Hafta letters: Pegasus, population control, rants and Hindi on Hafta

This is regarding the discussions on the past two Haftas. Why do we all need to be a party to Abhinandan’s rant or personal questions to the experts? How is this different from Man ki Baat?

On the past Hafta, he spent about 10 minutes talking with Vivek Kaul about the real estate business. As he says in the end, it’s his advice to people who are looking to invest. Why should all podcast listeners be exposed to this? If he wants validation of his opinion, let him do it on his personal time and cost. Also, how is this not misusing public/subscriber money to seek/validate personal investment advice? People have subscribed to NL because of podcasts mostly – at least I have – Caravan features are better investigated and provide much more in-depth analysis.

To top it all you guys rambled on for another 10 minutes before I got to hear Vivek Kaul. I listen to podcasts while running and on a web browser, so I can’t stop and jump.

Please keep in mind that NL Hafta is not your personal time with experts, it is shared time for all subscribers.

Thank you

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Hey, not complaining. Just don't let Vivek Kaul talk so much.

Ok, bye!

Nikhil Parnami

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Hi,

I’m a regular listener of Hafta and use it to quench my need to listen to some debates about current events. One huge point I want to make is that over the last few episodes I have noticed the panel’s inability to maintain a continuous discussion on a topic. Listening becomes so difficult when the speakers keep moving the context too quickly and results in a minor migraine just keeping up with what we are even talking about.

This is an earnest request to change this so we can absorb some information from the discussion. Hope this improves discussion.

Your subscriber,

Divye Marwah

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Hey guys,

Love your team's work! Sorry about the subject, but you guys seem to mostly pick angry subscribers, so trying to mimic one.

Ok, I just have one question: I believe that the Congress is the actual B Team of the BJP and they work behind closed doors to make sure no other credible opposition leader or party comes to power. Maybe the BJP has achieved this through their many tactics.

Your opinion?

Regards,

Sarfraz A Khan

***

Hello NL Team,

I've unfortunately been quite irregular in keeping up with the news in recent times, but the NL Sena articles on "Who Owns Your Media" caught my eye. The pieces show in stark detail how precarious the situation of current media businesses in India is. This made me think about how susceptible the media houses in our country are to hostile corporate takeovers. I'd like to know the panel's thoughts on whether there are any checks and balances in India to prevent this from happening? Was this discussed before? If so, I do apologise as I must have missed it.

How would the readers and common people know that, for example, the Times of India is now officially a mouthpiece of a certain ideology because it’s being held by a shadow corporation aligned with the said ideology?

I can think of antitrust laws in the EU, but nothing akin to it in India comes to mind.

As always, love your work, Keep it up!

Get vaccinated, stay safe.

Abhishek

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Hi NL Team,

I have been a subscriber for over a year and am a regular listener of Hafta. I’m also a fan of Newsance and Tippani (kudos to Manisha and Atul).

I am sending this letter to know your opinion on the ongoing political situation in India. I don't know about you, but things are getting scarier day by day and I am losing hope.

I am not focusing on the nitty-gritty but want to draw your attention to the bigger picture. With the gradual decay in major institutions, it feels like we are on a slippery slope from where you can only go lower. Just imagine a more ruthless "leader" (they do exist in the current scene or even worse) without any checks and balances, twisting the system so much that it eventually breaks.

And the current Godi Media is in such a sorry state that even after the carnage of the second wave, they are still playing "look over there!" It's frightening to see how the second Sushant Singh wave aka Kundra Wave is sweeping primetime when our already fragile democracy is at stake after the revelation of rampant illegal snooping. How do these people even sleep at night? Doing anything (even selling your soul) for money shows moral degradation. I guess we can call it the 'Gujarat Model'.

Keep up the good work. Our democracy needs superheros like you. Will always remain a supporter of free media.

Best,

Suraj Mishra

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Dear Hafta team,

his week you'll probably talk about the Pegasus and Newsclick "controversy". It's an example of how much legacy and conservative media are failing us. As if in unison, OpIndia and all Godi Media sites and channels launched into Newsclick, talking about funding from a Sri Lankan-Cuban in China. Guess what? Roy Singham is neither Sri Lankan, nor Cuban. He is my American ex-boss, the founder of the company I work for even today, ThoughtWorks.

