This week, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, Jayashree Arunachalam and Anand Vardhan are joined by advertising guru and columnist Santosh Desai and multimedia artist Anurag Minus Verma.
On the impact of political advertisements, Santosh says it has “never” been a significant player, as ads “simply fail” to reach an audience “beyond a certain comfort zone”. Anurag says influencer and meme marketing agencies instead have become “very important” in communication strategies.
The conversation moves to the elections in Uttar Pradesh’s Amethi and Rae Bareli. Manisha, who reported from the two constituencies, says that unemployment is a “really big concern”. She says that while people are talking about it from village to village, it is not a sign of anti-incumbency. “A lot of them say Modi should focus on this [employment] in his third term.”
On the temporary bail of AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal and his speech about Prime Minister Narendra Modi retiring before turning 75, Anand says, “It is a ploy to confuse voters.”
This and a whole lot more. Tune in!
Hafta letters: Modi, Congress and voting systems
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Song: Jogi Jabse Tu Aaya Mere Dware
Timecodes
00: 05:25 - Headlines
00: 14:21 - Political advertising
00:59:32 - Santosh recommendation
01:10:33 - Amethi-Rae Bareli elections, Kejriwal’s interim bail
01:33:24 - Anurag recommendation
01:34:23 - Letters
02:05:10 - Panel recommendations
References
Election Commission’s model code: Need for legal teeth vs practical concerns
Uttarakhand: Over 1,000 forest fires in 4 months
How police & politicians made false claims on Rohith Vemula death | Let Me Explain
Recommendations
Santosh
Anurag
Jayashree
Election Commission ushers India to its electoral nadir
Silenced by fear: Survivors reveal years of abuse in the Revanna household
Manisha
Social media’s impact on Indian politics
BJP’s women safety pitch vs the accused sex offenders in its backyard
Lucknow University boy explains why women in his village vote for Modi
NL series on government schemes
Anand
A dignified peaceful passing is everyone’s right
Abhinandan
How Modi’s right-hand man, Amit Shah, runs India
Ethical questions: Media’s ‘Kaama’ language in Prajwal Revanna coverage
Check out our previous Hafta recommendations.
Produced and recorded by Aryan Mahtta, edited by Hassan Bilal and Umrav Singh.
Hafta 485
Manisha: [00:00:00] This is a News Laundry Podcast and you're listening to NL Hafta. Angreze apna lagaan
Abhinandan: aur News Laundry chhorte. Welcome to another episode of Hafta. In the midst of election action, lots happening around the country and at News Laundry. Manisha is just back from Uttar Pradesh. Yes. And she shall tell us more about that.
Uh, we have a. Very interesting discussion. It's going to the intersection of politics and pop culture figure. But before we get into that, I have a very important announcement to make, which is that Newsable, uh, our website and app is now accessible. Uh, at the Media Rumble, we had previewed Newsable. It's a set of features that would make our website and app accessible to people with disabilities.
Uh, we launched it a few weeks ago. I mean, I'm, I think I can safely assume we are the first Indian news website that is accessible to people with disabilities. So it has stuff like [00:01:00] read aloud, voice search, keyboard navigation, dyslexic fonts, reader mode, podcast transcripts, subtitles. You can read a note about this by Chitranshu.
You can click in the note, uh, The link in the show notes below and tell us what you think. And if you are a disabled user or you know someone who is, please mail us at subscription at newslaundry. com. I repeat subscription at newslaundry. com. And we'd love to speak with you. And I had mentioned a couple of haftas ago that this idea had come to us at a, at an event, at a news laundry event, a young subscriber tapped me on the back and I turned around and I started talking to him.
He said, your website should be accessible to people who cannot see. Uh, And I realized he wasn't looking at me because he couldn't see. And then he told me what all other problems he has because he likes to consume. So he heard, uh, about, he heard me say this. So he sent me a voice note. And with his permission, I said, may I use it?
So he said, yes. I'm just going to play this voice note of a young subscriber.[00:02:00]
Uttam(Subscriber): I really want to thank you, uh, to making, for making your website accessible for people with disabilities and, uh, my newslaundry subscription has expired, unfortunately. So, uh, today I was listening to your Anil Hafta program and you were just thanking that individual who just suggested you that to please make our website accessible for people with disabilities.
And, uh, you would be happy to know that. That person is me. I was the one who in, in the News Laundry subscriber event, I suggested you that please make your website accessible for people with disabilities so that they can also enjoy the news. So I'm very happy to, uh, see the progress of News Laundry. It is.
Abhinandan: So that was Uttam. Thank you so much, Uttam, forever in your debt. And what I loved most about your message is the first time you referred [00:03:00] to News Laundry, you said our website.
The second
Abhinandan: time you said your website, but I would prefer if you call it our website because it is our website and I will show you just to what extent it's our website.
Next month you will see something else that News Laundry will do that I think again is going to be a first. So thank you, Uttam. This is your idea. That's how it started. And I hope you like it. Uh, And what time is the professor in Chhattisgarh? Uh, and, uh, if you're ever in town, come by and you should be on the half that with us as well, because you had kicked off this entire series of events for one year, which led to this.
So on that note, let me introduce our panel. Joining us in the studio is our chief justice in training on under then you see every week it gets elevated. And then there's actually studying law at law. So first he was a student. Next week I introduced him as a ASG. Then he was also the general. Then he became judge.
Now [00:04:00] he's chief justice in training. Manisha Pandey, who's just back from UP and she'll tell us about that. Hello. Joining us in this, uh, Not in the studio on zoom is our colleague, Jayshree. Welcome Jayshree.
Jayashree: Hello. Hello.
Abhinandan: And our two guests, Santosh Desai. Hi Santosh. Hi there. I'm sure most of our audience know who you are.
I mean, I've read his columns for the longest time. Uh, he's a columnist, he's a media critic and author. He's currently the managing director and CEO of Future Brands. He was previously the president of mechanics in one of India's premier advertising agencies. He's a post grad of IMM, the bar then spent 21 years in advertising.
Manisha: So
Santosh Desai: that's an ancient, that's an ancient bio, but you know, it's okay.
Manisha: Yeah.
Santosh Desai: Cause I quit advertising 15 years ago.
Abhinandan: But I think advertising as it existed 15 years ago is doesn't exist. So
Santosh Desai: that is true. So I pretty much quit advertising when it was advertising.
Abhinandan: And [00:05:00] also joining us is one of our regulars on Hafta Anurag minus Varma Hai Anurag.
Uh,
Abhinandan: uh, audience already knows Anurag. He's a poet, filmmaker, author. He's host of the Anurag minus Verma podcast. I hope you guys listen to it. The link is in the show notes below. You can check it out. He writes pieces that have been regularly published in several publications, including the print and the Hindu, and he has been on Hafta a few times.
Now, before we move into the discussion, here are the headlines, a huge ad blitzkrieg on, you'll be bombarded with ads on your YouTube everywhere by political parties. And we have, we have a discussion on that with experts on making stuff on social media and also the former head of a leading ad agency in India, uh, and Prime Minister Modi.
on an interview giving spree in the last one week. I think he's given over a dozen interviews and we will have a music video about that also coming up next week and the rest of the headlines Jayshree will tell us.
Manisha: Quite a few he's given and today the Aj Tak one will come. There's a [00:06:00] third one today.
Multiple anchors within the same. Same organization.
Abhinandan: So this, Today's is the third one towards the group
Manisha: and compare that to say Congress at least uh, Rahul Gandhi has not given any interviews
Abhinandan: because not
Manisha: even, I mean, television, I guess they shouldn't because they can be no fair kind of hearing, but not even to like say YouTube channels or digital media.
So they're really like, yeah, he's just focusing on his, uh, YouTube and Instagram.
Abhinandan: Right.
Jayashree: Yes, so here are the other headlines for the week. The Supreme Court on Friday granted interim bail to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal till June 1st, so he can campaign in the Lok Sabha polls. Amit Shah said this is not a routine judgment and Kejriwal may be provided special treatment.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Jayashree: Meanwhile, Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Sareen is challenged to his arrest. Uh, by the E. D. His plea will be heard by the court tomorrow. That is May 17th. The Supreme Court has declared the arrest and subsequent remand of Newsclick web portal founder editor Prabir Purkayasthan under the UAPA as invalid and [00:07:00] ordered his immediate release.
He was released last night.
Abhinandan: I would just like to point out to all those You know, I, I mean, I do not trolls because Twitter is where the dredges of who have no one to say anything to vomit and unload. But even journalists who have large significant They said, if you are, you know, not guilty, you have nothing to fear.
You bloody dimwitted shits. The guy has spent at the age of 74 a significant amount of time in jail and the arrest is illegal. So before you Vomit words out of your mouth. Think a little bit because tomorrow someone throws you in jail and say, we'll get you out three years later, three months later. It is not law following its course.
So understand governance and law and order before jumping into journalism. And especially goes out to broadcast journalists. Most of you are such uneducated buffoons. If you had been in a world where, where you say meritocracy or [00:08:00] meritocracy, we are three parties and, but we are meritocracy in a true meritocracy, at least an organization that values news, you would not even get a job of opening a door.
Many of you sitting in suits in prime time, remember that and read the order of this judgment. And shut up. Sorry for the outburst. Please continue in the most calm manner like we usually do in News Laundry.
Jayashree: So, back to serious stuff. The fourth phase of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls voting took place on May 13th.
There was voter turnout of 67. 7 percent and the next phase is on May 20th, which is Monday. In Bombay, the BMC and sorry, in Mumbai, the BMC on Thursday called off the search and rescue operations at the gut co site where a 120 foot hoarding collapsed on a petrol pump. It killed 16 people and injured 75 others.
Abhinandan: Sorry, before you continue, I just wanna ask if any of few know, um, like I saw some of the details of this case, we're not gonna discuss it in de in detail right now. It was Asia's biggest hoarding. [00:09:00] Today, no one is claiming ownership of it. The agency said we had rented out for a few months. Our rent has expired.
It's not our job to bring it down. Apparently, the railway, whose land was also partially on, knew it was illegal. No one brought it down. I mean, the size of that thing, after it collapsed, till like 24 hours later, people are screaming from inside, like no one came for rescue.
Jayashree: I mean, They rescued the last two, I think late last night, or they pulled, or not rescued, they pulled out two more bodies late last night.
So this was while also I think the Prime Minister's rally was taking place, what, 10 minutes away from it. I
Manisha: mean, Bombay really needs to every. Every monsoon, there's a story that comes out of there as horrific as this.
Abhinandan: I mean, I, I mean, horrific. Okay, but just walls collapsing. How does this happen? I do not manholes.
Anand: It's holding deaths in India are more frequent than we think. Uh, in Tamil only last year, three people died and they were [00:10:00] illegal holdings. They were not legal holdings. In Lano. In Lano. Eight people, maybe in the number 16 has caught our attention. No, no, but I,
Abhinandan: I remember, you're right, because in Delhi when I used to work at News Track Delhi, you notice Delhi, they no holdings, right?
'cause they were made illegal. There were no holdings at all because a few collapsed. And at that time, I think it was a, it was Supreme Court order. She ran Supreme Court order. They removed all the hoardings in Delhi. So in fact, the few you see now have just come up in the last.
Manisha: I never noticed that it's true.
Delhi doesn't have hoardings.
Abhinandan: Dude, if you were when the, when this order came out of the Supreme Court, I remember overnight, Delhi was unrecognizable. There used to be hoardings everywhere.
Manisha: Yeah.
Anand: And the most seen hoardings where we've been to newspaper wars, Times of India. Correct. Those
Abhinandan: hoardings are famous.
Yes. Please continue.
Jayashree: Yes. Uh, in Delhi, a court has framed charges of sexual harassment and outraging modesty of a woman against BJP [00:11:00] MP, Brijbhushan Sharan Singh.
Abhinandan: Also the case of Bibhav Kumar, who's, who was a former Maliwal, the former DCW chairperson and Rajasthan MP. Today, wall to wall coverage of that on, on all the primetime channels, although At the time of recording this, Swati Malayawala has so far still not filed an official complaint after the transition.
She hasn't filed an official complaint.
Manisha: And the NCW has called, uh,
Abhinandan: Vibhav. Summoned Vibhav, yeah.
Jayashree: The Election Commission has summoned Andhra Pradesh's Chief Secretary and DGP to personally explain the administration's failure to contain incidents of post poll violence in the state. So that is very important.
During voting in the fourth phase of the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP candidate in Hyderabad, Madhavi Lata, was captured on video asking women wearing niqabs to remove their face coverings so she could verify their identities. The Hyderabad police is now registered in FIR. The ED also arrested Jharkhand minister and senior state congress leader [00:12:00] Alamgir Alam in a money laundering case.
This is days after the agency seized rupees 34 crores cash from his bank account. Personal secretary is domestic worker.
Wow.
Jayashree: The Supreme Court Navlaka, who is accused in the Bhimankargaon violence case. It noted that the trial in the case is not likely to conclude anytime soon. The Supreme Court has also summoned the Uttarakhand Chief Secretary to appear before it on May 17th over the state's lackadaisical approach in court.
Containing forest fires. Five people have died as 1300 hectares of land were burnt in forest fires this year,
Abhinandan: which is tragic because there's such lovely hills there, but we don't want to say news on impact news on impact. I mean, it could have been because of anything, but news only has done a report on it.
The link is in the show notes below. Please have a look at it. And this is second pieces. I mean, this is the video, but he's done an earlier piece also on forest fires. I don't know if it was the same region, though.
Manisha: Yeah,
Abhinandan: he's
Manisha: done another one. But that was, this time he's only done one. [00:13:00] This is, yeah, this is an annual thing.
So we sent him earlier also about two years, I think the year before this last one.
Yeah.
Jayashree: Yeah. And finally, the United States said on Monday, it does not believe a genocide is taking place in Gaza, but that Israel must do more to protect, protect Palestinian civilians. Also, a former Indian army officer, Colonel Weber Anil Kale, was killed when his UN vehicle in Gaza was struck by an Israeli tank.
Abhinandan: And there's been no mention of it on any of the There is also that
Jayashree: final section, which you can read out. In
Abhinandan: the crisscross of this week, Haryana, Former JGP MLA Satvinder Rana joined Congress. Again in Haryana, BJP MLA Rohit Revdi joined Congress. Haryana Congress leader Manmohan Bhandana joined BJP.
Again in Haryana, Kailasho Saini, a former MP from Kurukshetra, has decided to return to Congress. And in Chandigarh, Congress leader Subhash Chawla has joined the BJP. And that's what's happening. And the former [00:14:00] Anand, I forget his first name, uh, minister in Kejriwal cabinet. Uh, he's still awaiting his acceptance of his resignation because I think he was still in the BJP and his resignation still hasn't been accepted.
So I don't know. Isn't that
Jayashree: Rajkumar, Rajkumar Anand? Yeah.
Abhinandan: I think that's his name. BSP. He has gone to BSP. BSP. Sorry. Correct. But his, so on that note, uh, let's get straight into the discussion about the political ads. So let me start by our brands expert. Uh, by the way, Santosh, just curious, how do you react?
