Kal Tak Ignores The Real Story

Sometimes the timing of the media is almost too much to notice without breaking into a great laughter. Take for example the latest episode of Kal Tak and then the next day’s Daily Times column by Dr. Masooda Bano. Let us look at these two media types next to each other.

First, Mr. Chaudhry spent the entire show talking about the various crises in the country. Listening to Kal Tak, one could easily believe that the end of the world is coming. Democracy is nowhere to be seen, law and order is completely absent, and only corruption is behind every door. The government is a complete failure, and PPP is secretly planning to repeal the constitution! No need to provide any evidence for any of these claims. It is enough to watch the TV ratings race to the sky to feel sufficiently justified.

Meanwhile, there are of course no conspiracies against the government at all. If one were to believe Mr. Chaudhry, though, shouldn’t there be some conspiracy? After all, it seems that according to Kal Tak, the government is going to end the world!

Obviously, this is all topsy-turvy. Actually, the government is not ending the world. Certainly there are many problems in Pakistan. Yes, there is some corruption. But why is Chaudhry talking about corruption when there was another explosion in Karachi, this time jihadis blowing themselves up on accident before they had a chance to find some school. Is paying some ghoos to the post office a larger problem than this?

And as for there being no conspiracy against the President. Maybe there is not. But can anyone be surprised to think otherwise? How many times will TV anchors make predictions on the air about Zardari being removed from office before it starts to sound like a conspiracy? It was only a few months ago that Anjum Niaz was predicting that there was a conspiracy between the Americans and Musharraf to abuse the President. This article was widely circulated by people like the Master of Conspiracies Ahmed Quraishi who has said on TV himself that he thinks the government should be toppled.

I will not chronicle all the media talk about getting rid of Zardari. If you watch TV even sometimes you will know them well.

With this in mind, I found it quite interesting to read Dr. Masooda Bano’s column, “Planned hype,” in the Daily News. Reading this with Kal Tak still fresh in my mind made me laugh out loud. I laughed at the ridiculousness of Kal Tak an its companions, but I also felt great relief that there is someone of sense writing in the media and making the most important point of all — Pakistan’s media is finally free, but with this freedom comes a great responsibility. I hope Mr. Chaudhry reads The Daily News.