NL Hafta
Hafta 575: The Naravane book row, WaPo layoffs, and TM Krishna on ‘making democracy a culture’
This week on Hafta, Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, and Jayashree Arunachalam are joined by musician and author T.M. Krishna and defence analyst Ajai Shukla for a conversation that spans Parliament flashpoints, billionaire ownership in journalism, and the deeper cultural fight over India’s national symbols.
The panel opens with a discussion around the furore in Parliament over former Army chief General M.M. Naravane’s yet-to-be-released memoir this week. Questioning Om Birla’s claim that the Opposition was planning an attack on PM Narendra Modi, Manisha says, “It’s fear-mongering… the same story as what prime time had done back when the Prime Minister got stuck in a traffic jam.”
Ajai Shukla opines that the very fact that a former Army Chief’s account is stuck in clearance limbo shows how tightly the government controls uncomfortable narratives around national security and China.
The discussion then transitions to the layoff purge at The Washington Post, which Jayashree describes as a symptom of a world where media outlets are “bought by a billionaire” and then “gutted to maximise profits”.
Abhinandan argues that economics is not just a study of money, but a study of societies, adding that journalism is a public good that cannot be left to the mercy of a billionaire.
Finally, TM Krishna discusses his new book, We, the People of India, which examines India’s anthem, flag, and other national symbols. Krishna contrasts Vande Mataram with Jana Gana Mana, arguing they reflect very different ideas of India. He also points to a deeper democratic failure.
“We entirely failed in making democracy a culture,” Krishna says, arguing that constitutional values were reduced to textbook lines you “just mugged up to write in an examination.”
This and a lot more. Tune in!
Hafta Letters: On NL's editorial bias, the ‘I Agree’ format, and app glitches
If you want to write to Hafta, click here. Click here to contribute to our Sena project. Check out the Newslaundry store and flaunt your love for independent media. Download the Newslaundry app.
Song: Shania Twain - You’re Still The One
Timecodes
00:00:00 - Introductions and birthday announcements!
00:05:25 - Headlines
00:28:14 - T.M. Krishna on his book and being an artist today
01:28:00 - Controversy over General MM Naravane’s book
01:49:11 - Letters
02:08:10 - Recommendations
References
Get a chance to win a signed copy of T.M. Krishna’s book
‘I am Hindu too’: Why Vijay joined ‘Mohammad’ Deepak to protect a Muslim shopkeeper in Uttarakhand
We, the People of India: Decoding a Nation's Symbols
Recommendations
T.M. Krishna
Ajai Shukla
Kargil : From Surprise To Victory
Manisha
The same 2 witnesses in 165 FIRs: How a young lawyer exposed Indore Police’s ‘stock witness’ malaise
Abhinandan
The Murder of The Washington Post
Jayashree
Ayurveda: Miracle cure or medical myth?
Check out previous Hafta recommendations, references, songs and letters.
Produced by Priyali Dhingra, with assistant production by Ashish Anand. Sound by Anil Kumar.
Manisha: [00:00:00] This is a News Laundry podcast, and you're listening to NFTA
Abhinandan: or News Laundry Hafta Cab as this episode of Hafta Drops while recording this on the 6th of February. By the time this episode reaches you, which is tomorrow, it's gonna be News Laundry's 14th birthday. Yay.
All: Happy birthday.
Abhinandan: Yes,
All: happy birthday.
Abhinandan: Happy birthday. 14 years ago is when News Laundry went online.
Of course, work on this started in 2010, but because of competing interests, it was halted and then it restarted in 2011 and finally went online in 2012. So those of you who have made this 14 year journey possible, thank you. This is not News Round's birthday. We'd like to believe this is the birthday of an [00:01:00] entire, um, coming together of a group of people, which includes many of you who said news has to fundamentally change the structure of how it's funded, supported, structured, even within the organization.
Uh, where, you know, in the beginning we said there's no news laundry position, and we've written a piece on that. The side edits, the nameless edits, the paper position, et cetera, et cetera. And in that, uh. Celebration. We are launching a campaign which is gonna run all month called I Built News Laundry. I built NL Campaign.
We want all of you to participate. Many of you have already sent in your messages. We'd like to send more what they look like. Here's a little example.
Manisha: I am Manisha Pande. I watch TV news so you don't have to. I run a newsroom the way it should be run. I [00:02:00] built News, laundry,
TM Krishna: my ramla, my a co-founder. I built new laundry.
Madhu Trehan: I'm Madhu Han. I build news media companies. I've built quite a few. I also built news laundry.
TM Krishna: I built news laundry. I built news laundry.
Madhu Trehan: I built news laundry.
I built news, laundry.
Abhinandan: I built new laundry.
Madhu Trehan: I built news, laundry.
Abhinandan: So current colleagues, former colleagues, subscribers, supporters, have all sent us their greeting. I built nl. Tell us what else you built. 'cause you also built nl. So do scan this QR code, share this message. We'll share it with you on WhatsApp. It'll be on our WhatsApp groups. Tell other people to be a part of this movement, changing news.
And it's very relevant this week because we know what happened to Washington Post. We'll talk about it later in the show. But yeah, thank you Ri and thank you [00:03:00] Manisha for all your messages as well.
Manisha: Yes, and I think Haal listeners should certainly send us a video because they've been listening to us since
Abhinandan: Yeah, 20 14, 13, I
Manisha: think a year ago.
And that has really made, built news, laundry, our listenership, if that's a word. You heard our jokes. You've heard our views, our opinions ran sometimes misinformed, sometimes very well informed. Mm-hmm. So I think HF style listeners especially, please tell us how you've been listening to us, how you built News, laundry, and how you've uh, one of the first movers in terms of paying for a podcast.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Manisha: So they're your early movers.
Abhinandan: Yes. You were the ones, the pioneers who, who told us this is possible.
Manisha: Yeah.
Abhinandan: When everyone told us it's not. So thank you. 14 years of ad free news. Our colleagues, our salaries are not paid for by billionaires or government ads or corporate ads. They're paid for by you. The QR code will flash throughout this show.
Do scan it, share this clip with others. Tell others about news laundry. Tell others about journalism that must be [00:04:00] supported by you. The news consumer. With that, we will have two guests joining us late on the show. One TM Krishna celebrated, uh, singer. We, the people of India decoding a nation's symbols.
He'll be joining us late on the show to talk about this book and about what happened with art, how it's more restrictive place today. Many shows are canceled, many artists are canceled. How that impacts him, how that impacts politics in general. And it'll also be joined by Colonel Shukla who will tell us about the recent controversy regarding the former Army Chiefs yet unpublished book.
But before that, we will get the headlines. So Joshi, can you please do the honors?
Jayashree: Yes. Here are the headlines of the week. There was chaos as the budget session began on February 1st, which is a Sunday leader of the opposition. Rahul GTI was an ro when he tried to quote passages from former Army Chief General s unpublished memoir.
Uh, the book, [00:05:00] four Stars of Destiny, has been awaiting government clearance since 2024. It, he basically wrote that top BGP leaders failed to give clear directions during the 2020 military standoff with China. So he would, while Gandhi tried to read it, he was repeatedly interrupted by Raj, Nat Singh, ah, SHA, and others.
The BGP then accused Gandhi of insulting Indian soldiers and making parliamentary rules. Eight mps were suspended for throwing papers at the speaker. Protests continued outside. The Lobar finally approved a motion of thanks to the President's address, but without the PM speech. This is the first time this is happening since 2004.
The speaker said he asked Modi to skip the lobar because he had, and I quote, credible information that several members from the Congress would create an unprecedented incident. I saw in the paper that he also said some women were standing near the women mps were standing near the well of the house, which I just thought was a very
Manisha: So what,
Abhinandan: so
Jayashree: what a, what a threatening thing to witness as a prime Minister.
Abhinandan: Some of the prime time shows last time I had the patients to watch them, but at least the [00:06:00] thumbnail they were suggesting that they're gonna be discussing or debating, I dunno what the discussion, debate is, that there was a plan to attack or assault the Prime Minister in Parliament. Is that, did, did you or your team get time to watch these primetime
Manisha: first ministry?
No, I didn't watch yesterday's primetime. Uh, but yeah, that seems to be the suggestion from what I, I've seen on Twitter. It's the same story as what the prime minister, what prime time had done back when the Prime Minister got stuck in a traffic jam. In Punjab. In Punjab, yeah. The flyover incident, the plot to kill the Prime Minister.
And by the way, there was a real plot to kill the Prime Minister, which everyone ran with almost eight years ago on Bima. Nothing happened of it.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
Manisha: So, I mean,
Abhinandan: no, but. No. So what was, I dunno whether you had, they said that there this, so what? There would be a bunch of PR people would get together and
Jayashree: like streets.