And I mean, I know you lead a more respectable life than me, so you don't have to be so offensive, but how do you feel being identified in the same kind of zone as a expert as Sohail Seth?
Santosh Desai: Interesting question. Next
Abhinandan: question. Next question. Sohail has been the Brad expert for the [00:15:00] longest time and I always listen to him and I'm like, what the fuck is this guy saying? Like, what shit does he talk? But anyway, so, uh, you know, I remember when we started news running the first year, 2012, we had a round table.
I know you've been here. I don't know if you were in that one. Pratap Suthan, who was the architect, who was the creative director behind the India Shining campaign.
Santosh Desai: And he had said
Abhinandan: on our platform that it was never meant to be an election campaign. It was a campaign selling India to the world because it did so well in New York as a campaign.
They said, we'll use it as the election campaign. It bombed and Pramod Mahajan was blamed for that. And so he was a creative director. Those days, ad agencies, Meant something creative directors was like a thing like dude is a creative director of mechanic Santosh. These are big important positions. Uh, seeing what an ad agency's role was then in a political campaign and today, do you see a difference?
And then we'll come to the specific ads of this campaign.
Santosh Desai: No, look, I agree with the fact that overall advertising agencies were a much bigger force then, then, then [00:16:00] they are now, I think for a whole host of We don't need to go into those, but I would argue that in, in, when it comes to And political advertising, I think advertising has been a very, very insignificant player then and continues to be so now.
I don't think even though advertising was in its heydays earlier. For political advertising, I, the role of political advertising in India was marginal. I always believe that it has always been much as India shining and all. I know a lot is spoken of its negative effect, but I rarely know of any campaign that has worked positively, you know, and, and I think it's easy post facto to sort of connect the dots and say that there was over confidence and it was oversold.
But frankly, the reach that, you know, look, the vote is our largest. You know, distributed the most deeply distributed product in the country. I mean, nothing is more deeply distributed than the vote and, you know, advertising simply fails when it has to reach an audience beyond a certain comfort zone that it has.[00:17:00]
And therefore it's by definition, it's impact, you know, when it, when you look at the scale of elections and the scale of the electoral audience, the impact of advertising has always been miniscule. So I would, I would suggest that, you know, even earlier when advertising was riding high. Uh, when it came to political advertising, there are, I mean, there is not a single political ad that anybody can remember, you know, favorably, I mean, nobody can see, oh, that was an iconic political ad.
You can talk about hundreds of other product ads and say they were iconic, but which ad will you say was an iconic political ad which changed the fortunes of a party?
Abhinandan: Well, I, I'd go meta, you know, news only produced an ad about a political ad. There's this constant in 2012
and then this, it was very badly dubbed. And this little child and her father said,[00:18:00]
and then cut to. Me sitting with a child, she saying.
Audio Insert: We pay taxes to the government, and the government makes flyovers, schools, hospitals, and a lot more. Wow, nice! Papa Metro, who made this? We did! Through taxes. Oh, just like the flyovers in schools. Yes, of course, dear. Wow! What a beautiful park! Guess who built it? Did you build it? We built it with taxes. Dad, who built such a [00:19:00] huge park?
We did, son. By paying taxes.
Song: Oh! Just like Bharat Nirmanand.
Audio Insert: Yes,
Song: son.
Audio Insert: See the beauty. Every year, the government takes thousands of crores of rupees from us and makes ads and puts them on TV. Isn't it wonderful? Is your father also so stupid? Ah,
Abhinandan: But Ara, do you agree that ads play a insignificant or marginal role in, in political campaigns?
Anurag: Not just in political campaign? I think, uh, we also mistakenly think that, uh, the ads are the only way to market and since, because they are short in high-end cameras and have our better editing, so we think that they have more quality to influence, which.
In a certain kind of age where TV was dominating and people used to, uh, you know, seriously watch these [00:20:00] ads, not just the political. I'm just also talking about the, um, I'm mostly talking about the nonpolitical ads, but over the years, uh, this whole idea of agencies have also changed. Now, there are many different kind of agencies which are in the market.
For example, let's say these, uh, influencer agencies that they have, and then there are the separate me marketing agencies also that they have. Um, that that are in the in the market. So, uh, different kind of players are there. And, uh, these ads, I think are very small portion of their communication strategy.
Mostly they are done through these social media campaign or say this meme campaign, or let's say the spoof videos that are on internet. Everywhere. So these are just, I consider them very insignificant portion of their communication strategy, but since they are shot in, in, in a good camera and with better actor, we think that they are something important, but I think they are absolutely not non important in influencing anything.
Um, and even their views and everything, I don't think are, Um, [00:21:00] uh, they, they achieve that kind of a virality, which let's say a different kind of video would, uh, would achieve a spoof video would achieve. Um, like for example, if I give you the example of, uh, there was an IB video at one point of time, which was on demonetization.
Yeah, yeah, I remember that. They went crazy viral. Obviously it was not. I'm assuming it was not funded by anything, but It's
Anand: not a holiday. How many times do I have to tell you? It's okay, brother. But the country is changing, right?
Audio Insert: Friends, you gave me 60 years. Give me 60 years too. So, I have to exchange 10, 000 notes.
Exchange limit is only 4, 000. Hello? Okay, sir. Actually, the limit has changed. It's 4, 500. Actually, just latest rule, exchange limit is only 2, 000.
Anurag: Whole idea. That's the first time
Abhinandan: we saw bare biceps, topless,
Anurag: bare bicep in that ad. [00:22:00] And there are, if you remember there, there was also a Modi song on EIC which became viral.
So we had this political, um, humor or political, uh, Obviously they were not campaign of a party, but they have more power to influence. But these ads that we have seen on, on, on the, on that document, I think none of them has any possibility of virality except maybe one or two ads because, uh, that too, also because that actors look similar to, um, to, to net.
We're kept casting that con. So that is the only. Um, yeah, influenza, that is the only relevance of, of them. Mostly I feel there. Jess, do you agree? Yeah, I
Jayashree: mean, I agree with him completely. Also, I mean, this is the thing that every organization is trying to hack, right? I mean, everyone wants to go viral, but unfortunately there is no set way to know what goes viral and what won't, because it completely comes down to what is the news of the day.
What is the thing that takes off the stupidest things in the world go viral and very important things don't. [00:23:00] So, yeah. I think like Anurag said, here people are just trying to sort of throw money at anything and see what sticks. So yes, there's a song work, we'll try that. There's a video work, we'll try that.
There's a meme work, because right here on Tamil Nadu, it is the memes, it is the music that really sort of drives interest in campaigns, not advertisements. So they're just trying a little bit of everything, depending on who has the biggest budget. And then something will take off on social media and get you clicks.
I don't know if it even translates to any sort of like, information among masses or any kind of educational experience. It's just, They just want to go viral, I think. And that is also the saddest thing. I mean, even here at News Laundry, right, where constantly while you report, while you're publishing stories, there is that worry about, will this be the story that will go viral?
Because you want people to read it, it is important. And we're always trying to sort of sell ourselves in ways. And that's pretty much what these political parties are doing too.
Abhinandan: Dude, I can't believe you just compared us to political parties.
Jayashree: Well, we could be.
Abhinandan: Anand Vardhan.
Anand: Besides print, which remains same because it has [00:24:00] to produce ads in the same way.
I think one big difference from a bygone era of political advertising to the present is that there is a lack of national frame. Yeah. Yeah. So, because earlier, if you captured Doordarshan and All India Radio, you had a national audience. So say government ads or political parties ad. In fact, now also there is practice that Doordarshan and All India Radio allocate time to political parties that you have this minute, this minute.
But now the. Because of the advent of, uh, first satellite television, now the internet, the attention is diffused. It is diffused to, uh, in me myriad ways. And that's why, uh, it is not, uh, uh, very, I think, uh, it's a magnitude is not fathomable how [00:25:00] it is getting delivered. Earlier you had a common. Uh, consumption experience of an, of a political ad that, okay, this came on their Darshan and by default you had to watch it.
Uh, now the, the, the diffusion of attention, national attention is in so many ways that the first, uh, earlier also it was the reflex action, uh, reflex response, but Uh, uh, it was unavoidable. Now is to escape the ad, uh, like any other ad, just escape political ad, just escape you. And as Santos pointed out that, uh, it is uh, very difficult to get, uh, a committed voter out of comfort zone.
So you are basically, uh, if you are committed voter of a party, they are not going to have any impact. These ads. It is only for the floating voter. Very undecided voter. And, uh. These are the two things.
Manisha: Yeah, I think, but these ads have very little [00:26:00] or negligible impact on, uh, floating voters. It is essentially for your core, uh, believers.
To energize them. And give them some sort of material to share, to laugh about, and for one upmanship, which is why you'll also see most of the ads that we'll discuss today. today have caricatures of the opposition party. So Congress will have a Smriti in their ad, a caricature of her. BJP will have Rahul Gandhi.
So it's basically fodder to like, make fun of each other and indulge in the social media one upmanship. One thing interesting, I think, with elections that has happened and which is a byproduct of this proliferation of vox pop journalism. I think, I mean, uh, From YouTubers to even journalists, it's really election reporting has been overtaken by Vox Pops.
And you have, and we also do a lot of them. And often you have those voters speaking in these Vox Pops who are brand ambassadors for parties. So, you know, somebody is taking on Modi. Parties are going to cut that, Congress will cut it, or [00:27:00] SP will cut it, and then make it go viral, and say, yeh dekho kya sahi bol raha hai, bilkul vaat laga di ho, whatever.
And BJP would do that for, you know, somebody taking on Raghav. You're saying that is more effective. So I think in the social media arena, it's the Vox Pop bits that really go viral, and parties are very prompt in picking it up from the hundreds of journalistic organizations that are doing it, and even YouTubers.
And on, uh, I was just, uh, and Raghav was talking about, like, memes. I think, like, politically, there can't be a bigger political meme than that gourmet auntie. I think, like, when you think of political ads, I just think of her, like, yeh big gayi hai gourmet. I mean, that is just so iconic. She's kind of like, yeah, she's everywhere.
Audio Insert: Okay.
Jayashree: But also that other woman, no, that war woman, is it the same one?
Santosh Desai: So I saw lots of
Jayashree: stories later on how the actor is going through tough times. I think Times
Manisha: of India had a story where she's, which [00:28:00] speaks about her going through a really bad time. Bad time, obviously, because she's been minified to like, she
Jayashree: says she's not getting assignments. Yeah. Cause
Abhinandan: it's, you know, she's in typecast, you know, it's, it's, it's like, like, like,
Jayashree: like the
Abhinandan: was angry young man.
She's the grateful young lady, but I just want to say that let's, let's count the good things about ads. It is one of the best way to distribute the money that it'll gotten wealth of political parties. You know, you need actors, you You need an art department, carpenters will work, painters will work, production.
I mean, as a filmmaker and having made lots of ads back in my small screen days, it is something which money goes around all over. So good, make more such ads, let the money go back into the economy. So that is one good thing about how effective they are. I don't know about the regular ads. I do think they definitely energize the bass.
So it helps. So it has a domino effect. But music really helps. And I, I happen to, you
Manisha: know, I was
Abhinandan: there, especially if it's live, if that same song is sung. I remember [00:29:00] Vishal was very closely linked to the ARP during the first election and he was singing outside the ARP office, they set up a stage and I was there at that time and I was just talking to people.
Why are you here? Are you a worker? People were just. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. excited with the music and they came and once they came there, then they got involved in the party because that was AAP's initial days. Same thing with the song that was sung, uh, at Ram Lokpal movement. Music actually really gets people in.
It joshes them up. People, I mean, I've seen that firsthand, but I don't know if it does the same thing on the screen that it does live. Can
Jayashree: I jump in for music though? Because, so I was going to talk about political ads in Tamil Nadu, but there are no political ads. I mean, there are, but not like Parties are spending budgets on it because they're spending their budgets on music.
So it also helps that parties like the AIDMK and DMK are very rooted in film, right? So they have an entire culture of music which they can bring anyway. So typically how it works is they'll release a teaser and then they'll release this entire full high definition video with the entire song and it'll go up on [00:30:00] YouTube and it's shared everywhere and all.
But also it happens because in the early days, I remember, um, political campaigns used to be preceded by full fledged Almost concerts where they'd set up speakers while you're waiting for the big shot to come. Then they'd play like music to these massive rallies. And this was particularly in 2014 when I was following Jayalita around.
So they would write songs for her and they would just play on loop for hours until a helicopter landed. And then you could buy her to start her off as audio cassettes. And then you could buy CDs. of the music that is played at these rallies. And there was so much currency. They would send these vans into villages through districts.
So it
Abhinandan: was actually,
Jayashree: it was like a thing, but now, I mean, now obviously those songs don't have that shelf life, but parties are still sort of making their own. Absolutely.
Manisha: I think even TMC, TMC uses really well, uh, it was really everywhere and you were just singing it. It
Abhinandan: was such a phenomenal, but you know, Santosh, you've seen some of the ads Uh, when it comes to [00:31:00] okay, effectiveness aside, otherwise, what do you think of the ad campaign as a, as a, you know, brand guru, you know, uh, did you have any, which you think are more effective than the others?
Or you think they're all a part of the same clutter?
Santosh Desai: No, there are some that will be a little more effective than the others, simply because of the fact that they speak to a particular, you know, whatever it is that they're trying to amplify, they do it well. So for instance, you know, I think the ad that on the BJP ad that
I
Santosh Desai: think it, you know, it takes the idea of the fact that here's a ragtag group of people, you know, where there's no leader and there's no clear face, uh, contrasted with the fact that you have one face that towers over everything else on the other side.
And you say that, you know, and, and the Dula Kone is a, is a, is a kind of a storyline that, that makes sense. I mean, you know, that, that kind of connects and presents it in a way that is. Colloquially kind of graspable. So I think there are, they will. And similarly there are ads, I think across the board where there are some ads that will typically the idea of everything being fixed, the Congress ad where, you know, the cricket [00:32:00] ad where, you know, right,
Abhinandan: right.
Yeah.
Santosh Desai: The empire and everything is again, you know, as a way of, of bringing out the fact that, you know, you have we live in a place which is totally fixed or the goatee ad of the media ad, you know, uh, which again, I think, uh, it makes the point that it wishes to make, right. Uh, I think it does so reasonably well.
The problem I have is, uh, is, is actually coming from a sort of a advertising background. My problem is that who are you speaking to and why? I mean, you know, one thing about energizing the base is fine. I mean, and, and there has, that is a limited objective. And to that extent, I think to that extent. These might work, but I agree with Anurag totally.
I think that other forms work much better. So, so, uh, that being said, what, what my question is that actually it, what it should be focused on is, is I think, as I think Manisha said, is the floating, uh, water is the undecided water there. I think what is the, what is the story? I mean, what is the opposition story?