Sumeet Moghe

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I am a recent subscriber who has been living in Australia for 30 years. You can understand how my knowledge of Indian politics is slightly dated. I am originally from Chennai and grew up without knowing much Hindi. I'm sure there are quite a few of us in your subscriber population. Therefore, I repeat my request that I had sent previously: please avoid lapsing into Hindi on the podcast and if you must, try and paraphrase what was said for the likes of me.

One of my main reasons for listening to Hafta is that it is an English podcast.

I have long noticed that Hafta is unapologetically Delhi (or North India) centred. Political news south of the Vidhyas hardly ever makes the discussion. Maybe another podcast with the likes of Dhanya Rajendran can fill this gap. Hafta panellists also spend too much time on what they are comfortable with, the 40-minute discussion on the death of Dilip Kumar is a case in point. A giant in his field he may very well have been, but there are more pertinent topics from the South.

Venu Parthiban

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Hi NL Team,

Hope you are well.

I would like to know your opinion about a point raised in this article on the Baffler.

It is about the experience of a Muslim journalist in India gradually losing hope for the future. One of the points he brings up is how his coverage has emboldened Hindutva goons to be violent and brazen.

He uses the fact that a Bajrang Dal worker became proud of being written about in New York to argue that his coverage has no effect on the future.

Do you also think that writing about violent Hindutva organisations is counterproductive and will only embolden them?

Or is there a perspective that we are not seeing?

I would like to know Mehraj’s views on this in particular.

Regards,

Calvin D'Souza

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Hi, I am a relatively new subscriber from Sydney, Australia. Just on the point of data journalism, speaking from the experience of working in similar 'intelligence units', their job is not to prepare graphs for journalists to publish. They are specialists/experts in subjects like managing data assets, developing data lineage, data pipelines, maintaining data platforms, creating data visualizations, etc to ultimately enable the journalists to perform 'self-service' analytics. I, for example, worked in Data Governance.

My guess is this is not that big in India – at all – based on the discussion. However, here in Australia we have some excellent data journalism happening and analytics is hot everywhere, government included. It's quite obvious that the commentator (Vivek) has absolutely no understanding of what these ‘intelligence units' in such spaces really do – it's not at all what he's describing.

Many thanks,

Vikram

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Hello Hafta team,

I have been a subscriber for four months now, but I was a mufatkhor for the last 4 years (I was in school at the time though). Right now, I'm in the second year of college. I wanted to use my student ID for a student subscription but my college didn't issue it until now. So inefficient admin at my institute led me to buy a subscription for now, as I'm at home. I hope when I shift to the campus, I’ll get a student subscription from Newslaundry. But, yes, I can happily say I pay to keep news free.

I recently did an art history-related project along the lines of urbanization and environmental conservation and social identity (it’s a topic very close to my heart). The way our cities, even small towns, are becoming unhealthy in the face of zero sensible urban planning is scary. I was glad that Newslaundry did the series on Central Vista (if I think anymore about that heartbreaking destruction, I'm gonna cry). And I am looking forward to the Aravalli series. I hope you get an opportunity to delve into the smart city project sometime after. How bureaucracy is functioning and is structured and how the funds, which are tons of loans, are being utilized, and if we are ever gonna see good returns (as if). Attached is a photograph that my mum clicked just outside the smart city headquarters after a meeting with city architects about sustainable development. Such greenwashing. Please read the wall.

Say hi to the agent snooping on us.

A happy subscriber,

Aparajita

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Hi NL Team,

My name is Anand. My grandfather's name was Ranganathan. Toh Social Darwinism samajhkar word limit maaf kar dena. In any case, the highlighted parts are under 200 words [in bold italics].

The Kashmir episodes were incredible and chilling (especially after hearing Let's Talk About). For some reason though, I had to watch your extraordinary work on some random YouTube channel because the NL links say they're private/unavailable. Why can't I access the Chase videos on the NL website or channel? This reduces the chances of my recommendations to people converting into subscriptions/follows. Do check.

