a Muslim is killed but turns a blind eye and refuses to outrage when Hindus or RSS/BJP workers are killed in Kerala, political analyst MR Venkatesh says that her response was “Why should I, it is not my job”.
After the Uttar Pradesh landslide win for BJP, Saba Naqvi in one of her columns admits that at least one pollster who works for Akhilesh Yadav conceded a BJP landslide. Yet, when Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati went on a tirade against EVMs and how BJP won a landslide because of tampering, nobody heard Saba raise a stink and question the dangerous lie being furthered by Yadav.
Saba Naqvi is the kind of ‘exceptional political commentator’ who almost writes love ballads for Aam Aadmi Party without disclosing her conflict of interest. While almost campaigning for AAP all the while masking it as political commentary, Saba fails to disclose that she was appointed by AAP to Delhi University governing body.
She had recently shared an old fake news from 2015 where she alleged that a Dalit man was murdered for entering a temple in Uttar Pradesh. The news, firstly, was from 2015 when Akhilesh Yadav was Chief Minister. Secondly, the man was murdered by a drunk and not because he entered the temple. These pesky facts escaped Saba.
She had also shared a craftily clicked image of PM Modi’s visit to Dawoodi Bohra community to allege that no women were present at the meeting. She was called out by many including OpIndia.com.
The ‘independent journalist’ who once used to be a cheer girl for AAP, had celebrated the return of Sonia Gandhi and has also used rape analogies in the past with utmost insensitivity, also doesn’t shy away from defending Arvind Kejriwal’s clone, Rahul Gandhi. When Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan had reprimanded Rahul Gandhi for his unprofessional and inappropriate hug-and-wink behaviour in the parliament, Saba had promptly joined others in slandering the speaker.
It should not surprise anyone that the AAP/Congress cheer girl would harbour sweeping disdain for BJP. However, the ‘independent political analyst’ Saba Naqvi’s disdain was so deep, that she even made an issue out of her pilot during a flight being named Amit Shah. We, of course, couldn’t find a pilot by that name. We found a first officer by the name of Amit Shah. However, it is amusing to note how “journalists” who are now being touted as the best political analysts ever have not only cheered for specific political parties but also expressed sweeping hate for names that are shared by the political parties she doesn’t like.
Saba Naqvi is, in fact, so independent that she doesn’t even mind indulging in whataboutery when people die. During the Ram Rahim verdict, when riots erupted, Saba was busy equating it to Kashmir to score political points instead of unequivocally talking about the violence then. This whataboutery seems to be a habit with Saba Naqvi considering in the wake-up Orlando killings, instead of talking about Islamist terror, she was busy talking about why America is not legislating on gun control.
The shenanigans listed by us here are, of course, only the tip of the iceberg. A lot remains to be said about how “independent” a “journalist” Saba Naqvi really is. It is surprising, however, the reputed college like Hindu would invite such openly biased and often-caught-lying “journalists” for a talk on, ironically, “ethics in journalism”.
