I have a recurrent dream every day and every night. I have a dream that my four favourite newsreaders will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the high-pitch of their voices and their strange news reading skills but by the content of their news discussions.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day the state of news television, whose editors’ lips are presently dripping with the words of aggression and hectoring, will be transformed into a situation where the big boys and big girls of telly news land will be able to join hands with the other big boys and big girls and walk together as friends and lovers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every news channel shall be exalted, every high-pitched and shrieking voice shall be made low, the rough arguments will be made plain, and the crooked debates will be made straight, and the glory of journalism shall be revealed, and all us viewers shall see it together. Under the watchful eye of Katju.

This is my hope. This is the faith with which I return to news channels every night. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to work together, to read the news together, to interview politicians and Sanjay Dutt together, knowing that we will be free from cacophony one day.

And just the other night it seemed like this dream had come true.

I switched on the telly and tuned into NDTV 24X7 . Not out of choice, but because that’s the first English news channel on the Tata Sky English News menu. There was Barkha, who made it a point to ask her contemporaries to not give in to nuance or indulge in binary choices on any issue, other than on Modi. On Modi though, she insisted on seeing shades of grey. Anchoring a special report on why Modi is the perfect choice for PM and how he knew exactly what the country needed, she didn’t once mention the words “riots” or “communal” in the entire 30-minute segment. And while interviewing a Gujarati Muslim who was weeping and telling the camera how if it wasn’t for the wonderful roads and electricity connections set up by Modi he would never have been able to send his only child – a daughter – to school, Barkha didn’t once shed a tear or put a comforting arm around the man’s shoulders. Her stark, composed and balanced reportage was only underlined by her simple cotton sari in shades of grey. The man burst into even more copious tears when she solemnly handed him a suitcase of her silk kurtis to make cushions with if he needed to raise some money.

While still reeling from the sobriety of NDTV 24X7, I moved on to watch CNN IBN – motivated as much by Rajdeep’s recent tweets which hadn’t included even ONE RT of a compliment to him, or a mention of his beagle or Old Monk. I must say I was quite concerned. Was he unwell? But there he was, and maybe he was a little under the weather, going by the fact that he was not wearing a shiny pink tie but, horror of horrors, a plain grey one. Something was definitely rotten in the state of IBN. Rajdeep proceeded to read the day’s headlines in measured tones. He also read out a special report on how The Times Of India was giving due credit to CNN IBN every time it replicated one of the latter’s interviews on its website. And that this was a clear example of TOI’s stellar journalistic ethics. But most importantly, at the end of his programme there was no editor’s take, so I felt a little bereft at not being able to read the précis of Rajdeep’s next day’s article in the Hindustan Times. But when I logged into Twitter, there was a tweet from Rajdeep saying “Good night”. But no song recommendation and no sad pensive statement. Hmmm.

But I’ve gotten ahead of myself. Before Rajdeep’s show was the nation’s little princess, Sagarika. Who was conducting a Face The Nation discussion on “The Internet Hindu Trolls: Misunderstood Geniuses”. Sagarika shed many a tear while discussing how @bringdownsaggy and @TempleRunMasjidCrawl meant no harm when they said they’d assassinate chief ministers in the country. That they simply wanted to talk and share a laugh with people, and she was willing to meet them and spend quality time with them for a good cause and giggle uncontrollably at their jokes. She also invited @IndiaReviewer over for a cup of coffee while on air and promised him that she’d never go swimming again and would actually bottle the water in her swimming pool and send it to those in need of water. At one point she started speaking so softly, I thought I’d pressed mute on my remote. She finished the panel discussion by holding hands with the trolls on her show and singing “Ek Doosre Se Karte Hain Pyar Hum” in a dulcet tone. Following which she gifted each of them stoles which she had cut from her Raw Mango saree collection – to remember her by.

By now, as you can imagine, my head was reeling. I knew the only thing that could stop these hallucinations was a dose of Arnab. He wouldn’t let me down. After all, the more things change, Arnab will remain the same. So what did I see when I switched to Times Now? The Newshour had been changed to The News In A Minute. And there was Arnab with a new wind-blown non-gelled look, smiling and talking to not 10, not 9, not even 8 panelists. But just the one panelist. He began with the sentence, “To be frank, the nation doesn’t want to know, but I have to fill up a minute, so I’m going to go ahead and ask this question…and only request an answer. If you choose not to answer, that’s cool”. His panellist was Musharraf, who thanked Arnab for the “welcome back to the neighbourhood” present of hair care products and shoe-repellent. When Musharraf commented on how Bilawal would have to return home with his tail between his legs, Arnab informed him that being a good neighbour he couldn’t bear the thought of any disharmony in Pakistan and he had already requested the Indian government to give asylum to the Bhutto boy. Arnab finished the segment by smiling beatifically at the panellist and camera and said that he had to rush as he was to attend Rajeev Shukla’s Vaastu party for his new farmhouse, and was dying to catch up with his old pals and regular guests at Shukla soirees, Barkha and Rajdeep.

At this point, I remember my eyes starting to blur, a wave of claustrophobia sweeping over me, the walls closing in around me and reaching for my smelling salts – I don’t recall much else. But I do remember muttering, I have a dream…

Thank god, April 2nd is another day.

Image By: Swarnabha Banerjee