Tippani

I am 100 percent gay for Atul's Hindi. Love everything about the show, especially Dhritarashtra-Sanjay Samvaad. Also loved his story in the one million subs series about how the segment came about.

Newsance

Heard repeated aspirational references to John Oliver's "Last Week Tonight", including in your 'one million subs' episode. I wish you LWT's reach and scale, but you are already a more important and uniquely positioned show today. LWT, if anything, should serve as a cautionary tale for your show not to stagnate and go its way of becoming 'pale, male and stale'. I was an ardent fan of John Oliver's standup, and later his work on LWT until about 2017. From around 2017, I felt his comedic and political takes could no longer keep up with the absurd reality of the Trump era. Reality beat him to everything, and their show resigned to using tired old tropes (like Karen references or that annoying 'country on a map' joke that's done to death). Don't let the same happen to you. May I suggest some off-format but edgier inspiration: Sacha Baron Cohen's Who is America.

My parents love Newsance and Manisha, so do my friends – some have already converted from mufatkhors to paying subscribers. Do keep pushing the boundaries with your format. When some student/researcher 20 years from now is about to cite a Times report from 2018 as a primary source, here's hoping they'll find a link to Newsance telling them ki innme itni oorja aati kahaan se hai.

Hafta

Heard every episode going back seven years and it's still something I look forward to every week. Abhinandan as moderator still gets the energy just right. Madhu’s and Raman's experiences feel like honest, credible and enriching accounts of the decades behind them. Anand Vardhan's interjections are insightful (even though he sounds like he's taking a very considered and bureaucratic dump as he speaks). I miss Deepanjana and Kishlay on the panel. Ranga, for all his degrees, was the clown who couldn't understand something as basic as the importance of lived experiences (TBT the bizarre episode when he insisted he knew what it felt like to be a black man because he read a book about it). Sudhir Suryavanshi, Saurabh Dwivedi, Mihir Sharma, Hartosh, Rukmini S, Dhanya, Leena Raghunath, Josy Joseph have been some of your best guests on Hafta. I thank you for the fantastic recommendations over the years (Dravidian Years, Amritsar, More Perfect, and many many others). Could you get Muneeb Farooq on Hafta? (See recommendations below for reference.)

Viewing recommendations (would love to hear any of these discussed on Hafta):

• Red State Blue State by Colin Quinn on Netflix. One of the greatest political comedy specials I have watched.

• That's Not Funny by Mike Celestino. The history of comedy and free speech in the US.

• Crime Tak by Shams Tahir Khan episode 63. Surprisingly, I found it to be one of the most comprehensive tellings of the story leading from the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter to the death of Justice Loya (despite the C-grade Hawas ka Pujari type thumbnail).

• Najam Sethi and Muneeb Farooq on Kargil. Masterclass in storytelling, and beautiful Urdu.

• I am 20, read with Samanth Subramaniam's Economist piece, "Midnight’s Grown Ups".

Criticism

Interview at The Quorum by NL with Karuna Nundy.

Ms Nundy's responses were mostly gas. While that’s consistent with her other talking head-type appearances on TV, I expect a platform like NL to be able to catch that. She doesn't 1) give specific answers, 2) cite sources, 3) acknowledge the work of others, 4) qualify her opinions, or 5) say "I don't know" enough. By contrast, former NL guests like Saurabh Dwivedi, Rukmini S, Ajay Shukla, Dhanya, Kishlay and numerous others inspire credibility precisely because they do these things. If you edit out the "right?", "y'know", "sort of" type generic rhetorical BS, you wouldn't be left with 10 minutes of footage from this session.

Sample the following exchange around the 25-minute mark of the video (paraphrased but content faithfully retained, my comments interleaved in bold):

Abhinandan: What are the solutions which are the lower hanging fruit to make courts more accessible to ordinary people? The US has cases of the common man winning against corporations like Enron or McDonald's. But in India, I can't imagine that happening. NL's case against the Times of India Group for instance...we have already incurred 16-18 lakhs in fees...most small organisations have no option but to take down/apologise when threatened with a lawsuit. How does one make the judiciary friendly to people who can't afford the big bucks (in a way that they have a chance of winning against big corporations)?