I'm not very clear as to what the opposition story there is, because if it is just making potshots at individual aspects of what is wrong [00:33:00] with the BJP governance. I'm not sure that to somebody who's otherwise a Modi voter, but is starting to have second thoughts, whether that is a compelling enough argument, it's not a coherent enough argument.
It is not packaged in a totality. There's no large story that comes out saying, this is why if you said that the, you know, the country is, is this the kind of country you want? If you frame it like that as against taking individual jabs at individual points and then laughing, because you think you're being clever.
I just think you're missing a trick in not providing the, the, the floating water with a powerful argument. I think on the flip side, the BJP does a little better job of telling somebody who is not really a BJP supporter, but is worried about the, about the opposition by saying that, do you really trust these jokers?
You know, I mean, really, is this really what you want? So I think one question on this side is, is this the kind of government you want? Is what the BJP? Uh, is trying to say, whereas I think what the opposition would, should have tried to say is the kind of country you want. And I'm not sure that they've [00:34:00] articulated that, I think in, in strong enough terms.
Abhinandan: Back in your day when you were heading an ad agency and McCann no less, one of the biggest in the country at the time. Damn, I wish I knew you then I used to keep gessoing my eddies. Trying to get an ad from McCann. Anyway, uh, and I think what was the CD I was dealing with? She was a lady. She gave us some like Loser Lays promo to do once.
And, uh, anyway, so, uh, would you be excited about getting a contract other than not just the check that is in the beginning, but as a project, I mean, even if it had no impact, just as a creative pursuit, is it a project that excites you? As a creator. Yes,
Santosh Desai: absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, politics is, you know, there are many reasons for not taking a political project.
Primary being the one that you never get paid, at least not in those times. So, I mean, this is the reason why you didn't take political projects. Uh, but, uh, but yes, I think strategically and creatively, I think it's, uh, it's fascinating because, you know, [00:35:00] you're, you're not about the most basic thing that there is, you know, something that potentially, even if the advertising doesn't work, What you are, you are, you will try and make an honest attempt to see that it works to the extent to which it can.
And I think that would have been fascinating as it turns out. I've never, uh, been involved. McCann today does the BJP campaign, but in those days, in fact, we had a policy not to do, uh, political campaigns.
Abhinandan: Yeah. I mean, I think today everyone has to take a position one way or the other. So Anurag, before we started recording this, you said you particularly found the apps the worst made ads.
So I, I just thought the best. For me, what's Sheen? And I'm not surprised because it's Bombay based and the best talent is from a, the actors are very authentic. They don't look like models
Manisha: like Congress ads. They look like models. Yeah. Congress
Abhinandan: ads, they look like more Congress. Even the beard is so badly done.
Yeah. Amateur dramatics is better. Like Modi Beard is coming off from here. Anyway, , I'd say the, the sh ena ads, the combination of production, casting, you know, everything was perfect and I was like, how appropriate. Bombay best ad [00:36:00] campaign. Uh, but, uh, the budget clearly the big, but the current Johar of the ads are BJP ads.
Certainly. Yes. Yes. So which ones did you like? Did you not like?
Anurag: No, I didn't like any of these, but, uh, in terms of like, if you analyze it through a budget thing, then a BJP, it seems that they are more interested in catching up the, you know, this quote unquote Zenzi audience, like most of their ads, it seems like they were speaking to them like two, three years.
And there was one of the rap song as well in which, uh, they are singing about hustle and everything, but there is my problem with the, these agencies who make these ads, because let's We have to connect to the Gen Z like there is a pitch. And then they think Gen Z means these four or five words like hustle culture, goat, and you know, these dude, bro, bro, dude, he's the goat.
So irritating. And I really wonder who Gen Z might might be, you know, influenced by it. And the second thing is that even if you are, [00:37:00] um, Let's say we call Zenzi term is more of a age based thing rather than let's say our brain or something which is cool or these words. So there can be two different kind of Gen Z's as well.
Like there's one Gen Z who listens to Taylor Swift. Then there is also another Gen Z who listened to Sapna Choudhury as well in the tier two, tier three cities. So we also in our mind thought that Gen Z is also a singular term. And everybody's like, dude, Hey, come on, man. I'm missing that. These agencies don't think beyond that.
So that is also one of the point of which I realized that. This is one of the reasons that influence may be limited. And also about this war, Rukwadi Papa was, was viral, not for the good reason, but because of the negative reason. And also it became viral. Mostly if you remember was when, uh, uh, mimicked it in his video.
So there lies another thing that in order to make it while my viral, even for the negative reason, there has to be something which is absurd about them. And [00:38:00] the second thing is there has to be some influencer involved who can, you know, in Canada, And one more point I was the last point I wanted to say about that, why these ads don't work for me, or maybe for the large audience is that there is no kind of a shock value in them.
Like earlier, there may be like the mimicry when the mimicry was some form of art or let's say when, when this whole resemblance thing was some, Some point of a shock, shock kind of a thing. But now in the age of AI, when you can recreate the, recreate their voice. So through, and there are many memers who are making it.
So I'd rather watch them because there's something shock value in rather than, you know, doing this copy of these actors and everything. So that, that also was my last point.
Abhinandan: Right. Jayshree, do you have a favorite or least favorite of the campaign? Or all the ads we've seen? I mean, in the last two days, I've seen some 25 of them.
Jayashree: So now I feel ashamed because. Clearly, I am an elitist because I quite enjoyed the Congress's ads, but only because I mean, I feel like there was something going on in [00:39:00] it. I don't know who their target audience is. Yes, like you all said, but
Abhinandan: I enjoyed it. The cricket ad was very good, which Santosh said. I think it's very, it gets the point home for sure.
That one was a good one. I
Jayashree: thought that one was pretty good. That media one was also quite. Randomly funny. The, but the Arnab goes, but it's so
Abhinandan: niche, but we've been, although I understand the do kursi Lana, a kursi Lana, a glass. I didn't get, I didn't understand
Jayashree: that.
Abhinandan: Can someone explain that to me? I didn't understand.
Like, okay. So I didn't get that. I don't
Santosh Desai: know if you were saying that, is there only one person rule? I was wondering if that is only, and even Amit Shah doesn't matter. I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I honestly don't know any. Anyway, that didn't seem to be a point of the A, but I don't know what it was trying to even,
Manisha: I think it was to do with, no, I think it meant that How many person direction?
Abhinandan: No, I think it was to do with, they said JI representation, so I don't, I mean, I didn't understand that ad. It's so clearly, [00:40:00] clearly, clearly the ad
Manisha: is not the
Santosh Desai: cast census is what the the That's what I, yes, yes. That correct. That's, I figure
Abhinandan: count how many Yeah, but I don't
Santosh Desai: know how it. Connected with the factory.
A glass.
Abhinandan: Yeah. I didn't understand that either. Yeah. Yeah.
Jayashree: But yeah, so I thought, I mean, but yeah, as to the B2B SI thought like, it just sort of, you know, it oscillates between sort of vague stuff, like 400 seats, et cetera, and all, all like the very sort of horribly venomous. ads, uh, from the BJP Karnataka and all, but also, I mean, that is, it is just a representation of the BJP's darkest, deepest secrets, right?
Though I don't know who, I mean, I don't know who thinks the BJP thinks otherwise, but it's their core and this sort of fundamental virulent sort of hatred that comes out in the BJP Karnataka ad, I think is exactly the kind of message that they want to market. So yeah,
Abhinandan: those animation ads are terrible.
They were like hideous. Yeah. The Instagram ad that they had to
Manisha: pull down, that was just.[00:41:00]
Abhinandan: I really want to interview the person who came up with that ad, like out of genuine curiosity, like what would that person be like?
Jayashree: But I do have like a question for Santosh, I mean, suppose, I mean, when issues like COVID mismanagement, price rise, you know, unemployment, all of this can't really overcome that sort of radicalization that works in these ads, but then what can the very best messaging achieve?
Right? Like if the message from the National Party of Governance, the BJP plays on these. Imagine injustices and fear and hatred and all, is there any sort of precedent where a good sense ad could respond to that?
Santosh Desai: Look, I think actually, I think advertising is usually not the answer is my sense politically, but yes, a counter narrative of some kind.
You know, that you create, uh, would be the answer. So, which is the reason why, you know, my, again, I've not studied this. I mean, I'm not as a, as a, you know, it's not an assignment that one has done, but that's why it seems to me that if there is a counter [00:42:00] narrative to the BJP, it is about the fear that people have started having, even people who are BJP supporters of saying, where is, where are we taking this country?
And what is this land? You know, where is it going to end up? The, there is a sense that, you know, a lot of what Modi says is just. Is just random stuff. I mean, it's just, you know, not just, they're not incorrect, but they're like randomly great stuff. The fact that there is a, you know, there is a virulent campaign that is aimed at, and then you are seeing this in all kinds of that there is a constant invocation of Hindu Muslim that there is a, so there are, I think there are, there are little bits and pieces where I think the, the, the, there is some shakeup that is beginning to I think I would, I would try and that I would try to sort of collapse that into something more graspable, which I think someone like Dhruv Rathee is doing.
I mean, I think the reason why it works is that there is a certain, you know, you can read him together and it makes sense. It is a certain, you know, it all comes together in some form. And I think what the, that's what I would, I would look for whether through advertising or through other [00:43:00] means, what I find lacking for the one, of course, is they don't have a counterpoint of what will the offer in place.
And, and apart from saying, there is actually nothing by way of their counter promise, which is, which is fine, which is a lot of times, you know, when oppositions go up against an entrenched kind of a, it is enough for them to merely attack, uh, the ruling party. And that, that, you know, you don't necessarily have to have a very coherent plan.
Uh, but, but I don't think the counter narrative is well formed. So I would just, you know, I will try and find ways of doing that. One simple way would be to sort of, you know, learn from things that work. And I think, uh, again, so Dhruv Rathee is a great example of things that work. And I don't think the opposition is adequately tuning into that.
Abhinandan: Also, I think this Irwin Kajal throwing this whole new thing that. Yeah. Modi is going to destroy all the leaders within his party. It's just an interesting little news. It's like, it's, it's a completely different, it's a, it's a [00:44:00] googly counter narrative, which no one had tried before. And this is why he comes up with these.
Clever thing.
Santosh Desai: No, I think that's very, that's very true. You know, this idea of 75 years that you have to retire. I mean, they've made the big deal out of that. So, I mean, to sort of throw that back in their face is a, is a smart way. I mean, you know, it's, it's a, you know,
Audio Insert: cannot go. Modi ji apne liye vote nahi maang rahe. Modi ji Amit Shah ko Pradhan Mantri banane ke liye vote maang rahe. So, uh,
Abhinandan: Manisha, you [00:45:00] have a favorite and least favorite?
Manisha: So, no, I mean, none of them are my favorite. Nothing really hits home. But I think if the main aim is to convince people who are a little unsure, then, uh, I think, I agree with BJP ad with the doola kaun hai.
Because it's, it's, it's, uh, addressing an audience, which, which is doubtful about Modi because it starts off with like, do you want these other suitors? And then the narrative goes on to say that this is going to be a disaster for you. So I think that kind of really, and it taps into a conversation that we're hearing about Modi versus who, whether you like it or not.
So it taps into that sense of, okay, there's this Modi and then there's this alliance, and we don't know who's going to be leading that. So I think that's effective at Because that ad is convincing someone who wants to go to the other side. So it's making an effort to tell that person that, look, no, this is a bad choice for you to make.
Go with this one face, one man, whatever. The Congress ads, I'm, I was wondering like in terms of narrative, like I saw the Smriti Rani thing ad that everyone was very [00:46:00] excited about because it has a person mimicking. I didn't find it effective at all. Because
Abhinandan: A, I think,
Manisha: Tulsi, Tulsi bhi aahin hai.
Abhinandan: Because ek toh itna takes long,
Manisha: woh bhoomika bahut bandh raha hai ad.
Man sab toh end mein jaa ke pata lata hai, what is it offering? You know, that one lakh in your account is just really, there's a whole story around it, which just, you lose me. So, um, and I think with Congress ads also, there's a certain, I don't know how to explain it, but BJP ads, while they're toxic, There's something visceral about them.
I don't know. There's even those odious Hindu Muslim ads. I can imagine people, you know, watching it and feeling really like, yeah, this is right.
Abhinandan: You should change the people. Not
Manisha: people I know, but I can imagine people, you know, this whole thing that Muslims will grow and Rahul is feeding me. It's, it's, it's toxic, but I think like it.
Abhinandan: No, I think that is so vile. It'll only appeal to the base. I don't see that appealing to anyone even if you have an iota of decency in you. It shouldn't, but I
Jayashree: think it kind of, [00:47:00] no, but like, like, like a small touch off in that ad where they show the, the Humber Suiter eating Italy with the chopstick. Like I know that really took off and all online because it was a very small sort of thing.
Yeah. Sometimes these
Manisha: base things and, and, but Thomas is, that is quite polished. Like even when rural, like this woman the LaMi had, it's a woman from a village, but it just never believable that she's.
Abhinandan: English
Manisha: medium.
Anurag: Also, most of these ads are just the combination of, uh, Twitter jokes. If you look, look at them, like for example, this, this was very, in terms of messaging, it was very smart.
The chopstick sadly,
but that
Anurag: was a Twitter joke. Like what was happening, even the BJP, um, Tamil Nadu. That, that team, they also put it like three, four months back. The Empire
Manisha: ad I liked, because I thought that was very, because that was very like, it just hits you and you know what it is, you don't have to wait to like, yeah, exactly.
Abhinandan: No, I just think that if I were the power position, [00:48:00] I would just get a really smart creative team and rather than come up with ads. react to every ad. Like, so when they come up with an ad about de dulha hai, come with an ad, dulhe ne toh apni dulhan ko hi chhod diya tha, you know, some shit like that, you know, throw that whole thing.
They'd keep reacting to ads because they are setting, yeah, like what are the, I think if you don't have a coherent plan like that, because I, I remember, uh, I may not remember the exact brands, maybe Santosh should remember. There were a lot of ads. Uh, there was either, there was this Coke and Pepsi one, which was it where they had to stop running the ad because the spoof was so effective that the original
Anand: ad monkey, monkey, which one is that?
Monkey thumbs up and Pepsi perhaps. Yeah, because the one with Salman, they had like a Salman. No, no. I was, I am talking much earlier, mid nineties. There was Pepsi, thumbs up monkey controversial ad.
Abhinandan: I don't, I remember there was one, there was a topless and then they had this really, uh, You know, spoofy Salman Khan topless and about a drink and they had to stop running [00:49:00] the original run because the spoof became
Santosh Desai: the kind of the default.
Abhinandan: That became the default. So I think that would be a better this thing. But, uh, you know, before I go back to them, uh, Anand, you haven't told us which is your favorite and least favorite and why, why aren't no Bihar parties on the ad list. They don't believe in ads. They only believe in music videos.
Anand: No, see, like someone was pointing out that the music video was played from Jai Lalitha story.