Yeah, they said some several correct. And they said they were planning to do some inappropriate incident near the prime minister's chair. The allegation mostly being that these would be women who were being used as a front [00:07:00] to sort of carry out the inappropriate, whatever the inappropriate incident would be near the Prime Minister.
So they said that this will tear apart democracy in India, whatever. So therefore the prime ministers advised not to come and so he didn't come because we have to uphold the high tradition of the house. So it was just, and then I think the speaker also said that um, it was not appropriate for him to come because uh, yeah, it would tear apart the democratic traditions of the war.
I think
Manisha: what they could have done is they could have my conspiracies that maybe they knew that they were gonna discuss Epstein Modi and Haldi P'S name in Epstein files.
Abhinandan: Mm. Yeah. There's some emails have come
Manisha: out from That's the only, yeah, like it means, yeah, ban a lot of ban. Also, Modi is not personally talking to Epstein, just to be clear, but his name is there.
Abhinandan: Mm.
Manisha: Uh but I think like that could be the only thing that they could be so like jittery about,
Abhinandan: I don't know
Manisha: what else. Like what on this book you can't, you've already done enough on the book. How much? Like the PM shouldn't be worried about that.
Abhinandan: Who [00:08:00] knows man. Which is a
Manisha: bizarre, maybe women mps were planning to do that.
Jayashree: Think of the
Manisha: gang of women.
Jayashree: I'm just finding
something.
Manisha: The gang
Abhinandan: women people, they had learned jitsu a, they'd be like a, anyway. Hmm.
Jayashree: Terrible. Okay. Also on fe first, the finance minister Niman presented her ninth budget. He, uh, some highlights, the total expenditure is 53 point a half La Crow. There are no changes announced in income tax labs.
Fiscal deficit estimated to be 4.3% of GDP. There are increased allocations to the home Ministry and Intelligence Bureau. Uh, equity markets reacted sharply on budget day. The BSE census and NSC nifty dropped heavily,
Abhinandan: but the last couple of weeks,
Manisha: then it went up. Also after trade,
Abhinandan: everything's been going up and down, down the AI announcement.
All the tech stocks collapsed two days
Jayashree: ago. That's life guys up one day down another.
Abhinandan: Gold and silver have moved up and down 25% within a week. So yeah, just get used to it. Hmm.
Jayashree: Donald Trump announced a [00:09:00] trade deal with India that slashes US tariffs on Indian goods to 18% from 50%. He said this is an exchange for India halting Russian oil purchases, lowering trade barriers.
He announced a deal saying that he had a call with Modi. He also said India will now buy oil from the US and maybe Venezuela
Abhinandan: and on queue, amazing associations like fki, et cetera. Put out full page ads thanking Modi g Dur for making this. Possible
Manisha: is after this all TV news was running that surrender.
Abhinandan: Surrender. So basically everyone thank Moji and there was this entire citation ceremony thanking him for
Manisha: making this possible. Yeah. In parliament ging him and everything dear.
Jayashree: But we do with no what the D says. I think somebody had asked J Ram no. What's I asked J Ramh thing.
Manisha: Shanka,
Jayashree: sorry. Somebody had asked how confus the details of it and he said you should go ask the commerce why, why should we go to commerce?
Manisha: They're in direct conversation and I'm not part of the trade deal, so he'll be able to tell
Jayashree: you. Oh. So [00:10:00] confusingly the agriculture Secretary of America had tweeted saying, great news for American farmers. All your stuff is being exported to India. So it's just, yeah, this was
Manisha: the most reciprocal aspect of this deal was that Trump Lackeys, Modi Lackeys were both praising their dear leaders,
Jayashree: but they
Manisha: do that anyway.
Both, both took claim for, you know, like best deal for America, best deal for India. But uh, the fine print is not out yet.
Jayashree: Mm. Manisha was hoping for a Trump imitation, but you did not do it. Uh, BJP Leader Yu Kean Singh took oath as the chief minister of Manipur ending President's rule in the state.
Tensions continue, however, because two umbrella organizations of cookies or groups said MLAs from the community cannot and should not participate in the formation of a government. Protests erupted on Thursday evening as well. Hmm. The Supreme Court has verbally asked the union government to rethink the continued detention of activist Sona Chu, who has been detained til since September, considering that his health is not [00:11:00] that good,
Abhinandan: which is, I mean, even if it is good, I don't see why he should be detained for so long
Manisha: without China.
And States Council said that he has framed China. No, India as them,
Abhinandan: the Indian
Manisha: government tried to create, tried to create, uh, disaffection was just dystopic.
Abhinandan: We all are we basically, we should all become North Korea. We, it's, yeah.
Jayashree: In quite dramatic scenes. I thought West Penal Chief Minister Manta Banerjee appeared in the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
She alleged her state was being targeted through the SIR of the electoral rules. She also asked why the process was not being carried out in BJP governed asam.
Abhinandan: Yeah, she addressed the Supreme Court. She's, she's a fighter man. Think
Manisha: like from the front.
Abhinandan: I think people like Accusation Gang can learn a thing or two from her.
Jayashree: A book discussion at Mumbai's prestigious Carla Goda Arts Festival featuring activist Arnold M Day was canceled on the orders of the Mumbai. Police participants were asked to delete their social media posts about [00:12:00] the event. Additionally, an actor Na Zhar said he was disinvited from a separate Mumbai University event.
At the last minute, without explanation or apology, the Raan police have filed a case against two Hindu men who oppose the harassment of an elderly Muslim shopkeeper by B members. On Jan 26th, a video of it went viral. Multiple rightwing goons threatened the two men as well.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Jayashree: Raja took oath as Maha's Deputy chief Minister.
She replaces her husband AB Power, who was killed in a plane crash last week.
Abhinandan: But, but sorry, before you know, we move on. The Han um, incident, uh, wonderful. Anol Priam went there. He has filed two reports already from there. Yeah.
Manisha: And a third one is coming where he is interviewed. The guys who led the attack on, uh, this Jim, this is Jim Un
Abhinandan: so please
Manisha: Moham.
Yeah,
Abhinandan: please check those out. And if you notice, this is something that primetime should have actually.
Manisha: Yeah.
Abhinandan: Because it has all the elements that make for compelling [00:13:00] viewing. You have video evidence that is conflict, that is combat. If you were just to look at even, especially when you have politics is ignorant just as piece of television, but it was completely ignored as if it never happened.
Jayashree: Mm-hmm. And could Cricket News Pakistan says it'll boycott the T 20 World Cup 2026 match against India on Feb 15th. Although Pakistan has confirmed its participation in the tournament itself, boycotting a single match could prompt action from the ICC.
Abhinandan: Yeah,
Jayashree: the Washington Post has announced it's laying off one third of its workforce sharply scaling back.
The papers covered with reports and foreign news bureau chiefs from India, Jerusalem, Ukraine, and most Middle Eastern countries were also laid off in the purge.
Abhinandan: So we just discuss a bit before, you know, TM Krishna comes in, and, uh, Jess, she will also tell you how you can get a signed copy of Tm Krishna's book.
But before that, on the Washington Post, cuing a third of the staff, uh, [00:14:00] several newspapers, including Al Jazeera on news platforms, have done this entire comparison of how much GFB Source has spent on other stuff. And I see a lot of, uh, you know, commentary, yarn on this, someone blaming markets, someone blaming ideology, someone saying, this is what happens, which I really find bizarre also, because of course, everyone's a commentator today.
If, you know, if you don't have people like Soheil Ra, then you'll get some other chimo from the street to talk about anything from. And
Manisha: Chad, Chad Gpt is really democratized this year because everyone's just putting out, you can tell that a lot of the stuff is just ai, uh, you know, essays that people are posting on and giving Yon
Abhinandan: Shahi has come down pretty heavily, uh, on the firing of his son.
In fact. We had, we had
Manisha: him over,
Abhinandan: we've had, uh, you know, Han Han on the hafta. We've had, uh,
Manisha: just last week, right
Abhinandan: Jerry, week before last, I think
Manisha: week before last week,
Abhinandan: we've had Jerry and uh,
Jayashree: we had it [00:15:00] Joan,
Manisha: we've had for our media, ramble
for
Abhinandan: media, we had Jerry in the media rumble as well. Uh, so right now, if I understand correctly, they have no one in India?
Manisha: No, they have their India staff.
Abhinandan: Okay. The India staff.
Manisha: So it's just who's officially been, uh, asked to leave.
Abhinandan: But Jerry also put out a tweet. But Jerry,
Manisha: so Middle East Bureau is completely hollowed out.
Abhinandan: So Washington Post will have nobody in the Middle East.
Manisha: Yeah, that's what it seems like.
Abhinandan: I personally think a good way of actually creating the new media ecosystem.