Karuna Nundy: Everyone knows we need more judges and courts. Efforts are being made, but not fast enough "by our entire system". That's the burning need. There are lots of smaller disputes clogging up our courts.

I'll give this idea out for free, even though I was thinking of monetising it: online/app-based arbitration accessible to common people for smaller value disputes.

First, this has nothing to do with the question, because a Times Group-type would have to agree to go to arbitration (arbitration is purely a creature of consent). Nevermind that Ms Nundy proposed "small claims" arbitration platforms to try multi-crore defamation suits. Why would a large corporation agree to a faster, less expensive forum that would defeat the very purpose of harassing a small company with their frivolous defamation claim? It's like saying all you need to eliminate black money is for corrupt people to declare all their wealth.

Second, online dispute resolution is not Ms Nundy's idea (whether to give out for free or otherwise) as she brazenly misrepresented. Dispute resolution companies/startups have been offering app and website based dispute resolution services in India for over half a decade, and globally for at least a decade and a half now.

Ms Nundy continues: The Supreme Court should not have to go into nonsense cases like the positioning of a bathroom. Recruitment of police officers should represent diversity of the population. It is widely known that people can be patriarchal no matter what gender they are. People can be casteist, there is internalised patriarchy and casteism. "How does one deal with that, that when you're interviewing these people, when you're recruiting these people, you make sure, you you, and I think this is really really important, because we see decisions where the rapist is told to get a rakhi tied by the rape victim. You have to make sure that the person has not just the inclination but the ability...because there is a technical ability that comes with fostering equality to further the constitution when you are wielding the power of the State." Otherwise, might is right, jiski lathi uski bhains and lathi becomes bigger lathi.

Throughout this vague incoherent tirade of woke buzzwords, Abhinandan says, "yeah" and "hmmm" with the attentiveness of someone on heavy antibiotics.

Ms Nundy continues: "When we recruit prosecutors, or police people or judges, we have to make sure they are going to further the constitution and not trammel the constitution. Ummm. And in accordance with this look at promotions, rewards and penalties that look at the decisions you are making."

So the low-hanging fruit solution to make the judiciary more accessible to ordinary people is to make sure we recruit people who will further the constitution and not trammel the constitution? Got it. Allow me a moment to recover from the blinding specificity of this suggestion.

Ms Nundy continues: This becomes a much more burning issue when you have political parties being divisive. Numerous studies including "Yale study" show that when there is a riot the BJP benefits and the Congress for all its ills doesn't. So it's not enough to increase police or judges numbers. You have to make sure that justice and the constitution is furthered.

Jab justice, constitution aur Yale study hai, sawaal kya tha kisko padi hai.

Ms Nundy's book chapter (the one plugged at the beginning of the session) is something I don't have the energy to critique in this email, but do get one of your lawyer friends to read it and give you an honest take on whether it could pass any real editorial muster if it didn't come with a famous byline.

Do us a favour, Team NL: when you have a lawyer or judge as a guest, do try and ensure your interviewer can challenge them with the same confidence and rigour that Madhu/Abhinandan would be able to when engaging political or media persons. Otherwise (as some wise man pointed out on the last Hafta) tum mic pakde reh jaoge aur koi interview ke naam par speech pelkar nikal lega.

I promise to write a shorter email next time. Keep up the fabulous work.

Anand

PS: I have no personal axe of any sort to grind with Ms Nundy. My criticism of the interview comes from disappointment at seeing someone cruise unchallenged through an NL interview simply by using woke keywords and random legalese. Surely, you can do better.

PPS: A "so much hua hai" moment for Manisha's viewing pleasure (at 10:35 to 10:42).

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Hi Newslaundry team,

I’ve been a subscriber since 2015 and have always loved your work. This is my second email to you guys so I won't waste time in saying all the nice things I said the last time. :)

I am writing to you in light of the recent Pew research findings. I grew up in a “non-woke” semi-urban place in Andhra, so the findings weren’t the “revelations” to me as they are being made out to be. I expected you guys to discuss the findings at length but was disappointed to see that you missed them except for a passing reference by Manisha in Hafta 336. (I am including two references below which capture the essence of the survey.)