Right. Where an helicopter come. In villages, the helicopter would be the attraction, not Jai Lalitha. So, so, so people throng to rallies to see helicopters and leaders have this illusion that I have come to see them. Yes, I have. So helicopter is a big interest. Anyway, uh, just one also one change, uh, from earlier elections of sale last 20 years is that, uh, the outsourcing has [00:50:00] now two professional levels now.
Uh, when earlier, when you outsourced ads to agencies, uh, that was the one professional group handling it. Now there is another layer of polis strategists giving them the lines like I back or some other strategies that they hire. So professionalization has now these two layers and they filtered it through them.
How much, uh, now this is a collaborative. creative effort, uh, that is also seen that that has also to be examined because that's one difference that you can see in last 20 years or so. Uh, second is that just like other Indian ads, the more than abstract imagery or symbols, Indian psyche is more tuned to stories.
Telling a story through an ad and not abstract symbolism like this chair that you were finding difficult to [00:51:00] decode what was it about. So a storytelling through a 30 second or 45 second ad is the more preferred way. to the Indian psyche. So, uh, most of the ads do that. That is third is that one thing that, uh, someone was pointing out that the tangible, like, uh, say, uh, unemployment, uh, or the material, uh, parts of government, like, uh, unemployment, others, some mismanagement,
So there is also this arrogance in certain political circles that the tangibles have to be seen as the only part of governance and the average voter is not concerned about non tangibles that is for the higher ups to decide what should be the foreign policy or what should be. So, Uh, for large section of electorate that does not work that way.
They think that we [00:52:00] have a say in foreign policy. We, the, the non tangible part, the identity part that also works. So I think some of these ads, opposition ads, uh, um, um, they miss this mix of tangibles and non tangibles.
Abhinandan: I went to watch a film last night. It was preceded by a music video. It wasn't an ad. It was a long music video by Modiji.
I haven't seen it online. I haven't seen it on TV, but clearly it's playing in all the cinemas because it's really long. I think it was two, two and a half, three minutes. And it is the, again, the Sanjay version of that, Milesur it went in it, Milesur Jo Thaado, Maado Bane Aapna Soorna Raado, Manja, you know, in every language.
So in every language, in every setting, in every costume, people dancing and saying how great Modi is. Modi, Modi, Modi. It doesn't matter. And I haven't seen this. It is. It is. I mean, the production scale of that could run news laundry for a decade. [00:53:00] So but since, since we won't get that, I don't know, you can subscribe to us and make sure we run for a decade because we finished 12 years now.
But those of you who haven't, we have a subscription plan where you get one plus one free by a joint subscription, news minute and news laundry, and you can gift one. Free subscription to a friend who you think should know about independent news. So please support us. We don't take any ads. Speaking of ads.
So yeah. So sorry, you were asking something?
Anand: No, no. I was just asking that the original Milesur was done by Piyush Pandey. Was it? I don't recall. Uh, maybe Santosh
Abhinandan: should know, but Santosh. Yeah,
Santosh Desai: yeah.
Abhinandan: It was.
Santosh Desai: Suresh Malik is actually the guy who did it, but anyway, that's it. But along with pure shares.
Abhinandan: So, uh, so, uh, you know, I know you have to, you have another engagement at four.
So we have your 10 minutes, Santosh. So, you know, I've just summed this up for us as narrative setting. Okay. It doesn't work, but yet the market needs ads. They are produced at an alarming rate. And if fun is to assume that there. I mean, such [00:54:00] huge sums of money and effort are being put. What is the thinking that people are putting?
Because even political parties are full of people like you and me, you know, you being Amit Shah, me being, I don't know, Maneesha Sodhiar, I
Santosh Desai: don't
Abhinandan: know the scale, you know, the Aukat difference. You're the Amit Shah. I just let
Santosh Desai: it pass.
Abhinandan: I
Santosh Desai: will just
Abhinandan: let this pass. You're the big daddy of
Santosh Desai: advertising. for that.
for the compliment. I'm sure you mean it as a compliment. I did, I
Abhinandan: did. So just, you know, sum that up. Why is it still, you know, why, why do people still take that call? And before you go, I know that's not a political commentary and Hafta is usually political commentary, but since we have you. Also, tell me why you think advertising agencies aren't what they used to be, uh, back then.
Is it digital? Sorry. And one more thing I want to say that, you know, that you [00:55:00] know, when you had nothing to watch that one thing just, so it impacted you today, you have 20, 000 things. So I don't think it impacts you. For example, That national integration, ban gayi tagat, ho gayi mainat. You know, it sticks with you.
It, nothing sticks today because you have seen so many things. So I think in that sense also effectiveness may have gone down, right?
Santosh Desai: Yeah, that's true. That's true. I think, I mean, just to, you know, complete that thought, I think that's absolutely true that given the overload of information right now you have, I also, I think advertising is, you know, Kind of moved on from the old days of easy to remember things and has gone on to, you know, narrative storytelling.
And while that is its strength, I think sometimes you lose out on simple things like mnemonics and that help you retain and remember. I think it kind of has become unfashionable, but I'll, I'll just, in terms of, you know, in terms of summing it up, I think, look, I think the reason why people advertise is because they want to throw everything, you know, they want to leave, want to leave anything out.
Really, really, I think the way advertising works, when it works, I think [00:56:00] it is. In energizing your own base, in restating the obvious. And I think in its best form, I would've like to say that it can crystallize your message. So, uh, you know, a tagline which is done well, for instance, crystallizes a message.
And I think it gives it a point. It is a sharp end of everything that you are saying. It allows people to grasp it and to hang onto it. And I think that that is the power, I think of advertising, I think that that when it works well, I think what advertising is not currently and this is true across, uh, all parties is not in fact, you know, Anand made this point about there being a layer of strategists.
But I don't see that their input in the advertising. I don't see any strategic bend to the advertising. I don't see any compelling reason that is being offered or even being attempted to be offered in terms of saying why should a floating water sort of, and so it's not persuasive. It is affirmative, but not persuasive.
It is validating, but it is not, you know, it [00:57:00] doesn't change minds. I think that is, and then I think that is a failure of intention. That's a failure of strategy. That's a failure of actually, and so you say a whole lot of things. And like, I think Jesree said, you know, something will stick against the wall.
And that's the best that you're doing right now. I think that is the state of advertising today. I think it could be much, much more strategic than what it is today. And
Abhinandan: why aren't ad agencies the force to reckon with that they used to be these big, you know, if you're not going to be out of the ad agency, it was the place to work.
Santosh Desai: There's a bunch of reasons. There's a bunch of reasons. One, I think, you know, from the supply side reason is that when agencies became international and led internationally, They lost their soul. They became, you know, profit, you know, they were, it became the agency were being run out of, you know, headquarters in, in, in different countries, which had no sense of the Indian reality, no interest in advertising, actually, they were largely bottom line focus for this, you know, you had otherwise individual mavericks running agencies, all of them with a point of view, all of them, you know, having a sort of a [00:58:00] attitude of a kind of saying fuck you to, you know, to the world in many ways.
Yeah. I think that that whole creative spirit, I think, was one. There was a loss that happened. The other was, I think, and a big part of it is, of course, the shift to digital, which has made the traditional agency and the agency still very much structured around the television ad and the print ad and however much they've tried to change.
And instinctively they find it very difficult to handle and think about it today, they were supposed to be the sort of sources of creativity in business today. The source of creativity is 100 percent creators on YouTube, creators on Instagram, creators on social media, all new interesting ideas are coming from there.
If you look at the last five years, you'd be hard put to name one ad, one ad that stands out and has, you know, has makes us, you know, and if you go back 15 years, there are hundreds of ads that you can think of that did that there is no, they do not advertising today is not leading culture. It is following culture.
It is not shaping popular culture. [00:59:00] And I think there is both an internal loss of a sense of who you are, as well as an external irrelevance that has happened. Because I think creation is no longer the, the, the sort of the preserve of intermediaries. Creative creation is now the preserve of anybody with a mobile phone.
And I think that that is a huge, huge, and agencies just have not managed to keep pace. So I think, I think that's the reason why you find advertising having lost so much of the glitter that it once had.
Abhinandan: Right. Uh, so Santosh, before we let you go, would you have a recommendation that could enrich the lives of our listeners and viewers?
Santosh Desai: Yeah. So there's this interesting book, uh, uh, called the anxious generation by this, uh, by this social psychologist and journalist called Jonathan Haidt, H A I D T. And, uh, the book has, uh, come out in hardcover on, I think next week or so it is coming out in, uh, even, uh, a paperback. I think it's a great book that looks [01:00:00] at the impact of, of, uh, digital sort of the digital impact on our, you know, on, on how generations are being formed.
And he makes an interesting argument that actually. For instance, mental health across the world, you know, uh, across the world in many, many parts of the world took a dive after 2012 and he said, you know, what happened in 2012
Abhinandan: and,
Santosh Desai: and it really was the, the smartphone that became democratized. There's an interesting book is interesting.
There's a podcast, uh, the whole bunch of podcasts that are worth checking out with him. Jonathan hate. generation, I would, I would recommend that.
Abhinandan: Interesting you say this, there's an article in the economist, um, I think a couple of weeks ago, which they've published this, an article based on research where, uh, I may get the numbers wrong by a bit, but it's in the ballpark, uh, girl, uh, depression, anxiety, and even, uh, self harm and attempts at suicide went up four fold.
[01:01:00] And that, that, that drop off point or that pickup point was Insta among teenage girls. So exactly. There's a
Santosh Desai: whole bunch of stuff like that. It is making a strong case. In fact, for, for schools to ban, uh, mobile phones in class, he's making a strong case for that. I mean, people may agree or disagree, but I think it's an interesting, provocative, and I think a very relevant and pertinent, timely kind of a Conversation to have so I think it's it's worth taking a look at
Abhinandan: and lastly before you go Just I want to make this point earlier, you know Not ad in media.
I think manisha has often said that News over estimates its power to form narratives. I used to have that same view, but I've seen how news has spread hatred effectively. So I'm not sure whether it has that. It's so hard to say. I remember, I mean, I know Santosh, you would remember that, you know, because we're probably around the same age, but you remember when Mayawati became chief in 2007 when she swept and she did not give a single interview.
None of her spokespersons would go on any panel. And [01:02:00] during the run up to that election, this was May, 2007. You know, when they would say who's going to be, she was not even there running. I know because her and suddenly, when she swept everyone, and I remember that when she, that press conference, she wore that pink suit and she came and Yeah.
Yeah. They were all like phoning over all the media before that and she came and said to the media documentary and if they are not going to make me or not, she demonstrated that media doesn't matter.
Yeah.
Abhinandan: Yeah. And sometimes you feel it matters. So, you know, nothing succeeds like success. I mean, I remember she not, she did not have even one spokesperson that went to any panel and she swept.
So you don't, you never know what works or what doesn't today. I can't imagine any party doing that. You know,
Santosh Desai: that's true. That's true. Because today, I mean, you have so much that is happening, but I think there is a, been a shift. I think, you know, the democratization of mobile phones. Has made a difference it till then till you didn't have media that reached into electoral India, right?[01:03:00]
What what she was saying was true essentially true and that's why so many times, you know When which is why you can even do a tour of you know a state you can wear exhaustive tour of a state Why it's very nature. There's no way to tell what is happening in an election. It's just too large And any individual vantage point is too small, you know, it's fundamentally not possible.
So, you know, you can, so this is the reason why when experts talk about, you know, what they have seen and what they have understood, and there is a sentiment building. Personally, I always dismiss it. It is all retrospective only when things you get the results,
Abhinandan: then you can explain it.
Santosh Desai: And then you change theories like
Abhinandan: famously
Santosh Desai: that happened.
Instantly your theory changed you there. You gave a very glib. And a very erudite answer as to why the results change.
Abhinandan: Yeah, but thanks so much, Santosh. Always a pleasure to talk to you. So much to learn from you, man. Thank you guys.
Thank you. Thank you.
Abhinandan: Thank you. Before we, [01:04:00] you know, switch to any other subject, uh, uh, you know, any closing thoughts on the ad part of it? Uh, what, what still explains, you know, you have made some Of the funniest and really effective videos.
Let's not call them viral videos because virality is a function of chance, but you made a video where you glitch in the
Anurag: universe. Huh? Glitch in the universe.
Abhinandan: Exactly. So, you know, your Starbucks one is something I forever remember. Uh, your, uh, Many ones about, uh, Yogendra, because you just mimic him so well.
Have you ever been approached by a brand or an agency to say, boss, do something and plug a product in there or something? Because, you know, your audience is an engaged audience, right? They're not just viewing an ad and moving on. Uh, and like, have you got that offer? And if you did, how did you react? Can you make something that you think will [01:05:00] make a brand worth their while?
Anurag: So, uh, basically brand approaches you, uh, your recent videos get viral. For example, Instagram is the biggest recruiter in that sense. So many of my videos went into millions and then I got, uh, many, many offers from many different kinds of brands to do. I don't know if I can name them, but there were many, many brands.
And, uh, and they wanted to make something around the same video diary style that I want, that I do. Um, but I chose purposefully to not, uh, integrate them into that thing, because then the whole purpose, all fun will be, would be lost. So I didn't do anything. And then there is also a different kind of, uh, brands, these, uh, you know, these, uh, betting apps will pay you the most, like these are.
These are the brands which can make you rich, but obviously because of the ethical reason, I couldn't do it. The third also is, um, uh, is, is being approached by political parties to do or tweets [01:06:00] or, or, or to make videos also. So this is also a type of marketing. So I also wanted to point it out like people now also, this is also a type of marketing and way of influencing through which it seems like you're doing the genuine tweets, genuine videos, but behind it, there is a very hidden, you know, marketing agency, which is, which I think is the most effective way of, uh, reaching across your message.
If you were to say yes to a
Abhinandan: brand, tell me what, what product would you say yes to?
Anurag: I would say yes to, uh, maybe a food brand. Let's say Sumitra or something like that, because. I can integrate something in that very well. Um, obviously not to Patanjali Chavanprash. If I can name like Patanjali or even Urban Clap or even Unacademy and these kind of brands because they don't integrate into that.
And also one point I wanted to make [01:07:00] about, uh, like you said about that this, that era when there was the spoofs were going on. Mm. I remember that at that time, uh, thumbsup launched a campaign and, uh, that was against Pepsi because Pepsi is more sugary than he, uh, thumbs. And the campaign was cap didn't, cap, didn't be whatever.
Abhinandan: I,
Anurag: that was into my psyche so much. Not just me, but. The entire school jumping with Pepsi pit used to say , . And we used to proudly hold that thumb. Up until now, I only drink thumbs up. in my mindset, I'm trapped by that. Sweet. So that is one thing, but like just to why I said this thing is because when I went to, like when I travel and especially when I went, I was just, um.
There was a, there was some boys from nearby my hotel and those boys. During that track, that five, five, six kilometer track, they were just repeating, [01:08:00] uh, mean lines. For example, uh, so their mind was trapped by these mean lines. So like Santosh said, that advertisement doesn't have that kind of impact that it becomes everyday, but the means to have.