And I've said this in the past, you know, on Twitter, you cannot really, some people have tagged us. I think Manisha, you also that, you know, can you explain how the economics of this works? You know, what is a way of avoiding this? I think we've discussed that length in other half, but just briefly. I wanna say the days of the, just like the days of those big studios that owned all their stars.
Like if you go into, there's a wonderful podcast, you must remember this. It's on Hollywood in the forties and fifties, [00:16:00] even the biggest stars that you know of. Studios pretty much owned them. They tell them how many cigarettes to smoke. They tell, especially the women that that studio control kind of collapsed in the nineties, maybe two thousands.
It's come back a little more significantly, but it's not where it used to be. Similarly, media companies have to evolve that days of, you know, the Jans and the Puris and the being this big media moguls is gone. A network of associated organizations that believe in a kind of journalism that they all agree upon.
And there will be some ideological affinity as well. And they need not have those, uh, you know, um, bureaus everywhere. You can have partnerships just like we and Newsmen have in the south and in the north. And we are looking for other partners in the Northeast and other parts of the country. That can happen internationally as well.
Governments will make it harder and harder [00:17:00] with regulations coming in, how you're making payments, how you share revenue, et cetera, coming in. But the fact is, it is not an economic decision for Jeff Bezos, at least not directly from this product point of view. Mm-hmm. If you can afford to, when's the last time anyone paid whatever, $45 million for the production and another $35 million for the marketing of a non-entity like Melania, Melania.
Not, these are not economic. This is all of you have pal economics. First of all, fucking learn economics. Understand it. Just knowing a few words is not enough. What is a public good? What is market failure? In which cases that has it happened in the past, in which cases can market? Markets are not working on their own?
There is a lot of regulation. For example, how many of you know that a channel today in India is not free to charge whatever they want on Tatas and all that? That that comes, there is a regulation around it. [00:18:00] If I say, you know what? I don't wanna be free on Tatas Ka. If you wanna subscribe to my channel News channel, you pay 50 bucks.
I can't do that. So fucking educate yourself before regulation is not, has not left market on its own. It's not a market decision. It's a very complicated decision. And also I'd directly remind you, economics is not just a study of money. Economics is a study of societies and all that is valuable there.
And in some cases it is material. In some cases it becomes more complicated than that. So it is a social philosophy, not just a financial or monetary philosophy. With that rent, what have you heard of this Washington Post? Uh, uh, kata layoffs, and I mean the Middle East being ignored. The most important place in the world is bizarre to me.
That cannot be an economic decision
Manisha: and that cannot be an interest based decision. Okay. Fine. America may not, an American reader, may [00:19:00] not be interested in what's happening in India. Mm. So you can justify the local, why do we need so many reporters? They're local person can report, but Gaza has literally sparked culture war in the us, Palestine, and Israels right now, in terms of pure economics numbers, it gets the eyeballs.
Yeah. Yeah. We know that. So of course if he's calling that out, it's not because of
Abhinandan: Yeah. It's not an economic
Manisha: decision. Yeah. But I think, and so it's been very interesting for journalists because, uh, the groups that I am part of, again, there's like fierce debate about what has happened with this layoff because it are, there are a lot of existential questions that this layoff raises for journalists.
One is this thing of how to make money doing news. And that's something that everyone now is really thinking of. And it's this peculiar breed where it's not news is survived, not because it's a business that makes money ever in history. Sure. Despite it. Mm. And I think that's what, what's happened with billionaires who acquire, I mean, I was discussing this with someone that billionaires who acquire media, don't do it for the love of media, but for influence.[00:20:00]
Mm. And then they're willing to pour in as much money as they want to just keep their influence going. We've seen that with Banani. We've said that with Anari, in fact. Murmurs within the NDTV say that Adani doesn't wanna put any money into this. Mm. You figure your shit out. I'm not gonna pour in mine. Now he may be making billions from other things, solar infra green energy, but he's not gonna now save NDTV.
You figure your shit out. Whereas a, whereas you contrast this with a legacy owner that became a billionaire because of news. Hmm. Like the NYT, they're rich because they got into the business of news and there is a heart there to make news work. So we'll do it by selling online cooking recipes. We'll buy wordle, we'll do gamification and we'll use that mind to pump it back into news.
So fundamentally with Bezos, he didn't buy this for the love of news, for influence. And in Trump era that influences upturn. Exactly. What does it mean to be influential in Trump era? Certainly not great reporting from Gaza or India. And the other thing I think, which was very interesting with some, someone pointed on Twitter [00:21:00] also, that uh, there is a cultural phenomena here also, which Americans, as they go inwards, they're not gonna care so much about what's happening in the world around.
And a lot of foreign correspondence or foreign reporting for American media was a soft power thing.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
Manisha: It wasn't just informing. It comes from the notion of the savior, the notion of the leader of the democratic world, you know? Yeah. Leader
Abhinandan: of the free world.
Manisha: So we call out democratic backsliding in Iran.
In India, and, and a lot of money was put in because it believed in that self-image. Or now when the self image collapses, you know, why should we put money into like these? This seems like an elitist thing. And I think what is very interesting in this, and this is a trend that I'd like to see if it holds true, we over the last 15 years saw the collapse of local news.
And the traditional thinking was that local papers have died, local news is dead, and suddenly now everyone wants to go back [00:22:00] hyper-local. If you look at Post's explanation, also they've said that we don't wanna be relevant to the whole world, but we wanna be very relevant to our own audience. So is he gonna take this money out and then bump it back into very granular Washington DC reporting, which also gives him favor.
'cause doing something in America, Harding report on Trump is remains to be seen if that is promoted or not. But it'll have more influence for Bezos than doing a hard hitting piece in India.
Jayashree: But he's laid off the metro team. The metro team is the
Manisha: local team. Yeah. Yeah. But, but so I'm curious to know like this hyper-local push, where does that really go if it's just like a sub dfu to eventually, I don't
Jayashree: think some business decisions going on at some point, you know, like the metro team being laid off makes actually, you know, sports books.
And I think that one quote I'm seeing constantly online is that Watergate was a local story. It started off as a local boring story that was just tad for a really long time until my God, it certainly unraveled. And then they realized this is Watergate. So I feel like for me, I'd set aside my, [00:23:00] uh,
Manisha: dislike for Western Press.
Jayashree: Yes. And for out and out propaganda arms of an American empire. But that aside, I feel like the larger trend is just shocking. It's that you live in a sort of world where media outlets can be bought by billionaire and then gotted, like private equity funds to maximize profits. And I think this is, I think after he did, he sort of blocked the endorsement of Harris and so on and so forth.
There was always very clear signs that the Washington Post was moving very strongly towards becoming a conservative paper, especially when you read the editorials and so on. I think there's some sort of, it feels that they are trying to become like political, you know, less about the foreign policy and just about like what's happening in the capital and so on.
But liberals, for all their faults read newspapers. A billionaire stupidity has tanked a newspaper and now he's gutting it. And I think that's what billionaire do. You can either. Buy an N TV or a Washington Post and trash it completely, or you use it as a mouthpiece. And end of the day, the Adani and the Bezos will [00:24:00] always have far more money than the shareholders of a newspaper.
So I feel like they fed the wolf and now the wolf is biting them. So that is my thing. But one thing about Washington Post itself, I think this is our Pope Newspaper can serve public interest in so many ways when you report and stuff, like when you're fundamentally working in the service of people, your coverage, I think it's a big loss for India because Washington Post stories on Adani in India, I think were really strong.
All of journalism, the kind of which that we don't see from a lot of Indian media houses. Mm. And just a large newspaper. The sort of people, the processes, the rigor, the editorial standards, these are valuable things. And
Abhinandan: yeah, even the,
Jayashree: even though I personally think the Post has historically used it for nefarious purposes, but it's fine.
Abhinandan: Even Jerry's pieces on Netflix and Yeah, Amazon Prime in India, how popular is being completely
Jayashree: twisted. How he also do the entire series on meta or failure protect.
Manisha: Yeah. In the run up to elections, the whole campaign on communal campaign and how systematically it was run. [00:25:00]
Abhinandan: So
Jayashree: those are great stories.
Abhinandan: So you cannot leave news to the mercy of billionaire, which is why.
From the beginning, news Laundry has been ad free. We do not need any ads. Not Sari Ads. Not Patanjali ads, not ban Adani ads. Here's a QR code support journalism. This is, we can use a cliche as a wake up call, but there have been many wake up calls in the last 14 years. When News Laundry was envisaged the rea, there was a reason we said it'll be ad free.
So, and at that time, ad rates were about 10 times higher than they are today online. So do scan this QR code. Tell your friends, if you don't support journalism, it'll die. And democracy cannot exist without journalism. You know, a lot of fools are saying, who needs news, dear? Your God? I don't even know what to say to such people.
