Paranjoy spoke about all pervading corruption affecting the media.
He said that paid advertisement pushed through as news had become the norm not just in this or that regional newspaper, but also in the so called national papers in English and Hindi. He cited a case involving Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, in which a news item was published three days after an event, as if it was current news. At a meeting on the issue of corruption in the media, attended by leading journalists from all the top papers of India, he had mentioned by name the papers for which this is regular practice. He was expecting opposition to his views, as well as legal cases of defamation. Nothing of the kind happened, indicating the skeletons in the cupboards of the media.
Paranjoy said that in most cases of corruption, many parties were involved. He cited the Bellary mining mafia headed by the Reddy brothers who have been in the news for some years. The Bellary mafia not only had the BJP in their pocket, they also had the Congress in their pocket in the shape of the son of YSR Reddy, the late Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, who has just recently left the Congress.
The acceptance of corruption has become so widespread that the discussion is on the percentages a politician eats, and how much he or she delivers on promises. He used pithy Bengali examples of Gajar, Mooli etc. to say that this is how the industrial houses refer to the rates for various politicians. He cited the example of Tarun Das, who as revealed in the Radia tapes, said that while Mr Kamal Nath was an ATM who took 15% on every deal in road construction, he was considered "better" than his predecessor Baalu, who took the money but did not deliver.