The survey clearly points to the fact that Indians are extremely religious and conservative. There is a clear acceptance of hierarchy, a shared sense of “Hindu” culture (even among minority communities), and a strong sense of scepticism by Hindus against minorities.

It appears to me that the only party that “vocally” appeals to these beliefs is the BJP. But other parties win elections too because they cater to the same emotions but not in an overt manner. The success of Modi could partly be because he was able to clearly draw this binary and forced the opposition to take a stand on many of these contentious issues and accuse them of hypocrisy when they failed to do so. (Beef eating, for instance.)

In light of this, I have two points to make to the NL team and Abhinandan in particular.

1) Abhinandan on many occasions seems flabbergasted by the fact that people continue to support Modi despite his dog whistles against Muslims. I find this surprising because I expect him to know this (Pew research findings) as common sense as he is someone who has travelled to most places in India while working on his food show (and never misses an opportunity to advertise that :p). How could he not pick this up as the common Indian mentality?

2) These days all of the NL panellists seem to agree too much on ideological issues. (Notable exception is Anand.) I know this is not by design but I have noticed that even when you bring on right-leaning journalists like Kanchan Gupta and Smita Prakash, there are subscriber emails expressing displeasure about their presence. This shows a uniformity in your subscription base as well. Also, whenever there were suggestions from subscribers to consider doing some positive stories just so that you’re not dismissed as an agenda driven organisation to oust the BJP, the team casually dismissed that constructive feedback.

My point is what do you hope to achieve if your content only appeals to the folks who already agree with you? I know Anand Ranganathan is speaking in a different tone these days but he used to say on Hafta that for any ideology to work the moderates have to buy it. I think Team NL can go a long way in making India tend liberal (that’s my bias), at least think differently if it can be a little more open and persuasive in its approach and not just mockingly dismiss the other side like Abhinandan often does. Finally, I want to compliment Manisha as she comes across as the most open-minded of you and puts forth her views very politely. Please can we have more of that?

Wish you the best!

P Kartheek

PS: I may have come across as an Abhinandan hater but I am a fan and have shamelessly borrowed many of his punchlines in my conversations to sound smart. :D

References:

1) Latest survey shows ‘woke’ politics is a liability in India

2) Grand Tamasha Podcast: Neha Sahgal on Religion and Identity in Contemporary India

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Hi,

The Gaia hypothesis is a discredited hypothesis which scientists do not take seriously. It is at best a mystical metaphor and at worst a quasi-scientific fantasy. It assumes that for some mysterious reason Earth functions in a way to sustain life which is not only a teleological fallacy but also in contradiction with over a billion years of Earth’s lifeless geological history. Even a school student knows that earth throughout its history has changed drastically from one environment to another; if the Earth was in “self-regulatory equilibrium” you would see cycles not change one after another¹. To get more details on it please see Wikipedia's criticism section, there are articles after articles and even book-length criticism of this idea².

But there are understandable reasons for the popularity of this idea, especially among the western population bereft of organized religion, which can’t be covered in under 250 words³.

On a related note, Abhinandan while describing the population problem, was essentially describing the Malthusian Trap, another discredited idea when applied to human population⁴. The reason the Malthusian trap doesn't work for the human population is that, unlike animals who are only dependent on natural resources, humans can think creatively and essentially create new resources. For example, petrol, uranium, sea water, etc were useless for thousands of years but human creativity turned them into sources of energy and survival⁵.

Also, a family can be poor with two children and be rich even with five children. What’s important is to create an environment for their employment, not forced sterilization⁶.

References:

1) This is a very simple argument attacking the core of the Gaia hypothesis but since the Gaia hypothesis was promulgated by two scientists (Lynn Margulis and James Lovelock) there are mathematical and geological arguments given but they all fail miserably upon closer inspection.

2) Gaia hypothesis.

3) One of the reasons is mysticism, please see this, and another reason is the current moral panic over climate change.

4) Why Malthus Is Still Wrong

5) Israel Proves the Desalination Era Is Here

6) India was way poorer at the time of independence when the population was just 34 crore. If the population was the cause of poverty, India would have gotten poorer with the increase in population and not richer.

Regards,

Uddalak Aruni