So similarly, for example, if you remember demonetization. Then the one video will always come to your mind, which is that reporter I can't repeat the whole mark of monetization. And how the reporter suddenly
Abhinandan: changed direction. Yeah, that was quite fun.
Right. So now we shall move on to political discussions of what's happened on the ground. We have lots of pandits here, including a genuine pandit. What do you call it? Pandayji? Pandayji? Pandayji, let's have some whiskey. What was that? What was that song from Chulbul Panday? Pandayji something, something. CT.
CT, whiskey, [01:09:00] I don't know where it came from. So, uh, but before that, just want to remind all our listeners and viewers that if you've recently discovered Hafta, it's an English weekly news show. We discuss what happened on the week. The next few Haftas are free. After that, we'll put it behind the paywall.
It's only because of elections we've kept outside the paywall.
Manisha: And they're doing pretty well. The moment we put them out for free, we have a lot of people tuning in
Abhinandan: so we can keep it free. Indefinitely, but I'll tell you honestly, while many of you and a large chunk of your annual newsletter subscribers pay not to breach the paywall, you pay because you believe news should be paid for by the listener, but we have the data that when we pull something behind the paywall, suddenly a lot of people will then start paying to access it.
I mean, we'd like to keep it free all the time, but We have to survive. In fact, now we've had about 25 of our colleagues who've been traveling right now. Even as we speak, you've just come back yesterday. Two more teams have left today. Vasu is traveling [01:10:00] to, I think
Manisha: he was in Bombay,
Abhinandan: Bombay, Srinivasan Jain.
I hope you're watching that as well. And then we had Karma Paljo did some stuff for you.
Manisha: Yeah, we have Pratyush in West Bengal. We have Basant in Haryana and Punjab. So yeah.
Abhinandan: I thought he had come back and he was here yesterday. He left again today,
I might as well relax here for a bit, but please contribute. Click on the link below page to keep news free. 'cause when the public pays, the public is served. That's our line. Pay to keep news free. When advertisers pay, advertisers are served. Okay, now, uh, to the political happenings, I wanted to discuss Arvind's release.
How much has it changed? Suddenly, there was a lot of buzz that, oh, this is back. Was it just an event on TV? But before that, you've just come in from UP. Yes, from
Manisha: Raidureli, Amethi and Lucknow, principally.
Abhinandan: So, so tell me something that I can throw around when people say, what do you know? You are sitting in AC studios talking
Manisha: shit.
I don't
Abhinandan: have to [01:11:00] go when my colleagues are doing all the hard work in the heat.
Manisha: No, but Santosh is absolutely right. You know, like journalists trying to ascertain which way, what, how and all that, because see a hundred crore people voting this election and I would have spoken to a hundred people. So there's no way to really give you a very conclusive understanding.
But I think if you listen hard enough and you work hard enough on the ground and you try and meet people away from the city centers. Where usually journalists go, where you get to talk to people. If you venture in, you can pick up on some things. And broadly, there are like three to four things that I thought were pretty striking for this election.
One is, uh, again, we've said this before, but unemployment is really, really a big concern when you go from village to village. It is just something that people talk about on their own. And we've discussed this before in Hafta that it's a perennial problem. It's not like we've ever had a time of surplus employment.
So this is something that has happened and it'll continue to happen. But I think there's a difference where a lot of families from [01:12:00] the most humblest of backgrounds invest a lot in education today. So you'll have families who, you know, save, take loans to give their child that gap year to prepare for an exam.
And there's a lot of investment of money, you know, And when a paper leak happens, I think it really rankles and I think a lot of people are just very angry about the paper leaks and the fact that they're investing a lot of money into the child's education, but it's not yielding anything and that, uh, group of people.
I mean, some of them are very, uh, interested in what Akhilesh is saying, or what Tejasvi is even saying. Some of them would talk about Rahul, because they feel that these guys bringing up this unemployment as an issue is very important. And a lot would also then say Modi should focus on this on their third term.
So the angry voter is not necessarily angry at
Abhinandan: Modi. He's just angry in life. It
Manisha: doesn't necessarily mean that they Maybe, uh, you know, against Modi.
Abhinandan: That says so much about his personal charm because as [01:13:00] an issue it really pisses everybody off but they still don't want to play with him. Even
Manisha: like the most tauntious of BGP supporters, they have someone in their house, a son, who's preparing for an exam and who's lost a year.
So it, it is personal now. It really does. So even they, you know, so some conversations would go like now our sons are telling us, So those conversations are happening, but yeah, it, it, how much will the opposition be able to galvanize this anger or this anxiety around employment is something we'll know.
Price rise again is key. Uh, we saw a lot of enthusiasm around Modi government's food grain program during Corona when we went for the assembly elections in UP, where they had managed to, like, contain all the anger or anxiety around Corona with their food grain program. Because people would come and say that hum bhooke mare.
You see that changing a little bit now. But the poorest, and I think this is the most loyal base, uh, for Modi, for Modi. The poorest segment, the red card [01:14:00] holders who get 35 kg grains, rice and wheat for two to three rupees a kg are still very much, you know, indebted to Modi. I mean, uh, this food grain thing, I think there are two schemes actually that are really helping Modi overcome anti incumbency on unemployment and rice rice.
One is the PM Yojana, which we've also done a piece on, which is 500 rupees in your bank account every month. There are about 8 crore beneficiaries, which is what the government data says, and one in every four is a woman. So 400 rupees, 500 rupees seems like less to us, but it's actually quite a bit.
Absolutely. I remember
Abhinandan: this one lakh rupee scheme that Congress has announced. It is getting people excited. I mean, I know people, and I
Manisha: think Congress is now responding because they understand the food grain thing has really created a loyal water base for Modi. So they're saying I'm, Hmm. And they're saying I'm bank account medal.
But I think, uh, the kisan, the [01:15:00] directly having access to 500% in your account, which you can use for medical emergency or with which you can buy a vegetables for the month, that has created a lot of kind of goodwill around the government that ham, and we don't unemployment, but we're getting this very directly.
I think where the opposition missed a trick or two is that When people talk about these schemes and then benefiting from it, they literally talk like Modi is giving us his pocket money, you know, because the marketing is just forget like we were talking about advertising, it's nothing compared to the sheer marketing they've done around food.
Exactly.
Abhinandan: This is where that communication works. Like even when he speaks, I brought this and that was on congress spokesperson who said That Congress says
Manisha: she's trying to do that, but I think there is, um, you have to give it to the government that we've all grown up listening to this middleman who would take everything away, build fridge. [01:16:00] There are very few complaints of that. So I think there's a trust in the Modi government to deliver, deliver these. And so this builds the trust on, okay, if this is a problem, he'll fix it.
So this seems to be, you know, quite a sentiment that you see in villages, at least very poor people where no one reaches there, no Dhruv no ads. It's really just a direct relationship with your government that is feeding you.
Abhinandan: I can't, you know, I just don't understand this and, you know, Anandi, you've come here.
It's so sad when you Think about the numbers, 500 bucks, and that is less than what you spend in one PVR outing, man. And that can
Manisha: influence your, I
Abhinandan: mean, if you think about this country, the, the overall conversations that even, you know, places like News Laundry or Hafta, anyone is having, it's a fucking different world, man.
It is like, who are we even talking about? Yeah. I just, Wonder at the extreme inequality, which is, I think it's a miracle, you know, when people say revolution, I say, boss, caste system can't bring revolution, it can't bring anything, there is no [01:17:00] chance, if there's going to be any change, it's going to be, you know, slowly, slowly, what do you call it?
Incremental. Incremental change. So,
Manisha: two more things I just want to add quickly because you mentioned caste census. Uh, one thing I think which was very interesting for me to at least observe because, and this is something that I think television media was guilty of it. But even liberal media is where, because the BJP has this electoral hegemony in UP, we tend to assume that there's a dominance of narrative, which isn't true.
Forget who they're going to vote for, there is a lot of conversations in villages about this Char So Par Nara. Kyun kar rahe hain? What do they mean by it? There's a lot of conversation on the need for a strong opposition. A lot of people, when you bring up this Char Sopar, they say ki nahi. We want a strong opposition.
We want a strong leader to go there. Uh, Ram Mandir, ironically, I think is the least, I mean, having made the temple, it has, I think this is the first election where it really seems to not be benefiting BGP much because people aren't really, it's like, [01:18:00]
you know, it's over.
Manisha: Now that's done. That's good. We all love Ram.
Aastha ka vishay good. But now education, employment. So there's So there's, the, BJP doesn't have a dominance in terms of narrative. I think it's very important to highlight that people are talking about a lot of other things, including the need for a strong opposition. The number of people who'd ask about Kejriwal, just if you tell them that you've come from Delhi, they'll say that, Acha Kejriwal Humko lagta hai theek bolte hain jo bolte hain.
You know, they'll throw in. They'll try and ask ki kya kare hain, Ya, you know, so there is this. It's a very vibrant kind of a discussion, I think. I know we should not kind of tend to assume that ek Even if they're voting for that one party. And caste census, I feel like, I mean, we went to villages where dominated by Parsi Dalit community.
If though they are telling us ki yeh hai, it means that there hasn't been enough groundwork to really explain to people [01:19:00] what, what does a caste census really mean. So,
Abhinandan: educated Dalit boys
Manisha: of course talk about it,
Abhinandan: but
Manisha: vast number of people look at it as, they literally say samajh se bahar hai. Yeh toh, it's like a bureaucratic exercise which will take place.
Tell us who's what, but people can't seem to understand what impact my life.
Abhinandan: So I
Manisha: think that hasn't really worked.
Abhinandan: What do you think about the development of the last week? Um, you know, because you haven't traveled back to Bihar, but do you think this release of Kejriwal and his googly about Yogi and Modi has opened a new point of conversation politically?
Or was it just a television event, everyone got excited and went back home?
Manisha: Said what everyone's been saying though.
Abhinandan: Yeah, everyone's
Manisha: been saying it. Everyone's been talking about it, he just put it out there.
Anand: Means, uh, this is for those who think that, uh, who are voting for Mr. Modi's face. And they, uh, [01:20:00] Hope that for the tenure he will be there and he's saying that he may not be for the whole tenure.
He may Relinquish the post for mr. Shah. So he it may be applied to confuse those voters it may be it may not be applied to create a new ground but to Confuse the Solid ground that BJP has by projecting Mr. Modi. So that is, um, what, what was your other question? Yes. Okay. So, um, I think, uh, discussions, uh, in, uh, there was a reporter from the Hindu that we did a podcast here.
Hmm. And she said that, uh, she found, uh, uh, despite. to all economic backwardness, she found the people in Bihar and UP to be most politically aware and about a lot of issues there. The [01:21:00] point is that if you talk about hundred things, but you vote for only one thing, you have only one vote. You, you, you have made up your mind.
You, when you vote, you don't analyze that, okay, unemployment may yet, uh, and
you may say a lot of things because you are a talkative person. And sometimes researchers and journalists misstate that simply he's a talkative person. He's a politically aware person. He has, he can bring many strands to discussion, but he may be a very politically decisive person. Person, he may have made up his mind whom to vote for.
The second point is, uh, uh, that, uh, yes, like, uh, one of Mr. Modi's, uh, uh, escape from all his, uh, drawbacks is that, uh, uh, in his, uh, uh, converted voters, uh. For all the flaws of his [01:22:00] policies and governance, the answer is a better version of Mr. Modi himself, not any other leader. So for the converted voters, not the worst.
So even if they may have a lot of questions. Complaints. So, yes, in the next term, he should focus on that. He should do this better. So the answer to anti Modism is Modism. So for them,
Abhinandan: I think he's managed to create that persona in a very impactful
Anand: way. And uh, The third is that about this paper, some people, means some of them, well known people contacted me for giving database of many students who suffered this paper leak problem and I gave them a lot of numbers.
I gave them. How much did you charge? I didn't,
Abhinandan: I didn't understand.
Manisha: I, I had you for
Anand: walk for giving numbers of, uh, students numbers
Manisha: or talk for a story.
Anand: Ah, yes. [01:23:00] So you should have said,
Abhinandan: okay, sell news, laundry.
Anand: I have my moments of generosity, so when it's available. So, um, so, uh. What is that, uh, many people who do stories around this and that is for very well known writers and journalists also, they have, they are not exposed to other worlds.
Suppose they have not come through, uh, the competitive exam world. They have entered the profession in, say, in early twenties after passing out from college and They can be easily manipulated about this thing. Now, the paper leak thing, it has happened in most of the states, most of the states, if not all.
And it is not a party centric problem. But, The failure of the center has been to be very big, a very strict law and enforce it. It is difficult to [01:24:00] enforce because of the technological things, but, uh, the, um, this feeling that, uh, uh, people laugh at things that you didn't, uh, get a job because there was a paper leak, but you are not passing this prelims exam.
You are not this means exam. You are not working hard enough. Suppose. I, I, I never blamed any government for being a failure in competitive exam. But of course there, there can be resentment. There can be, uh, say a kind of unrest among the students that we are not getting job because some government has not enough jobs.
But there is also a stream of students who think that maybe I am not good enough. Maybe I am not cracking exams because thousand people are getting into it. I am not getting into it. I, so
Abhinandan: I mean, I also think that is the successful of narrative building is like Trump has convinced them that, you know, it's because of immigrants coming, whereas [01:25:00] data shows that immigrants don't take hyping jobs.
The jobs they take, no one's taking. A white man will not take that job. Here, the narrative that musulmano mein baatiya jayega. Like Modi ji said, Main toh kabhi hindu musulman karunga, saarujan ek jeevan mein laan laya gaye ki nahi hoon. Next day he's doing hindu musulman. I mean, it's just bizarre, dude.
Now anything's going.
Manisha: This
Anand: election has become a bit silly. In Aligarh, his controversial speech, and next day he was speaking about, speaking in Aligarh and he was talking about hajj quota and how other parties have only done appeasement and I am doing welfare programs for minorities. It's bizarre. But I
Manisha: think one question should be, and I think they'll have to really work on this if they come back to power, is this Ministry of Skill Development.
Like skilling is because the government can't provide these jobs, but what about skilling? Like for
Abhinandan: that you have to have a robust private sector for which you have to relinquish control. You have to have a more federal structure, which Mr. Modi just doesn't like a federal. He has to have control over everything.
But Azharag, what do you make of [01:26:00] Arvind Kejriwal's release? And suddenly this, you know, like Manisha said, everyone's been talking about Yogi will be sidelined soon. He just said it out. Same thing about Vadra. Everyone knew what Vadra DLF deal was. He's the first one who came and said, this is happening.
You know, he just like you are thinking it, he just says it out like he says it out loud. I think that's his political genius. So just that And what do you make of Mr. Modi? Many speeches. Even no hin Muslim. Hin Muslim.
Anurag: I was watching his interview with the Rubal. Mm-Hmm. . So she, funny thing. Modiji, aapki ek khaas baat hai.