It's like, who needs books? You need news. No society has survived democratically without news. Do not leave it to billionaire QR code link share. Do all that. And the one thing [00:26:00] that people, you know, they think that as a given a first principle, an economic decision is always a quarter to quarter or year on year decision.
For example, since we've talked about metals and how they're going up and down, copper is the next metal that many analysts say is gonna boom because there's not enough copper in the world to actually take care of demand. It is actually used in many production and electricals, et cetera. 25% of world copper comes from Chilean mines.
There is a very large deposit of copper in North America, the largest. In the USA, the company that is excavating that or wanting to excavate has already spent $2 billion in the last 15 years. They have not extracted a single gram. The horizon of actually making money of mining copper can be from 10 to 20 years.
That means you could be pouring in money without getting revenue back. It also depends on how long the horizon is. If you think I wanna set a business in India and that business should not be a crony capitalist [00:27:00] enterprise, I need to have an environment which is transparent. That can be a reason to put in money into media, which is also an economic reason, but it is not an economic reason that will give you returns in the next three months.
It's way too complicated. Yeah.
Manisha: Especially news. It's not as, as simple as that. You know, your stories aren't getting clicks, so now we'll fire you. It's not,
Abhinandan: that's not how it works. It's just dumb. Right. We will welcome TM Krishna now and then after that, later, Joshi can tell you how to get a copy of this book.
And we are joined by the author of We, the People of India, decoding a Nation's symbols. You also know him as a classical singer, but right now you are here as an author and a commentator, and we have lots to discuss, uh, considering what's happening in the world of art, the purpose of art.
TM Krishna: Absolutely.
Abhinandan: Uh, but before we do all that, as we say in Hindi.
Ric Introduction, TM Krishna is a renowned Indian [00:28:00] RNA vocalist, author and social activist. His new book we the People of India. That's this. You can get a signed copy. I'll tell you how later explores the history, philosophy, and cultural significance of India's national symbols, including the flag, the anthem, and Constitution.
And the book aims to critically examine these symbols, impact on contemporary democracy and citizenship. So thank you for joining us and making the time. It is Deli treating you well? So far?
TM Krishna: So far so good.
Abhinandan: Right? I'm
TM Krishna: still wearing the mask, but
Abhinandan: yeah, I saw, I'm
TM Krishna: surviving.
Abhinandan: Thank you for taking it off the course of this interview.
In fact, before we started, uh, TM was telling us that you had, uh, done a concert many years ago before people were masks. What was that about?
TM Krishna: So it was a song, it was called the Rumbo Paddle. Rumbo means Commons in Tamil. It's actually abuse word became an abuse word. So in any Tamil cinema, I'm saying port means you're on useless, good for nothing.
But it has a very serious connotation because if you say the commons are useless and good for nothing, it can be [00:29:00] exploited. It comes from British time, and the commons couldn't be taxed. Right. And anything that's not taxed is not useful for the government. So then the people living on the commons are useless.
Their lives are useless, their cultures are useless. Their occupations are useless. So that's very deep meaning. And usually the commons belong to the tribal communities and marginalized communities. They lived there. And this was about not Chennai where we have 5, 4, 4 thermal pass stations, havoc to our river, to our entire fisher's life.
So we made this song, which was both a critique of that, but also a critique of development and other things. And there is, I have to, before I go there, there's a very political phrase in that, in Tamil, in Chen, especially if you say, and literally means, are you, you know, making ura, but actually means, are you lying?
No. So there's, there's a, yeah. So a line in that says, if you tell the government, they'll say, this is all development and cheat you. And so it's also political. And in that, the first [00:30:00] shot of the song, which is taken on the ash ponds, I was wearing a mask and I start singing in 2017 talking about the pollution.
And I removed the mask and it seemed weird then to do it. And now nine years later, it seems weird that I'm not wearing a mask.
I BUILT NL: Yeah.
TM Krishna: And we've just normalized this entire state. You know, I flew in and said this, this kinda ridiculous how. We've just said, yeah, it's, it's gonna be like this.
Abhinandan: So in fact, um, I remember the reader digest that I used to read regularly, uh, back in the eighties and nineties.
There used to be this recurring ad that, is this what I remember the day 1992 will look like? With people cycling and jogging with masks on because air pollution. Correct. Of course. It didn't happen in 92, but yeah, 20 years later it has happened. Absolutely. At that time it was like this exaggerated reality.
TM Krishna: Exactly.
Abhinandan: But now it's exactly
TM Krishna: accurate happen. You know it's gonna happen. And the other thing is you think it's happen somewhere? [00:31:00]
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: You know, some Luke and Conner, maybe few people, it'll not affect me.
Abhinandan: Yeah. So it'll affect all of you. Which reminds me, here's a QR code. Join a Fight to Breathe campaign.
We've been at this for over a year. No, Manisha.
TM Krishna: Yeah.
Abhinandan: And we don't, you know, stop covering this even during the summer months when the A QI is not so high, lest we be accused of only focusing at it for month of the year. It's a year long campaign. Check it out, there's a page dedicated to it. Now with that, we would like to discuss two things that we have TM with us for another 40, 45 minutes.
Your book and the place of art, and especially coincidentally just before you came yesterday, there was a incident.
TM Krishna: Yes, I saw that.
Abhinandan: And, uh, the Kura cancellation. Yes. So the book first, uh, I, you know, read a bit of your interview on the Indian Express, where you make the distinction between the idea of India through DJ gunman and the idea of India through Van Mara.
Now, before I do that, I'm just gonna play a clip [00:32:00] of A BJP spokesperson singing Van Mahr Atter on a primetime show. When he was challenged
Manisha: sing, um, slim analyst to
Abhinandan: ing s failing
Manisha: it himself and
Abhinandan: was told him toing it. He came lyric like sum de busman and all that.
Manisha: Stan, Stan became a thing. Stan New Nation, they created Stan.
And this is the information minister of Stan.
Abhinandan: Yeah, just get into that, uh, TM about these two songs particularly. And what was your motivation of writing [00:33:00] this book?
TM Krishna: So the two songs, uh, you know, in fact, when I first thought of writing about the Anthem, I was wondering how do I begin that chapter? How do I address it? It was impossible for me to decouple Ganara from Aath.
It was very interesting. It had to be spoken about together because their histories are closed and there is, and it was very clear to me. I write there, I think, is that we are talking about two different notions. And unless you make the dialogue between the two, you won't be able to make relevance of where we are today or what we are doing today.
So one day, Maro, as a song, I often say, is it really one song? It's like many parts put together. Okay. Historically, most historians agree that the first two verses were written between 1872 to 75, not for the, necessarily for a and the Mutt.
Vande Matram clip: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: But then when an, the Mutt was published in 1881, the other verses were added first as a song.
Those four verses just do not sit together. Let me just say bluntly, [00:34:00] they collapse as a song because there's certain things required for a song form poetic, uh, cadence, a certain rhyme scheme. Mm-hmm. A certain continuity, a certain ability for it to come back to the, the kind of the, the first line.
Everything is kind of very, very. Very, very patchy. Maybe that itself tells you something about the idea that it's, it's propagating and also it's very clear Bunky, ishan. You know, the first verse, first verse is, is very normal. You suji arms. She's a very descriptive verse. Yes, mother India is there, but she's still, it's just a docile kind of a thing.
The second verse, suddenly he's talking about the population. Of course, he talking about the population of Bengal, which is not the population of India, but nevertheless Ko. Then suddenly she's, there's some certain amount of ferocious saying you need to resist, et cetera. Who's resisting the people or the idea of Mother India?
Well, we can debate. Then the third and fourth words says it's a complete transformation. It is almost suddenly you see the image of what we see today as, [00:35:00] as you know, that kind of a lion and this goddess, so there is a lot of jerkiness, there's a lot of jump, and therefore it's a, it's a very difficult song in structure, which is why none of the people who try to tune all the four verse together, we actually able to do a great job of it.
Anybody I listen to about 20 versions, there are about 125 tunes to do it or more. Those who tune the first two verses were able to do it so it doesn't fit together. The other thing, this whole thing that you have to connect with Aamer, there's no way you can remove the song from Aamer. Let's be very clear about it.
If you read, it is a text that is not just against the political Muslim ruler. It is anti-Muslim. It is islamaphobic. I mean, you have these Hindu attacking villages, pillaging places, and this is a anthem. The song is like the anthem. It's like the initiation song during it. So it is deeply [00:36:00] problematic. So to have a problem with that entire song as it is together, is very legitimate, in my opinion.
The first verse, of course, I will keep aside now.
Abhinandan: So is there also a hypothesis? The first verse was written separately and the others.
TM Krishna: So the first two verses, okay. The hypothesis is there, and I think most people agree.
