Decline

Who was the winner of Maharashtra Assembly elections? Congress-NCP? MNS? The democracy, as is fashionably said after every election in India?

All of them. But there was another winner: fourth pillar of the democracy. Most major Marathi newspapers, allegedly, offered "packages" to candidates for publishing reports of the campaign. Not just favourable reports, but any report. Those who weren't ready to pay, didn't get any coverage. Most candidates paid, says P. Sainath.

On reading Sainath's article, Govind Talwalkar (says Prahar), the legendary former editor of Maharashtra Times, wrote to a friend, saying that CBI needed to probe this.

What would CBI probe, Govindrao? Journalists are spineless, and readers stupid. Not a single senior Marathi journalist (exception: Kumar Ketkar) spoke out against this. (subject to correction.)

Narendra Bodke, a former journalist, recently wrote about how Marathi editors gradually lost their authority. He called it "the decline of the editors". I objected to the title, for I felt that it was over-dramatic.

Now I am tempted to borrow Bodke's title. This is a decline. RIP, Jambhekar, Agarkar, Atre. Marathi journalism has moved on.