The Sushant Singh Rajput (SSR) case has become a circus in the mainstream media what with the actor’s tragic story now spiralling into a national obsession with many predictions and speculations
Amina Kausar | Clarion India
ONE cannot stop wondering at Indian media’s manic obsession with the Sushant Singh Rajput (SSR) case and the subsequent larger drug debate at a time when India is facing so many challenges, including a raging pandemic, but then, this distraction helps the Narendra Modi government to get away with murder.
Why is the Indian media using the SSR case and distracting Indians from the more critical issues and helping the Modi regime to escape from all the criticism?
Well, the SSR case has become a circus in the mainstream media what with the actor’s tragic story now spiralling into a national obsession with many predictions and speculations.
Media tactics to deviate from critical issues: When the country was mourning for the suicidal death of SSR, the case took a new turn when anchor Arnab Goswami and Bollywood actress Kangana Ranaut deviated from this issue for their personal benefits and distracted people from the main critical issues. The following agendas were run by the mainstream media to cover up the government’s failures, mismanagement, and ill-thought policies.
Agenda on mental depression: SSR’s death by suicide was presumed to be an outcome of depression and severe mental illness. Discussions on mental illness followed which worsened matters for those facing similar issues and are more likely to put fear and shame back into those with mental health concerns.
All this is likely to endanger the lives of many who are going through the toughest phase of mental depression.
Agenda on nepotism: Kangana, known for her pro-government leanings, took to social media to put forth her grievances against Bollywood elites and blamed nepotism for driving SSR to death. She alleged that they made a conspiracy to end his career in Bollywood and prevented his films from hitting the screen because he is not a product of ‘nepotism’.
After that, millions of social media users unfollowed celebs such as Karan Johar and Alia Bhatt, who are being accused of fuelling nepotism in Bollywood. Kangana saw an increase in Instagram followers overnight while Karan’s profile saw a rapid drop in minutes. Many people supported the hashtag to boycott Bollywood movies of the elite stars. The issue quickly turned from the ‘suicide case’ to ‘a murder conspiracy’.
Agenda on Money laundering: SSR’s father filed an FIR in Patna accusing actress Rhea Chakraborty of siphoning off money from his son’s bank accounts. This made the Enforcement Directorate(ED) to register a money-laundering case against Rhea and others accused in the FIR, which even involved her brother Showik Chakraborty. The agency has questioned many people involved in this matter. ED has confirmed withdrawal of Rs 15 crore from SSR’s Account, assuming there would be some transactions that happened between Rhea and SSR since they were in a relationship, but no money was sent to her from the account from which Rs 15 crore was withdrawn.
CBI: The Supreme Court ordered an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the death of SSR. The order came after actress Rhea’s plea seeking to transfer the case filed against her from Patna to Mumbai. The CBI said all aspects were being looked into and no aspect had been ruled out as of date in SSR’s. The investigation is still continuing.
Agenda on drugs against Bollywood: With the arrest of Rhea, the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), ED, and CBI appear to have moved ahead towards working out on the mysterious death of the deceased actor. Perhaps it was still a mystery that SSR was a habitual drug user and why Rhea regularly brought drugs for him with the help of her brother Showik and SSR’s manager Samuel Miranda. But the mystery of the drug issue is yet to be resolved.
Rhea has been arrested in connection with the NCB’s probe of the drug angle followed by the arrest of Showik, Miranda and his house help Dipesh Sawant.
The NCB had summoned Bollywood actors Deepika Padukone, Sara Ali Khan, Rakul Preet Singh, and Shraddha Kapoor. One wonders whether the allegations of drug abuse against top actors could be the last nail in the coffin for Bollywood.
The mainstream media had covered this issue in hours of debates, ignoring the farmers’ protests going on simultaneously. It seems they have got an agenda to distract people from the farmer’s protest.
Rhea is being made a ‘scapegoat’ of political agendas as the media trial has caused her extreme trauma and has infringed on her privacy. The death of SSR sensationalised by the media since it occurred at a time when Bihar electrons are due. The media accused Rhea of murdering SSR and also found her guilty of it.
The custodial and judicial bench of media court found her guilty of controlling SSR’s life, putting him on drugs, using his money, giving him wrong medicines, distancing him from his family, using him to get film offers, having other affairs, performing black magic, appreciating marijuana from Bhubaneswar and calling him ‘babu’. The media, indeed, has got a new villain, i.e, Rhea.
Is the unfortunate and mysterious death of SSR more newsworthy than the unprecedented spike in the total number of corona cases, hospitals’ mismanagement, millions of job losses, plight of migrant workers who lost their livelihood and are struggling to have one square meal a day, severe economic contraction, farmers’ protests against the draconian agriculture Bills?
And why is the media making light of students being forced to give exams neglecting the horror of the pandemic, floods in various parts of the country, China’s intrusion, increasing rape cases, rising of violence against women, rising criminal cases, rising prices of fuel and other food commodities weakening many middle-class and poor families, and India’s poor performance among all major nations.
Surely, the country is in grave danger but the focus of the media is on unnecessary debates on unnecessary topics. Barring journalism, Indian media is doing everything else. The mainstream media is deliberately creating diversionary narratives to blank out the issues that really matter.
The death of SSR has been converted into a media-cum-judicial circus. The media has been left with nothing, apart from wasting its time on discussing dozens of motives attributed to his death.
Quite evident is the manufactured outrage of anchors whose faith in government handouts would have been touching if it was not so self-serving and sickening. Their unwillingness to present the facts to their audiences and readers has lulled most Indians into believing that we have secured a great victory. The anchors are in the forefront in supporting the government’s propaganda to hide the truth from its citizens by suppressing, distorting or denying the facts. This may prove costly for the country in the long run.