Aap Shakila aur Shakuntala mein bhed nahi
Abhinandan: karna. Kya? Aap Shakila aur Shakuntala mein bhed nahi karna. Seriously yeh poocha? Yeh
Anurag: toh mai bhi jaanti hai. Aap sabko samaan nishti dekhte hai. Toh bhi toh yeh toh mera nature hai jee. Yeh toh mera nature hai jee. These interviews are funny. These guys, they're too funny.
[01:27:00] Kejriwal thing also. Uh, like, like you mentioned that he, uh, 75, he will retire in the, I'm sure I will become larger watching an interview of, um, uh, I'm sure with, uh, uh, that, uh, uh, asked the anchor, uh,
Anjana.
Anurag: So she asked him this question and I can see it was very I mean, uncomfortable. I'm saying, no, no, no.
Modi ji hai banenge. Modi ji hai, agale jab tak hai, wohi banenge. But he was little,
Audio Insert: matlab mann mein laddu phut. Aur poore India Alliance ko kehna chahata hu, Modi ji 75 saal ke ho jaye, isse aapko anandhit hone ki jharurat nahi hai. Yeh Bharatiya Janata Party ke samvidhan me kahi nahi likha hai. Modi ji hi yeh term puri karenge, aur Modi ji hi aage des ka netrutva karte rahenge, isme Bharatiya Janata Party mein koi confusion nahi hain.
Yogi has not
Abhinandan: come all guns flying. Yogi has not come and made statement after [01:28:00] statement, like his famous son in India, kya chootiya pak rahe hain.
Anurag: And this time Yogi is not the star. He was last time, like he's not there. Like last time he was even in the small towns of Rajasthan. Yeah. Yeah. He was everywhere.
Manisha: Dude, he would be in Kerala. Yeah. Send him to South in Bangalore, in Karnataka, Yogi Adityanath. But,
Anurag: but one interesting thing, like how Kejriwal is. Right. To change the pitch. And even the Congress has this time, right. To change the pitch of the center to and everything. And they started the whole social justice thing, which was basically the idea of like mostly it's like that.
And all this costs and all these other things. So this is also an interesting experiment. Now, BJP, rather than they're responding to bjp, BJP has to respond to them, right? So most of the movies and Isha speech, and even they have hired people who are on the social media. All they're doing that[01:29:00]
they also have to, you know, play. on that social justice pitch. So that being a very interesting change. I think the
Abhinandan: first time they managed to make them reactive rather than being reactive all the time. Uh, Jesse, you have any comments before we have
Jayashree: a bunch of my thoughts, which is, uh, one on KG wild release.
I think the entire thing was very strange to me, but also it's a very strange thing about India, which is that. We're so inured to all these things that take place that his arrest was barely a blip. You know, like politicians will sort of tweet predictable things, courts will say very predictable things, opposition leaders will talk about authoritarianism, about corruption data.
And then it's sort of like in the news cycle for a couple of days and then we kind of move on. It's like the Congress's accounts, they said they were frozen. We sort of saw it for two days and then we've become very dispassionate about it. I mean, like It barely registers as in events that happens on, uh, modi's [01:30:00] sort of language and speeches.
Especially that recent one where he said, the day I do what, the day I do Muslim, I'll
Abhinandan: be unworthy of being in public life.
Jayashree: Yeah. And so both the times of India and the Indian Express, I think hired on page one, but in a very unqualified way. And then in that they just narrated what he said in an interview without.
That sort of context or background or fact checking or like even, you know, you're not, we're not asking for much as readers, I'm saying you're just allowing a prime minister sort of misrepresent himself and misrepresent facts. If he's effectively claiming that people with more children he was referring to the poor, then he's also effectively saying that he was, upset that the Congress said they want to redistribute wealth to the poor.
And this is just a very basic, lazy sort of thing, but it was still sort of reproduced. And then a couple of days, you'll probably have a very mendacious editorial, you know, taking this moral line, the prime minister's blurring this. And also what is the point? I just think if a journalist doesn't sort of test a politician's statement against facts, then why do they [01:31:00] exist?
Which brings me to another point, which is, Because very pessimistic take but you know, Manisha talking about unemployment and I think every single election we will have, we use the word unemployment in headlines so many times because this is the one thing that people talk about and we talk about the sort of entrenched poverty and this is why India is a failed experiment because it is sort of like, Story of deep contradictions with, you know, this growing middle class, but most of the population is vulnerable, living in poverty, living hand to mouth.
The most basic public goods are not provided to them. The most basic public good is a struggle to survive. So, and yet every single year, it just sort of gets worse and worse. Our sort of human development indicators are down, down in the bottom with, you know, comparable sub Saharan Africa, all those things.
So we sort of developed a rhetoric over it, but these are issues that we are just simply Not interested in solving. So,
Abhinandan: yeah, I just think it's, I think the expectation of the average Indian from their lives is really [01:32:00] pathetic. I mean, just not being dead is an achievement. You just see the wretchedness of so many lives and them not being completely, you know, aghast at their lot is something that is.
I think it is a sociological study that can be done at a meta level. But before we go on the emails, uh, we must thank Anurag. Any closing remarks you have Anurag before you give us your valuable suggestion for the week.
Anurag: Like Manisha said that, uh, it's very difficult to make out of the public opinion by, by, by talking to them.
So. That's what I was saying that, uh, I realized that most of the people are very scared to, uh, uh, speak up their mind, especially about the government, about the Modi. So they are not exactly telling the
truth
Anurag: while they are in the in the community because they are also performing along with them. So I've seen it By myself also, like there are many people who are, since there are many more supported, let's say in a shared cab or shared [01:33:00] bus, then they also perform like, hi, so good.
Maybe their opinions are very different. So this has been one of my, uh, kind of a learning thing in the recent time that I can't really make my opinion by talking to people because even their opinion, it's all performative. That was there. And, uh, about, uh, like the final recommendation, can I get,
Abhinandan: yes, please go ahead.
Anurag: Yeah. So these days I'm not reading that much of book because I'm making my own film. So, uh, yeah, I'm watching mostly the film, so I can recommend two films that I watched recently, which are very, very good. The one was a pollen leaves by one of my favorite director. Okay. Thank you. Uh, which is, which is available on movie and he's the master of that pen cinema and the way he, uh, brings out so many nuances of his society, Finland society, and also about the existential crisis of the character is very beautiful.
So that one of my recommendation. The second one is the Oscar winning film on this [01:34:00] year, uh, the zone of interest, uh, which I think is one of the real masterpiece of recent times. So I must
Abhinandan: watch it. It's
Anurag: excellent. Excellent. Excellent.
Abhinandan: Yeah. Right. Thanks Anurag. Look forward to more of your stuff and next time hopefully we'll see you in office.
Anurag: Sure. Sure. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank
Abhinandan: you. And that brings us to your suggestions, feedback, recommendations, critique, brickbats, bouquets. Uh, I repeat, we only entertain the feedback of subscribers. So if you're a subscriber, you can click on the link in the show notes below, it'll open out this window and you can fill in your feedback.
Uh, if you want to mail us, mail us at podcasts at newslondon. com. I repeat podcasts. That's an S plural at newslondon. com in the subject line, please write Hafta and please keep your email. 250 words. We have one that's five. 150 words today. Yes. We'll not read the whole thing but[01:35:00]
Manisha: So we have 21 letters. Are we reading them all?
Abhinandan: No. Let's read about 12. We'll leave the rest, but definitely we, last week we have to do like
Manisha: a, we'll have to do a special letters half. Yeah, we'll
Abhinandan: have to do letters. hta, but yeah. Let's, let's, let's do like 10 11 today.
Manisha: Okay. So RA DK says on HTA 4 78, Manisha suggested BGP stronger than Congress.
And that's why they keep winning. I would like to differ on this. Now, on a scale of 10, let's say TMC, which defeated BJP, is at 10. To my mind, BJP is somewhere at 4. And Congress at 6. But BJP plus media is, say, 8. And that's why they win. Media in South isn't as partisan, and so Congress manages to give the duo a fight in South.
What do you think would happen to BJP if media ripped them apart, as it did to UPA? Indian people are more Or like sheep, they follow the trend. They go where they think the wind is blowing. Wind might not be blowing where they're going, but if the media told them it did, they will go that way. It's not a good situation.
That is our reality. How else do you suggest people silence on [01:36:00] Rewanna? On Prajwal, we should say, I was corrected last time that Rewanna is his father. I mean, it's the last name. So Prajwal, but a huge protest over Nirbhaya, either that or simply that a large part of Hindus are pro Rewanna. Plain and simple bigoted to the extent that they even think rape and murders are sound means to maintain power.
So as a counterfactual, where would BJP be if, if the media was going after them day in and day out? That's something interesting to look at and, you know, maybe they'd be, they'd find it difficult, but I don't think we shouldn't extend that argument to say that all that's working for the BJP is the media.
Like I said, like the most loyal supporters of Modi government are so divorced from media Any of the conversations that were happening here, uh, marketing does play a role. So Modi's face on the ration bags, the continuous messaging, which is not always the media. It's always the, it's also the strength of the BGP that the Pracharak would be present there in those villages doing that outreach, you [01:37:00] know, meeting a beneficiary and You know, driving home that message that you are getting this food because of Modi.
So that's also strength of the BJP, I think. So I think it's not just the media that makes them win. But sure, like, this is an interesting thing to actually look at. Like, how much of a difference does media really?
Jayashree: I mean, how would you look at it though, right? I'm saying objectively, how would we analyze?
Yeah, I think it'd be quantifiable. So it's sort of entrenched that it's hard. So
Manisha: I often ask this question to people this time, especially in every time I go, because I'm curious what they're watching, like, what are you watching, uh, to different supporters, like what kind of news and this time I asked Dhruv Rathee, so that was only like really students preparing for competitive exams and all who was Dhruv Rathee, Read Express and BBC.
A lot of people actually say, jo hain, which means ki wo phone pe wo shots dekh rahe hain. So whatever the algorithms are showing them and chances are, people aren't even watching news. Happy to report this? I don't know how good or bad this is for us, [01:38:00] but
Uttam(Subscriber): there
Manisha: isn't a huge consumption of news. People aren't consuming news in the way that we think they are.
So I'm, it's an interesting thing, but yeah, it's, it's worth. investigating or at least, uh, exploring. Ankit says the discussion on inheritance tax was interesting and insightful. The reservation I have on the implementation of such a tax would be the manner in which this would be implemented and the use of such taxes.
Tax system in India is already very convoluted and this would become another tool for the government to get back at its detractors. Many of these initiatives do not yield the desired results as rich people with the resources at their disposal engage in tax planning and avoid tax evasion. Paying such taxes, any new taxes will be welcomed.
Citizens have confidence in the government that both the implementation and taxes will be used effectively. Currently, the confidence is pretty low among Indian taxpayers based on the recent implementation of GST to address wealth inequality. Macroeconomic measures such as higher minimum wages, pay parity, diversity, and recruitment should be mandated and [01:39:00] can yield better results.
Thank you for all your work. I enjoy reading and following it. Thank you and Kit. Um, method man says from the discord server, the very defunct discord server, we have glad to know somebody's on it. I mean, and then thank you for clearing up the distinction between undemocratic leaders, modisha erosion of values and the this is the last election narrative.
In my opinion, if this isn't a democracy, there's no point discussing it on a podcast. While I entirely agree that Modi Shah not instinctive Democrats, I think circumstances forced them to be so. So question, which Indian leader do you think was a Democrat by instinct after the freedom struggle generation?
Yeah, I was just going to point out. Yeah, me too. As an exam marker, recently students at a top tier professional college submitted pages of squiggles. The students were obviously hoping that they would be Rewarded for bulk. Yeah. RI ram might be the same. Regarding evms. One thing,
Anand: RI writings, RA is an [01:40:00] abbra and with all your hyper bull who wrote, whoever wrote in, it's an abbra and it's not a norm in India that you get.
So this normalization that writing this slogan, a religious slogan gets you, you passing marks is an abrasion. It is in a. And accepts an even in India.
Manisha: Regarding EVMs, do you think returning to paper ballot paper is better, which ballot stuffing and invalidation of votes with ballot stuffing and invalidation of votes?
One year in what is going on with wire meta tech fog? What consequences should Siddharth Sen face in your opinion? You have a discord server. I think there are probably 10 of us left. Why keep it?
Abhinandan: So your last question, uh, the discourse we've really tried to get everybody, including me into the habit of using it.
It's just something that None of us got around to like, none of us got into it. So I guess we're just so invested in responding to our subscribers like this and in subscriber meets and [01:41:00] in those, you know, every quarter we have those little zoom calls, et cetera, uh, and chat box, uh, it just, No reason, you know, method, man, we just never got into it.
Regarding others, I think the best system is, uh, EVM with a hundred percent VV patch validation. I think that's very important and I don't see why that can't happen. Regard. Tech fog, I mean like in any, like any news organization, you, I mean, there's not, the first time it's happening in any news organization, you do a, what do you call, you withdraw the story.
You put out an policy, you put a clarification. A clarification, and that is. And there's not something that it's new that's happened. It's just that it is in such a polarized environment, Oh, but every other day I've seen times express of, you know, clarification and sometimes they use someone's name and someone's photograph and sometimes the whole story is false.
They had an
Manisha: internal inquiry, but we don't know what really happened.
Abhinandan: Yeah. So that,
Manisha: I mean, they didn't put out the findings of it, but there is that FIR against the reporter. Actually, the case is completely [01:42:00] like,
Abhinandan: yeah, I mean, basically it is, what's the guy Amit Malvias. Which is
Manisha: also in cold storage. RS says, with regards to Manisha's response to my previous letter, I would just like to say that dumbed down actually means simplifying the message and not that someone is dumb.
Manisha's assumption that I am South Indian on a high horse is just example of how complex issues are unnecessarily simplified. What did you say Manisha? I'm probably as south in I'm, I think I'm turning out to be a cowbell supremacist. Yeah, you are. During elections, I really, no, no pun supremacy, but I really think that BHA and up are just randomly badmouthed and I'm really, they're the best It the,
Abhinandan: no, I think.
Manisha: The kind of, honestly, like, the kind of people you meet and, uh, especially students. No, their political awareness is at another level. You will not find this in many states. Punjab.
Abhinandan: Kerala, Lialanam,
Manisha: in English, [01:43:00] but even That's the thing, no. They don't talk to them in their languages.
Abhinandan: Go Motihari in English.
Manisha: Lucknow University also has
Jayashree: spoken English to them, but I think No, but I say you're cut off from a huge section of how people think when you don't speak to them in the regional language. Let the Bihari
Anand: also come in. No, no, no. Just on a lighter note and for trivia, Moti Hari and English, George Orwell was born in Bihar.
Abhinandan: Moti Hari, yes. That's how I think also. No, but I'm not
Manisha: saying that they aren't good, but I just think that UP Bihar is vilified too much, so I think I will take it on as a duty to always side by them. Bye bye. And by their political awareness, one fact
Anand: that it's like a stand against so called authoritarianism.
One fact that you can dig from history is that after 1977, in the 1977 elections after emergency Most of the South Indian estates voted for Congress and it was the northern estates which [01:44:00] voted out Indira Gandhi.