Abhinandan: Okay.
TM Krishna: The first two verses, we don't know whether Bunky Madin thought of the novel at that point of time.
Mm-hmm. Right? But then the fact is that he had the song did transform into something. Okay. So even Taggar for example, says the Accidental Association with, because Taggar has a soft, very emotional, soft spot. Especially the first verse. That's the only verse he has sung. Mm-hmm. Okay. That's for me, an unacceptable, even Taggar is explanation.
You can't remove it. If you remove it from then where is the song? I don't know. Right. Or you're gonna just take the first few lines away. You can't do that. So it's a very, very, uh, problematic song. And if you look at his history, it's very interesting that if you look at the Cons Assembly, [00:37:00] those who wanted one day, maam as the anthem, and this argument goes on.
Hmm. They're the same people who speak about slaughter. They're the same people who discuss about uniform civil court. They're the same people who also have discussed the one language issue. So one day, maam, is not just a song, it symbolizes a majoritarian outlook towards this country that we were making then.
Hmm. And this we see even now, very rarely will you see these issues decoupled or person talking about one of them, but not interest in the other. Sure. Janna Gana is just the opposite. It's, I call it a protest song for simple reason. Taggar was irritated that anybody could have the goal to come and ask him to write a song in honor of King George because he was coming to India in 1911.
Mm-hmm. This is his own words.
I BUILT NL: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: He was pissed. And then you can imagine, so a very angry tag goes out and write a song celebrating who he calls the aka, which [00:38:00] is of course not King George, as people like to constantly just talk, is just this divine cha, the, the onlooker, whatever the guy. And of course that song is never sung anywhere where God George was.
Then he hands over the same song to the Congress session the same December in 1911. It's sung for the first time. So that's, and that song is entirely different. It's geographical description. It's also a description of the state of the nation. And we forget some beautiful verses, which we don't sing in the anthem.
The worst way he talks about this is a country of Hindu, Bo the Sheik Parsis coming together as a country. It is a gorgeous description of this land.
Abhinandan: And that would be completely opposite to the vision of India.
TM Krishna: Absolutely. The sung
Abhinandan: ideology,
TM Krishna: right? Absolutely. So you have to see them as very different ideas.
And I'll add one more song to this list. Mm-hmm. Which is the hindustani version of J, not even version interpretation.
Abhinandan: Mm-hmm. [00:39:00]
TM Krishna: That, um, Abbe Hassan did for both in Singapore. Okay. So Bos the first one who adopted Janna Gana first when he was in Berlin. And then he realizes that it's too Sanskrit, it's too high that way.
And he says, let's make a Hindustani version. So it's written Hindustani, which is very colloquial. And to me that is another very, it's the common person's interpretation of Zara in terms of its words, che. That's how it starts. Beautiful. It's the same tune as Z, but the language is different. The imagination is more every day it's more real.
So that adds, I think these two songs together in a way represent. India as we would like it to be.
Abhinandan: Uh, interesting. I'm just so peaked. Uh, my interest is peaked by how you have dissected this. But other than that, how, when was it adopted as a national anthem? 47 or later,
TM Krishna: the last day of the consum assembly.
[00:40:00] 24th January. 1950.
Abhinandan: Okay, so
TM Krishna: it was, is when, is when finally It is, it is shortly before, actually. There's no big discussion about it. It was, uh, it was kept to the last, uh, moment. But the fact is also true that by then GaN had kind of default been used already. Uh, it had been played in, you know, the armies was already playing it 'cause they needed an anthem.
There was an urgency in United Nations, for example, that they needed some anthem and was being used. And, uh, so by then it had it slowly already. In fact,
Abhinandan: it was, it was adopted as our school song in 1935. Which is what, 12 years before independence.
TM Krishna: Oh, that's fascinating.
Abhinandan: 15 years before.
TM Krishna: That's fascinating.
Abhinandan: So it is the school
TM Krishna: song. The person who really recognized its potential is Gandhi 1922 when he publishes the Baja for his astro. There are three songs he includes in it. That's the first time he publishes this book of songs. GaN one Day Rum of course.
Abhinandan: And
TM Krishna: Sari, all these three songs I see in 1922. Gandhi has [00:41:00] already put it in his, in his book of budgets.
Abhinandan: So, um, you know, I don't wanna hog up all, uh, TMS time. So, and uh, Manisha, please go ahead regarding the symbols and the book. 'cause uh, in another 15 minutes we can start discussing art in general and what its role in society and politics.
Manisha: So just on Monday, Madam, which was back in news, because Moine Parliament said, and Ro cut it.
So the cutting is, is what you're saying, the first two stanzas, which he felt that. But when he writes his letters. He is saying that the Muslims are creating a problem with this and also in an accommodative spirit we can get rid of the LA later few.
Times now clip: Yes.
Manisha: But in your assessment, you think they realize that this was just a manufacturing of jina or they recognize that okay, we wanna kind of,
TM Krishna: so I think if you look at the letters exchanged at that time,
Manisha: yeah.
TM Krishna: Not just Nero, everybody else. Nero first was not very clear because he had not read on the mu. So then first he says, I don't know why this problem is happening. Then he goes and read the mu. After he read the mut, his opinion changes. [00:42:00] He actually says, now I understand why this can be, uh, irritating for Muslims.
Manisha: So in the spirit of accommodation,
TM Krishna: hundred percent. I mean it seems like, and also even at that time there were two, three things going on, just not one day maam. There was also the question of national flag that was being raised by the Muslim league is, uh, you know, what is the national, is the Congress flag going to be the national flag?
So I think it's accommodating. It's also, you know, the spirit of saying we were trying to create a new nation. We wanted to be together. We wanted the fact that, um, multiple communities can live together, can come together and therefore it is actually great understanding of the situation. Through which this decision was made.
And it, if you see the decision, they also said, let's also look for other national songs, you know, and we will consult Taggar, for example, and decide what are the other national songs. The other thing, this whole thing that one song represents the country was not there for a long time. I wanna put that in place in Congress.
Um, sessions, if you read the sessions across the country, they all say National [00:43:00] Song. Now it need not mean one song in Karnataka. It was a different song in somewhere else. It was a different song. So the idea that only one song represented the entire landscape of India was not real. There were parallel ideas happening.
There were parallel notions of nation happening. So this whole idea that Vande maam had to be truncated was not only a, I think a correct decision. I also think it's a correct decision because yes, it, the third and fourth was our problematic. And there the use of the song in Under the Mud is a, is an issue.
So it's not just accommodative, it's also a realization that we need to bring this together. And we did recognize that we need to find a way where the song retains its presence. Why? Because it had a role to play during Bengal partition. At the same time, we need to keep the country together because they were at that time really moving fast towards the notion of complete independence.
Jayashree: Mm-hmm.
Manisha: So
Jayashree: I do have a couple of [00:44:00] questions. One is, um. Which I think is, I guess is a very obvious question, is that a lot of the symbols that you're writing about are sort of appropriated in various ways, right? Like they now stand for a very masculine hyperaggressive sort of nationalism. So it's very difficult to sort of de link those ideas.
But I guess that's something that you're trying to do in the book. So I was wondering if you could just, uh, explain why you picked the five sort of main symbols in the first place, and also how do you think fundamentally you can get people to look at them in a way that was once very pure and very innocent and very standing of the country that we are in.
And so,
TM Krishna: so one, the greatest difficulty in writing this book is every morning something new happened. They feel like at one point it is like, stop. Because every morning I get up as
Manisha: in, in the news.
TM Krishna: Yeah. Something they do to one symbol. Suddenly next morning get up, suddenly there's a new capital in this new parliament that is like agro and looking at me and that those lions, I'm like, guys, will you stop because I wanna finish this damn book.
So you, that was actually a problem. [00:45:00] So. See the idea. I mean, you can ask, why did I write this book? Right. And I think I struggling with the same issues that everybody else, the, the, the tonality of today's discourse, the, the aggression, the notion that being confident and being respectful or accommodative, like you said, is somehow weakness.
And that you have to be at everybody's face and telling everybody to basically fall at off. Mm-hmm. Right? That that's the way this nation should be, you know, almost colonial in many ways. And that was really bothering me. And, um, as an artist, I see it every day also even more because things, you're not allowed to sing.
You cannot sing here, you can't do this. So I think that's how I went to these symbols. Now also, music in many ways is a symbolic art form, like any other art form. It's an, it's an impression of an idea. And I love you to pick what you want. So there is this, that emotional connection. But why these phi?
Because I think for me, these five in a way [00:46:00] cover the entire landscape of what we have tried to give ourselves in the constitution or in the basis of the ethics of coming together such a diverse set of people. And I keep saying it's actually miraculous in many ways.
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: That we are all together.
