In the wee hours of the night, the nation sat glued to their television sets in anticipation. Chandrayaan-2’s landing module had gone silent after Vikram the lander, went silent when it was merely 2 KMs from the landing surface of the moon. At 2:40 AM, ISRO chief K Sivan announced “Vikram lander descent was as planned and normal performance was observed upto an altitude of 2.1 km. Subsequently, the communications from the lander to the ground station was lost. The data is being analyzed”.
Moments before K Sivan made the announce, one could see the Prime Minister pat Sivan on his back. The stress was palpable on the faces and drooped shoulders of thee scientists who were awaiting a successful landing after 45 days of Chandrayaan’s travel.
While the nation congratulated ISRO and the Prime Minister told the scientists that India’s resolve to touch the moon has only become stronger and that, after every setback, there is a new dawn, an NDTV journalist decided it was time to arrogantly scream at the scientists who were already going through enough.
If you want to see the pathetic state of Indian Journalism, watch how the journalist is shouting at an ISRO Scientist during such tension.
The Tone ??? pic.twitter.com/zT2IWesU77
— Ankur Singh (@iAnkurSingh) September 6, 2019
In the video that has now gone viral, a journalist can be heard screaming arrogantly at the scientist who was interacting with the press. The journalist questions the scientist and asks why the ISRO chief was not present at the press meeting as it is a tradition that ‘when something goes wrong, the ISRO chief interacts with the media’. Taking his arrogance to the next level, he then says that the ISRO chief should be interacting with the media and “not someone junior”.
The scientist interacting with the press looks visibly distressed at the journalist’s uncouth behaviour.
It was later revealed that the journalist who was displaying uncouth behaviour was Pallava Bagla from NDTV.
Several people took to social media to express their ire at that behaviour displayed by the NDTV scribe.
That’s a NDTV Journalist (@pallavabagla), just being a NDTV Journalist .. imagine if this was a Republic or a TimesNow scribe !! pic.twitter.com/pxanFzD6uZ
— Yo Yo Funny Singh (@moronhumor) September 6, 2019
Dear @pallavabagla, the esteemed scientists of @isro are servant of Nation and not your father that you’d scream and show your Aukaat like this!#banNDTVpic.twitter.com/zNmLP3BabX
— INFERNO 2.0 (@TheAngryLord) September 7, 2019
In fact, some even pulled out a clip of Pallava Bagla displaying his ignorance while interviewing the ISRO chief.
Look at the preparation of @pallavabagla while asking questions to ISRO chief Sivan
Journalism Level- NDTV pic.twitter.com/KRe86VXcDN
— Ankur Singh (@iAnkurSingh) September 6, 2019
In the video, it can be seen that Pallava Bagla was asking the ISRO chief how many astronauts are being sent up with Chandrayaan-2 and the ISRO chief patiently explains to Bagla that this is an automatic, unmanned mission and no astronauts are going to be sent up to space.
