Backstory: The Vantage Point From Which to Tell the Story of the Farmersâ Protests
A fortnightly column from The Wire s public editor.
Farmers raise slogans at Ghazipur border on January 30. Photo: PTI
Rights30/Jan/2021
While covering the ceaseless swirls and eddies in the epic farmersâ agitation on Delhiâs borders, a professional journalist would need to arrive at a vantage point from which to view, report and analyse the developments, in order to tell this history-making story with some degree of credibility and seriousness.
Many media persons have not had to search too hard to find their respective vantage points. Some are happy to be guided by TRPs, circulation figures, or the hits they can garner in their search for the perfect perch. A great many are content to occupy a roost crafted for them by an authoritarian, micro-managing political apparatus through the agency of supine and mendacious managements. All they, on their part, have to do is to suspend criti