Abhinandan: Yeah,
TM Krishna: let's, I mean, it's miraculous and
Abhinandan: I think one doesn't appreciate it enough because we take it for granted.
In fact, I had one suggestion in the, that, I mean, until I read MHAs India after Gandhi. The miracle that India stayed together as a political unit. 'cause what was happening in the north, he what was happening in the South
I BUILT NL: exactly.
Abhinandan: With, you know, people starving to death for, you know, their own identity.
TM Krishna: Yeah,
Abhinandan: I, I mean for all his flaws and he had many Nero. Uh, I think the fact that he could keep in it together is, uh, is a true master stroke, which I think was beyond any other leader at the
TM Krishna: field. I completely agree. You know, exactly. You know, you, we all will critique nru for many things, but I think the, the, the problem in today's discourse, first of [00:47:00] all, bringing Heru for everything, you seems almost comical at some level.
But I'm saying I think Nru or all of them, you know, with different political backgrounds, different sociological ideas are their intentions. I think were in unquestionable. Yeah. I think that's something we are not even talking about.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
TM Krishna: You know, you may do wrong, but what's my intention is what you're looking at.
Right. Whether it's Nero, Gandhi, name it, they, all of them, or Patel or all of them. And they all like wanted to build this. This kind of a crazy place and say, can we keep this crazy place together? Together in some manner? And of course there was pull and push. So in and in imagine in, in between all that you suddenly choose these kind of symbols that sometimes even seem so farfetched.
Mm. Like why would you choose something like their shn capital? I mean, at one level I'm like, why? And then you realize that you are trying to pass on some kind of a value system in some manner. Um, and also they were reimagined. It was not like Ashoka's ideas were like, put into those capitals and dumped on your [00:48:00] head or my head?
No, they were reimagined the context. They were looking at partition, they were trying to not get caught in this Hindu, Muslim kind of a division. They realize caste is a major issue. So you have all these different reasons why you're choosing symbols. And we forget the power of symbols. Actually, the people have made us realize the power of the symbols are the right wing because they realize the power of symbols.
Mm-hmm. Even before we did, because everything they do is symbolism.
I BUILT NL: Hmm.
TM Krishna: Because they culturally kind of beautifully bring it the, it's a poison which is there in your school. It is there in an everyday you go on the street and suddenly you start seeing things and then you normalize that thing after a while.
Abhinandan: I mean, I think the RSS understood that really well. Exactly. Much, much before like their brand positioning is something that they understood before all the o Mss and pew
TM Krishna: and which is why they call themselves a cultural organization.
Abhinandan: Yeah,
TM Krishna: exactly. And that's such a smart positioning and I think that is why we need to [00:49:00] bring back these symbols.
Abhinandan: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: We need to not allow them to be appropriated and allow, allow for new imaginations of these symbols in a contemporary context. It's very essential we do that.
Abhinandan: No. Also the complexity of, you know, what our founding fathers are negotiating, whether it is writing textbooks, I mean, another example, it's not a song, but Kumar Johans Ani that I studied that in school, but the paragraph from the sin was taken off because the Syns refused to give her, you know, a safe passage or support when she came with an infant tied to her.
And of course that man today is the BJP and the minister. Uh, an arrogant as hell. Uh, but that was taken out. There was a certain heroism to her, but yet she only fought to protect her kingdom. And we call it the of independence, but everyone was. Yes. Fighting to protect themselves. Similarly, Manal pane heroic as he was.
He protested when he was asked to bite a bullet with beef. He did not [00:50:00]
TM Krishna: exactly,
Abhinandan: you know, do mutiny because he was asked to shoot at his own countryman.
TM Krishna: Exactly.
Abhinandan: So you see, it was so complex and to negotiate that quagmire to say, okay, they're heroes, they're imperfect heroes. So we will try to ignore this and highlight this.
Absolutely. With such, I don't think any country has had to negotiate this complexity in the national symbols, in the national heroes, in the icons, because we start really, you know, investigating each of them and dissecting each of our heroes and national symbols. Oh my God. It is going to lead to, you know, caste community.
Oh, everything linguistic.
TM Krishna: Absolutely. And, you know, and also, um, we, that's, that's why it's very important for us to also push back on this civilizational history nonsense we hear today. The fact is we have to keep on saying we are a modern country that came into being in 1947 and was a republic in 1950.
It's important we keep saying this, otherwise we go into this whole thing of saying 2000 years. Yeah, exactly. Which is, this is, this is, like you [00:51:00] said, everything was a, I mean, little, little pockets here and there. Why then even now, you know, I, I love to climb mountains and I sometimes, I was in Nagaland for a week and I was somewhere and I'm like thinking to myself, what, is there anything that connects me with the people here?
There's zilch, there's nothing, there's no language, there's no clothes, there is, there's no sensibility that I could say I associate with them. So what keeps both of us together? There's only one reason. The reason that we give ourselves a constitution and that we will said that we will somehow find a way to cohabit this space.
So this idea that we are, we are a modern country, is somehow taken to be almost a negative remark. Mm. We have to regain that and say, no, we are a modern work in progress country. And it's, and that's why these symbols become very important also. Right? Otherwise, like you said, we can choose all these characters for various reasons, you know, but they were all fighting for their own domains, right?
Their own identities, their own little things.
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: And there were intra intra fights happening. So [00:52:00] we just completely, you know, want to forget all that and then make this whole claim that for 2000 years we are a continuum. We are not a continuum.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Manisha: But I'm just thinking, and this thing of, uh, we are a modern nation.
Do you think like modern politics has failed the Constitution in that sense? Because irrespective of what you may think of this thinking that we are not a civilizational, whatever country, something as simple as van de maam, the right wings responses. And this happened during the partition, although we forget there was a bloody partition.
Yeah, absolutely. And people hated each other. And Hindus were genuinely very aggrieved by the fact that they got a country. We didn't, there was that popular sentiment and Gandhi ne all the, you know. Post independent leaders had this conversation every day explaining to people why it's important that we're gonna be secular.
And somewhere down the line, I think we've taken it for granted because today when it's common sense, when, you know, you see this most common in TV debates when someone says that, but why can't a country of Hindus allude to [00:53:00] their country as Barat Barta? That's our,
TM Krishna: it always seems a benign
Manisha: statement. It's a very normal, and, and that's, you know, what, what's the big deal?
Like if they can Yeah. Speak about Allah and country at the same time, why can't we? This is, so, I feel like there's no political response to this anymore. Or, or, or there's a lazy political response so that we have to keep going back to maybe what Niru wrote in his letters, which, frankly, most people today don't have the time to do or care to do.
And
TM Krishna: I think that going back there is also a sign of weakness, isn't it?
Manisha: Yeah. Because there's, because you don't have
TM Krishna: a discourse for yourself.
Manisha: Like, like I said, RS at least is constantly reinvented what they're trying to communicate.
TM Krishna: No, I, I think, I think we failed, actually. I think, let's look at this. When we got independence, we were extremely impoverished of feudal land, full of discrimination and carism everything.
Gender. Oh, I name it. Everything is happening. And
Manisha: real communal hatred.
TM Krishna: Yeah, communal hatred. I mean, it was, and then we imagine that somehow everybody will understand constitutional morality and democracy. We are not, we were not a even set [00:54:00] of democratic people. We failed in actually passing on the idea of democracy, social democracy, cultural democracy to the citizens.
I mean, why go then, even when we were in school, what did we really read about constitution or constitution making on stupid civics textbook, which was like some few pages. Un preamble, but that's about it. Right? So, but that as dry as it could get and you just mugged it up to write it. Yeah. An examination.
The fact is we entirely failed in making democracy a cult. You have to feel democracy almost culturally, like you have to feel it like they feel, you know, this idea of in their stomach. The truth is that they do feel it. Let's, yeah, let's accept it because that has been there from childhood. What have we done parallelly, you know, we can say justice eternity.
We can use all these words, equality, secularism, these some high words that most people don't know what you're talking about. But we have done nothing. It's all still in some court, Supreme Court. Uh, justice is saying something some point of time or some academic, but [00:55:00] beyond that, in everyday life. We have not done enough, which is the truth I think, for a long, long time.
And what is even crazier is even after the emergency, we didn't think there was an urgency to actually talk about these things among people in schools with, with students. I don't know how that baffles me even more, at least the emergency should have been a moment of saying, you know, this is very delicate.
You know, the balance can tilt at any moment. We still didn't. So actually what we see today in many ways is also our failure. And I think it's important to begin from there. And like you said, if you want to reimagine, if you're asked a question today, if you don't have an answer from today and you only answer from 50, 60 years ago, it means that you have not engaged as, yeah.
You heard as a citizen or as a a thinking person with those ideas. With today in context, you have to do,
Jayashree: I mean, I have, my question though would be, I mean, you're saying that when we got independence though, we were a very impoverished, [00:56:00] feudal, land divided and so on and so forth. But are we not still, uh, even more impoverished?