Abhinandan: All we are missing is Rajshri Sen to come here and say that everyone shut up
Manisha: Indira. We are just missing
Abhinandan: Rajshri.
Manisha: I'll say it
Jayashree: on her behalf.
Manisha: No, I'm saying that even if a student say in Lucknow University would criticize Modi, they would be able to explain very factually what's happening on the ground and why. You know, certain things are working out for
them.
Manisha: So it's, it's more refreshing. Okay. Anyway, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to call you a South Indian on a high horse, but that was reference to my South Indian friends on a high horse.
And he says, hope this clarifies any feelings of hurt. No, no hurt. On a different note, I'm quite impressed with the election coverage and I was happy to switch to the NLTNM joint subscription. Which my previous subscription came up for when, when my previous subscription came up for renewal recently,
Abhinandan: but you've skipped one very important line where he said Manisha's assumption that I am South Indian and a high horse is just another example of how complex issues are unnecessarily simplified.
I'm probably as South Indian as Abhinandan Sekhri. I resent that R. S.
Manisha: Yeah, how dare you? I'm very South
Abhinandan: Indian. Aiyaiyo. [01:45:00]
Manisha: Aiyaiyo. Curd rice, also you should add.
Jayashree: And here we end the podcast, guys. Here we end the podcast.
Abhinandan: After pissing off every community. If you haven't been offended yet, please stand in line.
Manisha: I use as high team great work on election coverage in Surat and some other superb reports by Basant. Uh, but I still feel NL didn't capture the ground reality well this election so far, but this could be due to the seven phase election. The South coverage has been great along with News Minute. My main request today.
to see how we can focus on data based journalism. Rukmini S. has a great new website, Data for India. Actually, we should call her for one of the issues. Also, Poonam has done a great job challenging the data put out by Election Commission so far. The absolute numbers are missing, which is further worrying, given their clearly perceived subservience so far.
My one question to the panel on Modi's speeches would be, would he be banned under an impartial EIC for his anti Muslim comments? Overall, happy to be a subscriber [01:46:00] for many years now and hoping your strength and reach Manifold from here? Ban, definitely suspend Tokyo. Yeah. I mean, had he not
Abhinandan: been mohi, he would definitely be suspended.
Like for, for they suspended. Yeah. Who did the suspend for? Uh, all right. Correct.
Manisha: And for example, what happened with the Karnataka? Did the election commission send them a notice or nothing? No. Twitter
Abhinandan: was asked to pull it down, but that's about it. That's
Manisha: it. I mean, that was also very, very, but also that was
Abhinandan: summoned.
But he didn't do, then he was summoned a second time. I mean, I don't know if he's anything happened. Right. I mean, this election commission has really disgraced itself.
Manisha: Hassam U Korya, Kroya, I'm sorry for mispronouncing your name, uh, Hassam says, Trust me, I'm with you when it comes to acknowledging the danger Prime Minister Modi poses to our country's democracy.
However, there's a very thin line between journalism to uncover the truth and media's bias being projected onto citizens. Through your tremendous hard work over the years, you have earned great respect [01:47:00] from Power of making people stand up and pay attention to what you have to say. But it's your responsibility to not use it lightly, lest you may end up becoming the ones you loathe the most.
Just my opinion. You can totally ignore or tell me if I'm wrong. Is this? Oh, sorry. I missed the key part that this is all. This is a reference to a thumbnail.
Abhinandan: So I don't know what is the thumbnail here though.
Manisha: Let's see
Abhinandan: it. No, I, but it's the video. I can't see the thumbnail.
Manisha: Oh, the thumbnail is basically, uh, it is, um, Who is the serial offender?
I think this is that one. No. Atul's show from Jadavpur University, where a girl is saying that Modi is a serial offender. I think
Jayashree: the thumbnail says who is a serial offender or something like that, if I remember correctly. So what he's saying is
Manisha: says Modiji saying we should not say such stuff that Modi is a serial offender.
Okay.
Abhinandan: Okay. Noted, Hassan. Okay. Um Okay.
Manisha: Now this is Nahar. I'm
Abhinandan: guessing. Nahar or Nahar, although I have a nephew also called Nahar. She's from Nepal. [01:48:00] Uh, Nahar has put a 565 word email, he's explained, first of all he's asking like, is first past the post system the best way to elect leaders, I'll just explain what it is.
And then he said there are alternative systems, such as proportional representation, which is PR, then mixed member proportion, which is MMP, which is a combination of first past the post and proportional representation. And ranked choice voting system, which is RCV, which allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference.
So after a certain amount of chunk of votes have gone for the first, then the second is picked, et cetera, et cetera. So he said that, what do you think is the best? It's like. I think the, I mean, I think the best is actually the method of runoffs. I think that runoffs is truly representative, uh, but it's time consuming, it's expensive.
I don't know how practical it is. Uh, and I, I think that's only possible in a presidential system. You can't have a [01:49:00] runoff with every, considering a runoff is suppose whoever wins has to get more 50%. So the three of us get. We get 30, 30, 30 each, okay, then we're equal. Suppose I get, suppose I get 20 and both of them get 40 each, then I'm out, then it's just both of them in.
Manisha: And then we have to get more than 50. And then you
Abhinandan: have to get more than 50. So France
Manisha: has that, right?
Abhinandan: Yeah. So I think that truly democratically, that is the most effective system. I don't know how practical it is. But it's such a
Manisha: large country, I don't know. And it's also
Abhinandan: possible it's for a presidential, you can't have it for every, every MP, no?
You can only do it for the president.
Anand: All kind, all methods of voting were. Debated in the constituent assembly and the winning logic for the first passport system was first that We are introducing adult franchising and we have to go for a simple method and Because Explaining this Would be difficult for [01:50:00] first a country having adult franchisee for the first time.
Second is that India already had a, an indirect way, an experience of this. Mm-Hmm. because of it was following the British pattern of voting. So these two arguments cleansed it in favor of the first passport, the system in the constituent assembly. And that's why we went with this.
Abhinandan: Right. I mean, but yeah, now to your point that sometimes someone who's just got 25 percent of the votes.
Can win and is considered representing . I think that's flawed, but I dunno who said. And, and democracy is the least flawed system of governance we have. And
Anand: that is, uh, also because it means, uh, opposition has always been very strong in India because of that only,
right?
Anand: Because, uh, none, uh, the govern, uh, the governing parties, the ruling parties, [01:51:00] uh.
Um, more often than not have less than 50 percent opposition at national level or state level has never been weak in India. It has always been a challenge to mobilize that correct. Anonymous says, dear NL
Manisha: Hafta team, I'm writing to express my sincere appreciation for your exceptional news coverage as a 12th grader, I rely on your platform to stay informed on important matters, particularly appreciate Hafta, Tipani, TV Nuisance, in depth analysis, investigative reporting.
Focus on local news. You're reporting keeps me engaged and helps me understand the complexities of the world around me. Thank you, Anonymous.
Abhinandan: Please tell your other friends that we give free subscriptions to students and we expect you to, when you're earning successful earning members of society. To pay it forward and pay to keep news free.
Manisha: Renu Jha says, I like the discussion reports on elections.
Abhinandan: First of all, Renu Jha, 236 words.
Manisha: She says that it was nice, the one that we did from Bangalore with Maya Sharma and Srinivas Raju. Curiously, Renu feels that [01:52:00] with Srinivas and Jain and News Minute, it's possible for us to get more right wing views.
Really?
Jayashree: No, she's saying that she likes you got a BJP spokesperson. So, therefore, maybe. Bigger teams are able to invite, oh, but, uh, I mean,
Manisha: yeah, it's not a correlation I draw though with Srinivasan Jain and Newsminute that we'd have the possibility of more, right? Anyway, I agree with Manisha that neither the BJP nor Congress may have known the extent of the scandal that's the Prajwal River, na?
Scandal. And she says that I heard on Neta Nagri Lallantop that these allegations, rumors have been around for two years. Somebody within or close to the family knew this. In fact, News Minute is doing a very good series on this. You guys can catch that. In
Abhinandan: fact, they are really following the story up well.
Manisha: She says the morals of those who knew about this and did nothing is the real question. There were people around who could have prevented this from happening and they didn't. Congress blaming BJP, BJP blaming Congress is just bizarre. Uh, as he comes from an important family, it's unlikely that he will be punished for this, only the violence on the women, if all this is true, is real and will be [01:53:00] long lasting.
Baki sab news cycle and real politic ke saath change ho jayega.
Abhinandan: Yeah, but I hope not. We will keep up the pressure at least. I mean, the extent of this horror
If after this also nothing happens, really, it often makes you really think that is anything even possible.
Manisha: Roger says, Hello, please see this as a cathartic exercise for some concerns, Rahul and Manisha. Which Rahul
Abhinandan: is this?
Manisha: Gandhi. I'm guessing. Gandhi. Surprised her views on Rahul, especially given her positive view of Prashant Kishore as a politician.
I don't think I've ever said Prashant Kishore was a politician because, I mean, it'll take some time for us to say that. Besides Yatra's engagement with public, a much improved SM game, what else is needed to appreciate Rahul's efforts given the mountains he climbs against the Pappu tag and news blackout.
Um, so I've never at least said, but I just think with Prashant Kishore, there's, there's either an overestimation of what he's able to achieve for parties, like he's. [01:54:00] And that's true for all political consultants. It's like these shadowy operators who can just turn your fortunes, which I just think is exaggerated, to then these spineless folks who just move from one party to the other and have, so I just, I mean, I don't agree with either of those, uh, and like I said in the previous podcast also, the Pappu tag is really what we are hearing.
People generally don't look at him as Pappu. This is not a conversation that is happening on the ground, and I don't think, uh, I don't think he has to fight that tag on the ground because people don't see him as that. In fact, like, Raibarili, I'm sure, I'm very confident he'll win Raibarili, and a lot of people you talk to would say that, look, we want a strong opposition leader to be voted from Raibarili, so we'll send him too.
Of course, it's a Congress bastion and all that, but there's still, like, And appreciation of the fact that he's a tall opposition leader. Baaki my criticism toh I don't want to keep repeating it.
But
Manisha: I don't think he's very effective in his communication and Like I said, I think this election, uh, there was a [01:55:00] lot that could have, uh, gone against Modi in terms of, but it hasn't.
So I would blame the opposition for that. Anyway, EVMs and Anand believe the digital payments analogy is false as people who don't trust it have alternative mediums. Germany has a low uptake for digital and so it is in line with their stand on voting. Inheritance tax, UK has a 325K threshold, which is 3.
3 crore.
Anand: No inheritance was not my bit. But I will respond to
Manisha: that while each country can define thresholds. The discussion assumed that this is only for the ultra rich, which isn't the case in Europe. I believe that it cannot be levied in India with EU thresholds without the government providing social security.
Yeah. That's also a huge aspect of Europe. Like there's good social security, heavy taxation, but nuclear power. So
Abhinandan: yeah, we'll just finish the email. Then you can respond. Nuclear
Manisha: power. Maybe you said that Europe overreacted to Fukushima incident. That is me. That's you.
Abhinandan: That is me. Wait, wait, let me finish.
Manisha: Europe overreacted to the [01:56:00] Fukushima incident and oversteered towards fossil and dependence on Russia. Just FYI, the opinion is changing, with 11 EU countries calling to fully unlock the potential of nuclear. Great work. Apologies if the tone is terse. No, no need for apologies. Intent
Abhinandan: was to keep it short and cover the four points.
Cheers, Roger. Yeah, go ahead. No,
Anand: uh, I think analogy can be inaccurate or accurate, not true or false, but what I meant is also your point that digital payment always has absence is not correct, at least in India. I, I pay university fee only through digital, there is no other means you cannot pay cash for that.
And for a lot of examinations also now, most of public examination, you have to pay, pay Pay the fee just by digital transaction. So in a lot of very crucial aspects of life in India, digital is the only way they have made government as well as in private sector. Um, I don't know whether for your subscription there is cash [01:57:00] payment or not, I don't know any, so, uh,
Abhinandan: subscription. Very good. Yeah,
Manisha: very good impression.
Anand: Second, second point is that. See, uh, the German constitutional court's point was that even if one person has a skepticism and he is not an expert and as a layman, he cannot be explained. So if you need some special knowledge or expertise, technological expertise to, uh, be explained the voting process.
Process it has to be discarded now. Uh, so, um, uh, my point why does That lot of things would not move ahead with that. You trust your body to doctors by knowing nothing about the medical procedure You trust your money with banks. That was the point I am making also It is a for different countries the Processes evolved differently and for a [01:58:00] country of India's scale and the kind of distrust people had with the ballot when the electoral banditry was that the origin of AVM was there.
So means electoral democracies evolved in different directions.
Abhinandan: Also, I think in India, sometimes what happens is we, uh, Uh, you know, when we're seeing a cost benefit analysis, two things, we see the ideal situation in one and the flawed situation in the other. For example. Paper ballots. I mean, many of you watching haven't seen the video of the mayhem.
What was Devilal's son's name? Chautala. Chautala. When his men battered. I mean, that's the first time. Now, of course, you see these videos of people dying very often. When NewsTrack got the first footage of a guy being hammered to death with luts during a takeover of a ballot, it was like, And then stuffing ballots or setting fire.
So dropping ink in them, even that was very flawed. So we can't say, [01:59:00] so when you're saying that we should go back to that, that'll also have to be embraced flaws and all. So it's, uh, I mean, it's a complicated one, but yeah, one thing that helps is transparency and election commission has failed to provide that it is a failure as an institution right now, whether it does paper, whether it does electric, this election commission should not be overseeing anything, not even a, you know, What do you call class monitors election?
In my view, they've just been a disaster in messaging, in coming up, up clean on, on, I mean, I have never seen in my life in election commission that is so scared of answering questions that they don't give any press conference. And
Manisha: one more thing, which has been disturbing in every election, this kind of Stories that we're hearing about the police getting in conflict with the voters.
I think that's really something that is cause for alarm and there should be more attention to that. Because people are complaining that we've been asked for more IDs, Muslim neighborhoods. So that, I mean, [02:00:00] They have
Anand: registered the case on this Burka thing. But that the state government has done. The election commission has done.
No, no, election commission has served her notice. I read there. But it all
Jayashree: hinges on if something goes viral. Also, I have a
Anand: different take on MCC. A implementation the legal part of it wise election commission has that position. I have written a piece. I would recommend that because that would be a long discussion.
Abhinandan: Then it's in the link below. We'll read a couple of the emails and then we'll stop. Yeah, we can read a few. I think the small ones. Yeah,
Manisha: I can be very quick.
Abhinandan: Yeah, go ahead.
Manisha: Uh, so Manan Shah says continuing discussion on nota of the last letter. I get Manisha's point. What if nota wins? Then there should be provision for re election with complete new nominations and older contestants should be banned from contesting next election because voting is our constitutional right and every citizen should get to exercise it.