We are still very feudal in a lot of ways. We are even more divided. So I think the idea of the spirit of, you know, I, you talk a lot about the spirit of the constitution, which I find very romantic, but that entire ability to engage with it would only therefore come from elites, right? Because the poorer, getting poorer, the marginalized have their own issues.
So if there would be a movement or a push to sort of. Understand and engage with those sort of ideas. It would come from upper, upper middle classes, which
TM Krishna: is not true. Right? No, actually, actually, our present in many ways, our present contemporary sense is changing there. Who is actually dealing, who actually, uh, engaging with the constitution today?
It's the Dali leaders. It's the Dali communities. It is people in the margins who are actually doing far more for the constitution than the middle class. And elites the opposite actually. Yeah. Right. So you could ask, how is the common person talking about these very high ideas? Because these ideas are not high.
That's what I wanna say. You can't [00:57:00] make it high. We made it high. We made this inaccessible. So when I say that at that point in time, nothing was done. I mean, nothing was done in public discourse. In public conversation. It's actually very simple things that you could actually do on an everyday basis. So we are in a situation where today you have gait leaders, you have the minority leaders, you have, those are the people who are actually lifting the flag on many of these very essential values.
Why? Because they have no choice. That's even worse because they have no choice but to push back using these very. Um, ethical values to say, boss, this can't happen. Where is the middle class and the upper, the greatest failure in India? You know, somebody asked me, there are these protests in other countries where the middle class join in.
Mm-hmm. You do have a certain larger mass of people. It's not happening in India because class and cast is so intertwined in India and,
Abhinandan: and not just, that's
TM Krishna: why
Abhinandan: hierarchy is completely embedded. It's etched into our heads, whether it's in families, [00:58:00] whether it's in, and the most
Jayashree: baffling thing about India is that everyone loves to believe that they're part of the middle class.
You are really, you are not.
Abhinandan: Yeah, exactly. True. When you see that, no, but just from a family level to villages to, you know, so often you hear Exactly. Of course
TM Krishna: I know him here.
Abhinandan: Yeah. So, uh, you know, at every stage you're taught that. There is a hierarchy, whether it's age rated, caste, gender, family.
TM Krishna: Absolutely.
Abhinandan: You know, your social positioning. And I think that is so entrenched in us, uh, that it's very hard to kind of convince people of this modern India that we want to kinda speak about,
TM Krishna: which is where in collective action is something that is all very difficult in this country.
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: You know, so the notion of collective automatically in our brain is one of those formations you spoke about.
Either it is close family formation or it's a caste formation, or it's a gender formation, it is religious. So you can't think of a collective that in a way [00:59:00] transcends these borders and your, that is cultivated from childhood. Right from, from your home. You know,
Manisha: this is why I sometimes in Gandhi, for all his flaws, was quite a genius to have got everyone together to fight.
TM Krishna: Absolutely.
Manisha: I mean, I just think like, how did he manage this? And he did it with a series of accommodations.
TM Krishna: Oh yeah.
Manisha: And people call it weakness now.
TM Krishna: Yeah.
Manisha: And also there's criticism that, not just weakness, but there's also, he was papering over a lot of issues, but it was also very canny politics. Like
Abhinandan: So have you, I mean, ever worked in films in any capacity?
TM Krishna: No, actually
Abhinandan: no. You haven't. Would I've
TM Krishna: sung a song?
Abhinandan: Of course. Yeah. But is it something that you like to stay away from? Like No, no, no. Nothing like that.
TM Krishna: Anything interesting? Of course.
Abhinandan: Okay. No, because you know, that is one place where hierarchies, the civil services, another, uh, you know, two anecdotes I'm gonna speak about determine that.
Way. Back in the early two thousands, I run a production house. We were doing a show [01:00:00] and it was, uh. In, I think this is 2001 or 2002 with the ministry. And we had sent a proposal and uh, there was, I think the joint secretary, uh, me and my co-founder came. He looked at us like we are women. Uh, we stood around before he even acknowledged we had entered the room.
He says, yeah, but this nothing great, but your research sucks, whatever, everything else. So we kind of stood there, you know, that I wanna say like why we've been called if, if we are so terrible. And then is there any other secretary, chief secretary would like to see us? So we went and saw the chief secretary was a lady, I remember.
And she saw the fact, she says, this is brilliant. How long did it take you guys to put this project together? The guy who two minutes ago had been telling us how shit we, I was telling them this madam. I mean, I was looking at the guy, I was like, fuck. You know? So how quickly they can just move from whatever your superior says.
Yes, sir. Three bags full, sir. And the second is when I was an assistant director in Bombay. There was a, a studio, at that time, [01:01:00] it was a new sound studio called Spectral Harmony that had come up. And uh, I was there for the dubbing of a song that I was in 82. So the waiting area of that had like, what, 30, 40 years.
And, and there were four rooms inside where, so, and I, an ad's job at that time used to be a lot of waiting.
TM Krishna: Mm-hmm.
Abhinandan: So I was just sitting and reading a book because I used carry a book. 'cause out of the 10, 12 hours, you're working in a day, four, five hours, you're just waiting.
TM Krishna: Got it.
Abhinandan: So I reading, suddenly everyone showed up ta you know, ta ta ta, like, yep.
Military parade. So I looked up Amitha B had walked in to do his dubs. So, you know, on the one hand you don't wanna sit with 39 people standing the other foot and you're like 24 at the time. Like, who the fuck are you? So, you know, you kind of awkwardly also stand up, like, and then once he passes by, then everybody sits down.
Then you also sit down. Then he, again, everyone get track. So then again, you then you also, your peer pressure makes absolutely absolute. But if you're just sitting, let's not turn around and say you little shit, why the fuck are you sitting? I know. Exactly. So each time he'd [01:02:00] walk through the corridor, everyone get up and sit down.
And if you are not a star. You can miss your meal, you will No minimum, absolutely nothing matters. You know the, the light department
TM Krishna: Yeah.
Abhinandan: Used to get there three to four hours before anybody else and would pack up three to four. That means effectively they'd get like four hours of sleep. And I also wonder how come the lighting department, no one asked the light man.
Like, what the fuck? You've just been working 20 straight. Yeah. But I think in the civil services and in Bollywood, I dunno how it's in the South, you see, hierarchy will determine how you're treated in such a dramatic way. No else. Do you see it in So Star?
TM Krishna: I hear that mean from my friends in, in Tam cinema that it's still, it's there.
Mm-hmm. But it's far better than what you see in, in, uh, Bollywood. It's far better. And I, I think that's true to some extent. It's far better, but it's still there.
Abhinandan: Sure.
TM Krishna: But I, I, I know exactly what you're talking about. I've seen it in studios and there's another thing that d you, so if I go for example, to a [01:03:00] recording, the moment I go in, whether the guy no has ever heard me sing or whatever, he just knows his name.
Abhinandan: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: Everybody will get up. Everybody will get up. Okay. Now say there's an artist, a Dali artist who's super, he see maybe even older than me. Mm-hmm. He enters the same studio. Nobody will get up. I've seen both up. Hmm. Exactly. Yeah. And it's just, and I'm not even saying anybody's wantingly, like saying, oh, I will know.
It's just,
Abhinandan: it's a condition.
TM Krishna: Refl, it's a condition. You just do it. You
Abhinandan: just, you just started doing it.
TM Krishna: The same thing will happen to women too. Mm-hmm. The same thing will happen to women too. Identical. It's just like something you are from childhood, you just do it.
Abhinandan: Mm.
Jayashree: Yeah. I feel like everything is so comparative.
I mean like catalyst cinema and so on and so forth is way ahead of most of the states in a lot of ways. And I do think that in Catalyst Society also, class differences aren't as stock in terms of how people treat each other. But, but then you throw in gender and then you throw in a whole bunch [01:04:00] of other issues.
And it is as,
TM Krishna: and
Jayashree: I backward,
TM Krishna: I think cast is also very, very strong ly it's just like Absolutely. Yeah. So complicated, layered that nobody knows what's going on.
Jayashree: Exactly. And then at a glance you think that this works better than it might work in, I don't know, pull out another state from a heartland or whatever.
But fundamentally there are always going to be those distinctions.
Abhinandan: So, so, uh, we have 20 minutes, 'cause I know you have a book launch today. Yep. Straight from here. So we, you shouldn't be late like most stars. Thank you. So we, so we have 20 minutes Gehi. Uh, would you just wanna quickly tell us what happened to the Kala Hora and with the na sha bit where we will play the clip and then we'll just get on the discussion of art as a form of social commentary or political
Jayashree: commentary.