If unopposed candidate will be declared winner so easily, this will be normalized in future. You all know there are Bahubali's contesting elections in our country. They just [02:01:00] have to go to homes of all the people and ask them to withdraw the nomination and it'll be done. As Abhinandan says, that's my rant of the week.
Thank
Abhinandan: you, Manan.
Manisha: Amitabh Bachchan has written into us, T
Abhinandan: 800.
Manisha: In Hafta 483, what Manisha said about Modi using Mangal Sutra against minorities has some logic. People are attributing a lot of things to me which I haven't said. I don't think I said it's logical that he said this. This sounds highly unlike me.
Please point out when I said this. Maybe I meant that it connects with what people believe in. One has to remember that Modi is an RSS will always keep the Hindus united over other threats such as Muslims, Christians, and communists. Gulwalkar talked about this in Bunch of Thoughts. RGE is trying to replicate the Dravidian model at a nationalist level by talking about caste census and wealth redistribution model.
Modi is using welfare and Hindu unity to attract voters. RG is using social justice and more welfare to attract the same set of voters. Hence, Modi was somewhere forced to escalate to polarization. I've written about this in my personal blog. [02:02:00] I can reproduce under anonymity, if interested.
Abhinandan: Thank you.
Anonymity. Yes, please do send it to T800.
Manisha: Uh, Siddhanth says, Agree with Manisha that bashing North Indians is pointless. It distracts from a much broader question. which Hindu society at large will have to reckon with. How did we allow RSS's hateful ideology to establish itself so deeply in our collective psyche?
How can we reserve, reverse that? That answer will be region specific, but we will have to deal with it before it's too late. Before we, like many Israelis, find ourselves celebrating wholesale dehumanization of fellow humans. We're well on our way. There are multiple reports of suppression of Muslim voters, but many seem to be carrying on as if this is business as usual.
I recommend they thought they were free a book about how regular citizens in Nazi Germany found themselves being complicit in the Holocaust.
Abhinandan: Yeah. In fact, there's the literature on this around Rwanda, which is way more recent is fascinating on. In fact, I recommended that in one of my, you know, how people and media lottery with normalized, You know, killing someone because they were of a different [02:03:00] community or belief
Manisha: Anonymous says, thanks Abend for reading out my letter and discussion regarding closure of Rohit Mila's case.
I'm a woman as you referred to me as a he.
Abhinandan: My bad, sorry, my male default setting.
Manisha: The day the closure report was filed, all goi channels screamed. Ro Mila, not a Deitz Smith. Rani am were. Seen on Republic TV, as the stakes are high for BJP in this case. As a Dalit, I'm aware of what a Dalit in college campuses.
Rohit was an outspoken student activist and I can understand how he would have suffered. It takes a lot of inner strength to be outspoken about Dalit identity and I have immense respect for people like Anurag Varma, Yashika, and many more from the younger generation who are doing great. On Saturday 12th, May 12th, 2020.
Pooja Prasanna released her. Let me explain on this topic. Yeah,
Abhinandan: please watch it. Link is in the show notes below.
Manisha: Before I conclude, I appreciate Abhinandan's point of view on merit. Anyone who treats Dalit realities with empathy melts my heart.
Abhinandan: Thank you for your support Anonymous. You're too kind with your praise for us.
I think we can do way better. [02:04:00]
Manisha: Ravi Prasad has said he watched Broken News and was blown away by the fact it's so close. People are really saying good things about this. We should watch it. Because hardly any media shows get it right.
Abhinandan: Right.
Manisha: Says all regular subscriber, Royal Enfield with NL sticker guy.
Yay!
Abhinandan: Go buddy, Ravi.
Manisha: Please promote pasting the sticker on cars and bikes as it's an effective way of branding and awareness.
Abhinandan: Yeah, please. I mean, we have stickers. This is what it looks like. So write into us, Abhinandan Sekri at newslaundry. com or subscriptions at newslaundry. com. Order these stickers, put on your car, man.
I get a lot of waves and thumbs up because of that sticker. Siddharth
Manisha: Sachdev says, dear News Laundry, at a time when legacy news media is failing its mandate, it is subscriber led models like News Laundry that are emerging like Zetio. What is Zetio?
Abhinandan: I have no idea.
Manisha: What is Zetio? No clue. Yeah, she should know.
I am. I'm assuming, I'm assuming it's like some sci fi thing. Substack.
Abhinandan: It's like a substack. ZTU is a new media organization that seeks to answer questions that really matter. It's like [02:05:00] Mahatma Gandhi's new one. Oh, I see. Okay.
Manisha: How is NL different from similar organizations like it globally? I attended the screening of While We Watched Italian Princess.
I was deeply impressed and happy to see NL staff being so determined about their work. Thank you for the effort. Take care, everyone.
Abhinandan: Thanks Siddharth. I don't know anything about Zitu. So I don't know if you're different or not, but I will have to study Zitu a little bit to answer that question. But thank you for your support.
And I hope we met and shook hands at the screening. Uh, but if you're around next, come say hi. I'll read one last email because it's only 27 words. Khushboo, you truly put your point through in such few words. Absolute to you. Thank you Anhata, for your work. I'm working on appreciating good work more and I've particularly enjoyed your contribution, especially Manisha's.
Keep up the great work. Thank you for, I really like
Manisha: this. She's saying she's working on being more appreciative.
Abhinandan: Yeah. So she's making effort. And you And we
Manisha: made it to her list of We
Abhinandan: did. Yeah.
Manisha: Great. Thank you so much. That's really,
Abhinandan: thank you. So you can share your [02:06:00] feedback@podcastsatnewsland.com. I repeat podcasts@newsland.com.
Please put hafta in the subject and, uh, please make sure you're a subscriber. Otherwise you don't entertain your meals. So let's get the recommendations for the week. Jessie, you want to go first?
Jayashree: Yes, I have four, but I will do them very quickly. Uh, so the first is, I mean, we've been talking about free fair election.
What does it mean? What is the election commission doing? So I thought that was a very good and detailed piece by, uh, in front lane, which he talks about, um, what are the necessary and sufficient conditions that must be ensured by an election commission. He lists out the prerequisites, like including all the processes that has to be followed and where he thinks that we are going wrong.
So it's very good as a sort of primer on what is an election, how should it work and what is not happening. So it's called, um, Election Commission ushers India to its electoral nadir. So that's in front lane. My second recommendation, we briefly mentioned, but it's one of the News Minute [02:07:00] stories on the Ravana case.
For instance, it talks about a 47 year old woman who worked on one of their properties six years ago. She was a domestic worker and she borrowed money from the family and she was molested, she says, by H. D. Ravana and raped by his son. So she says, I wanted to scream, but who would believe what I had to say?
I had to keep working there as I had to repay my loan. I wouldn't have been able to live in society with my head held high. My kids wouldn't have gotten married if I had shared, I was assaulted. And it's a very distressing sort of story to read, but I think it's important to read something like this, which so meticulously documents, uh, what this case is about, the headline is silenced by fear.
Survivors revealed years of abuse in the Ravena household. My next two, um, recommendations are more cheerful. So one, I know everyone goes on about The Bear, which is a very good show. But before The Bear, there was this short film called Boiling Point, um, by Stephen Graham. It was, I think, a BBC movie, but I'm not recommending that.
I am recommending a spin off TV show [02:08:00] based on that short film. It's called Boiling Point. It is a mini series. It is just four episodes on BBC. player and it is fantastic so it is again sort of behind the scenes of a restaurant but it combines like so many issues including like loneliness and friendship and what's you know sort of under hectic and chaotic work conditions and it's it's a brilliant watch and like I was crying through it I was laughing it was really really stressful and I'm very bad with anxious shows but You know, it's only four episodes, then I was like, yes, I can manage, I will power through it, even though I'm weeping over my dinner.
So, great. So please watch it. It's on BBC Player, which is an add on on Amazon Prime Video.
Abhinandan: Who was sitting next to you when you were crying and laughing?
Jayashree: I mean, sadly, it was my husband who had to watch this sort of
Abhinandan: shit show play out. I always, whenever I'm watching anything with someone who starts crying.
I just, my whole thing is gone. What? Gone? What does that mean? As in, I'm not watching. Then I, I mean, I, which is where Somebody else is crying, it upsets [02:09:00] you. No, it's like, you know, I'm thinking, will people think that have I fucking done something? Why is she crying? Because she is Why I see if I'm crying alone in my house, I don't worry about like express.
Secondly, you're like, why would she
Manisha: cry in Chiney Express? I don't know.
Abhinandan: Some people, although I an angle that I'm like, so whenever someone's sitting next me starts crying, I'm like, okay, am I supposed to say it's okay? I'm supposed, I'm like, fuck man, I'm never coming with this person again. That's what I'm thinking.
See, so
Jayashree: the great thing is that my partner also cries. So, oh, then you're fired. It's like a, then you, then you have company. Anyway, so my last recommendation is a fantastic book. It is called the will of the many by James Arlington. So it's classified as high fantasy because it's built around the concept of the Roman empire, which I know sounds like a very boring selling point, but okay.
So it's in this sort of magical imagined society where lower classes must seed part of themselves called their will to those above them in a hierarchy. This fugitive teenager goes on the run. He's sent on a [02:10:00] secret quest, which takes him into an elite school. But he also has his own personal agenda of trying to bring down our society.
So, but the word building is excellent. The magic system is great. The pacing is fantastic. Even though it's a very long book, I think it's like 650 words. Also be clever. Don't be like me. Start reading it only in a few weeks because then part two will be out. And then you won't have to wait for the sequel.
So yes, this book is called The Will of the Many. Please buy it.
Abhinandan: Good tip. Manisha?
Manisha: So, Yamini Iyer and Nilanjan Sarkar's piece, Social Media's Impact on Indian Politics, was interesting. Although, I think there's much to be explored there, maybe we should, in just the two weeks that is left of this election.
Uh, Baby Reindeer. Very creepy, interesting show on Netflix that I watched was quite nice. Uh, I want to plug quite a few things from News Laundry. I hope you guys are catching, uh, Claim vs Reality with Srinivasan Jain. I think his episode with Brij Bhushan was very [02:11:00] nice, immensely watchable and, uh, just the questioning and just that whole election is, is just so absurd.
I think it's, it's very succinctly done and very, very nice to watch. Uh, the series that we're doing on schemes. I know it's, and Jayshree's been editing them very expertly. Uh, thank you guys. We have two more left. Uh, they, it's a long read, but I, I really think it's something that you should spend your time reading.
Abhinandan: Hat tip to Shambhavi and Manjul's artwork and our design team. Very good. The design
Manisha: team has done a great job. And, uh, there's a lot of visualization along with these pieces and since schemes are such a central part of the selection, I think it's good to read what we've put out. It's very, very detailed.
And. You know, very, very good, uh, series. Catch that. Uh, in defense of my, uh, conversation with Lucknow University students, please watch it. It's not just Rivedi, Dubez, and Pandes that I'm talking to. Far from it. It's a diverse bunch of people. Though I'd agree that most of them are probably not Modi voters.
[02:12:00] So they're not that diverse in that sense. But even so, it's a very interesting conversation. So those are my recommendations.
Anand: Anand. Okay. So I am returning to the more important things in life that is death.
Manisha: More important things in life that is
Anand: death. So there was a piece about the right to pass away, which is like 70 percent of Indians suffering incurable diseases die in ICUs far away from their home and families with their families watching and in no communication with them. So, uh, um, there is a piece by Dr.
M. Raja Gopal and, um, Sam Sarma is there also. They have co authored it. They have talked about the right to [02:13:00] pass away. A second, uh, my recommendation is about Abhinav Chand Chur, who is a lawyer and son of the chief justice.
Uh, and now this said, um, north Saudi, I thought about this recommendation when there a Manas Yes. Bigotry. So he has written about bigotry and so, so it may add to the bigotry . So yeah.
Jayashree: They're
Abhinandan: the cow belt, both of them. I like
Jayashree: that you are now suddenly aligned with the South. Yeah, I am
Manisha: quickly. But you are also Hamare team guy,
Anand: Punjab.
So he takes a historical look on the 16th amendment. It is also linked to election. During election campaign, the DMK and some parties Parties in Punjab also were on this Sassanist agenda of what is again now in fashion [02:14:00] about Dravid land. So it was seen as Sassanist by the Nehru government. And in 19, after Nehru passed away, I think in 1963, they brought the Congress government brought Uh, they had planned earlier, but brought a constitutional amendment and, uh, one of the exception to freedom of speech that you see now, one of the eight, uh, about sovereignty, uh, uh, that the freedom of speech should not violate sovereignty of India.
That was brought through that. That was one of the last exceptions. So he has written about that. That what is the genesis of that? And so, um, uh, it, it, uh, revives this debate in a very constitutional way. So it's in Hindu business line, perhaps.
Abhinandan: Right. My recommendation for the week. One is it's a long read in the guardian by Atul Dev.
It is a profile of Amit Shah. Read and share at your own peril. Is that the
Manisha: [02:15:00] headline?
Abhinandan: No, it says he likes scaring people, how Amit Shah, Modi's right hand man runs India. The first paragraph is late one night in November 2005, a small group of Indian, a small group of plainclothes police officers pulled over a bus in Western India.
They escorted off a man named Sohrabuddin Sheikh who was joined on the side of the road by his wife Kausar. Sheikh and Kausar were put into separate police cars and driven 600 miles. A way across state lines into Gujarat, they would never be seen again. So it's a very, it's a, it's a piece that really paints Amit Shah as this sinister person to be very scared of, and he's this mafia Don image.
So it's a, it's, it's a good read, it's well researched and no Indian publication could ever write this. So that is one of the second is, you know, not just the one piece, I think the one piece which is very interesting was. ethics, ethical question, media, karma, language, and Prajval Rivanna coverage, which is, I mean, you're talking about sexual violence and rape, but yet the [02:16:00] language, the grammar of coverage is sexual or, I mean, it's an interesting, but overall the news minutes coverage of this issue, please, they've done, I think already five pieces on this, if I'm not wrong.
Uh, they are pursuing the story. Please do continue to,
Manisha: yeah, and I think they will pursue it beyond election. They will for
Abhinandan: sure pursue it beyond election. So do subscribe to New Year's Minute as well. Uh, they're doing some fantastic work. On that note, I would like to thank our producer Aryan and our sound recordist Anil.
Uh, do go out and vote wherever you are. I am part of some, one of these youth organizations because even I'm youth, Devi.
Jayashree: It's like how Stalin was. They called him a youth leader. They said,
Abhinandan: you also be a youth icon and please vote. When do you
Manisha: cease to be a youth icon? Like, what is the age cut off in India?
See, Stalin stopped being youth leader when his father died. It took him that
Jayashree: long.
Abhinandan: I'll tell my father just, he [02:17:00] was saying this,
Jayashree: very, very bleak, never,
Abhinandan: but, uh, I'm very excited about this week song because it is a song recommendation that goes out in my view from Arvind Kejriwal to Yogi Adityanath ever since he got Yogi to do a googly on the entire electoral campaign. So until next week, stay safe. Enjoy the weekend. Adios Amigos.
Adios.
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