Yes. At the Kago Art Festival they were having, uh, which took place in Bombay. So, um, a was scheduled to appear in a panel along with Reish Fernandez and a journalist called, and a writer called Nita, um, I think her name called Huka.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Jayashree: So, yeah, so it was to be [01:05:00] moderated by ish Fernandez. It was supposed to happen this week at 8:00 PM Then, uh, suddenly the night before, I think they received a bunch of messages from the organizers saying that it's been, uh, canceled.
You need to take down any social media posts that you might have put up over it. So apparently the police had granted permission for the festival, but had not screened individual guests at individual panels. So they saw the banner advertising Arnold's, um, session. They got in touch with the organizers of the event.
They said that we do not want this to take place. The organizers agreed, took down everything, didn't really put out a statement explaining why, and uh, they sent an email saying that they've canceled it on request of the police. Sonita who is on the panel has written a very long, very, I think, important piece, which I will also put into my recommendations where she just says, this entire capital ation to say yes.
Yeah, we can't hold This event is incredibly distressing. Also, there was a lot of social media trolling just ahead. Hmm. Sonita has [01:06:00] alleged that it also probably stemmed from social media posts from. Rightwing veterans like Ali who said that it is astonishing that aans be allowed out to speak when he's out on bail.
So that is perhaps how the police got involved. So that was in Bombay. Uh, then additionally, I think he wrote an essay in the Indian Express where he said he was invited to a Mumbai University for an event.
Abhinandan: Mm-hmm.
Jayashree: Without being informed why it was organized by the, the department. He wasn't given a reason, but he was disinvited at the last minute.
The university then told the audience that he had pulled out, which he said is blatantly untrue.
Abhinandan: Yeah, exactly. That, that they gave the wrong, so she is so
Jayashree: yeah.
Abhinandan: Art as political or social commentary? Um, I mean, you can tell us about music. You know what, for example, the MA was such a beautiful rendition. It was, I think Rag was Arag dish.
Right? I there was a need for it or that, and that, that cartoon, this thing, uh, I
TM Krishna: almost forgot that one [01:07:00] actually.
Abhinandan: Yeah, that was, that was so, uh,
TM Krishna: I know
Abhinandan: annoyingly addictive. I
TM Krishna: know.
Abhinandan: But, uh, tell us when music has kind of. Told us what the world was at the time or the ur, I dunno how I pronounce it. My art con, you guys, that Picasso gu, we
TM Krishna: allow it.
Abhinandan: That is, I think a commentary on it was a scene out of this bombing of the World War ii.
TM Krishna: Yeah. It's, it's, it's a town that was bombed and it's from that anyway, go.
Abhinandan: Yeah. So, you know, when you see that, and if you are art, I literate like me, then you have to read what it's about. Then you start identify, okay, that's what this is about.
When does music do that? When does Art do that? And do you feel, and this is something we've discussed in other podcasts, that over the last seven or eight years and Jerry Shin who's been laid off, uh, from Washington Post hadn't those two investigative piece in the WA Washington Post, that O tt mm-hmm.
Will only commission stuff that is ideologically compatible with the [01:08:00] current, like there is a a hundred years of RSSA film being released. Every film that's been released of any significance budget in the last few years has been consistent with the political ideology of the time. What's the role of art?
Is protest an important part or an important trigger for an artist? And what has music's role been and did you see that? This is the clip of Nain sha being harassed. I, by this, I feel bad for this kid, uh, because this is what he's learning where he is. 'cause he clearly doesn't have the agency of deciding what good or bad journalism is.
Uh, but this is what he did.
Times now clip: Just clarification needed from you. Sir. I do not want to talk about this issue. So please don't harass me. No, I'm not harassing you. Just asking that. Please go. I'm trying to just ask you question. What exactly meant, uh, you know, when, uh, when you stated that you, you were dis disinvited from the university for you?
I don't want to talk about it. So why are you pushing the mic, sir? Because you are shoving it into my face. I'm not, I'm [01:09:00] just asking. I'm not answering. You asking what is there in there? Why, why are you getting angry, sir? I'm just back. 'cause you're bothering me. I'm noting I'm not understand You take that away.
Will you take that outta my face? No, I'm just trying to ask a question. You shut it outta my face. What's the problem in answering the simple question, sir. Want answer? Why can't you take a go for an answer? People, what kind of a person are you? If I'm that I've just come from a journey and I've said to you politely, I don't want to talk about this issue.
Why you post persisting? Why you harassing me, sir? I'm not harassing you, you're
harassing
Times now clip: me. Question.
TM Krishna: So one, uh, I'm not least surprised by these things because I have been. All also faced the same thing. My previous book launch was canceled day before.
Times now clip: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: Because they said the law book would cause social disharmony.
There's a book about Dali makers, this was in 2020.
All: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: I've had concerts canceled in Delhi because of the same troll, legendary [01:10:00] army.
All: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: So this doesn't surprise me now to the role of art. I think we romanticize the role of art a bit too much. Art by itself is nothing. It's the artist who's everything.
So art is like, art can transcend all board borders. You know, we hear all these things. It's ultimately got to do with what the artist wants to do. Art is a craft. It's a craft craft of being able to change something, create abstract imagery from something, and evoke emotion. This is what it does at a very fundamental level.
The mode can be tuned, can be formed, can be movement, can be color, can be anything. Now it depends on what the artist wants to do out of it, because the artist is in a way. Changing the way you think, rewiring your emotive spectrum at that point of time. So both can happen with art. It can be art that is manipulative and that wants you to be violent, that wants you to hate, but wants you to kill.[01:11:00]
It can be art that gives you further nuance and gives you different ways of looking at something, or maybe even reflect about yourself or protest. So, you know the fact, I think often we think art can just change the world. No, art can't change the world. So if you have a social environment, which is an environment of othering, fundamentally, then art is going to other, because the people who are majoritarian, who have power at that point of time are going to push the, at the same time.
If you look at history and art, the communities that have always made protest art, mm-hmm. Or art that challenges norms are those who have been the margins across the globe. Whether it's African American community, it's community, whether it's the minority community, depending on the country. They're the ones because they have no, the choice.
You're not always listen to their voice. You don't give them space in mainstream. So they are the ones who, who are always actually making art that challenges the norm. Now, ideally, art should be not. Art [01:12:00] is not something pretty. Art is not something beautiful. The whole notion that has to be something, you know, painting that looks nice or has the right colors, no art, in my opinion, has to take you out of your comfort zone.
As to in fact realign what you think is normal. No, that is my ideal of art. So it may not be something comfortable, it may not be something you find pleasurable. That's fine. But how often does that happen? So it goes back to saying what are we teaching our children? What are we teaching our, our society?
If you going to pass on what you see today, which is why we should be worried about the cinema that's being made. Because it's not just about today. If this is going to go on and on, say for a generation, and if this is what they're going to see constantly without enough pushback, then you are going to create an environment where this becomes the way art, this bravado, this chest beating this 56 inch or a hundred inch, or I dunno how many inches I know.
And you know, and making sure your neighbors are some evil demons who are just filled with people over there. [01:13:00] If this is what you're going to constantly do, this is what is going to happen. Which is why we should be concerned. So we have to be very careful with art. We be very, very careful. It's, and it's, it's, it can do, do it like that.
Mm-hmm. Even before the individual knows it's happening. You know, color associations just think of that, you know, now you've associated certain colors with certain political ideolog ideologies.
Abhinandan: Yeah. And they, you've let them own it.
TM Krishna: Exactly. Just think of that. Right. Even though the moment I see Saffrin today.
And I mean, my brain is wired to only think one way. Right?
Abhinandan: Yeah.
TM Krishna: How has that happened? It's happened very systematically. It's happened over the last 20 years, and now it's almost game over for a color. Imagine, or for example, if people see green, a specific green, you know, from childhood, for example, I remember that green was not a color that Akka community ever liked.
They'll say in Tam, they'll say Muslim, uh, Muslim or it the Muslim green. You know that it's almost, it's a tag.
Abhinandan: Or even [01:14:00] Czechs, even now. Yeah. There are certain temples in Tamal which says that in the Czech luge is not allowed inside, which, oh,
TM Krishna: I'm, I'm a, I'm a person when with who's had manys with Aung, by the way, why is
Abhinandan: Muslim, why the Muslims are the Czech, the,
TM Krishna: by the way, any lgi?
So I, yeah.
Jayashree: Any, any LGI is looked at as being not braman,
TM Krishna: therefore not to concert. So I have been like trolled like hell for it because I wear a lgi. I, I won long to concerts. I'm saying, how can you wear a lgi? But what's the problem with luge? It's the same piece of cloth. It's just tied all sides in.
That's all right. No, because it's Muslim. So look at all these things that we've done, right? So it's very dangerous. It's a very dangerous game and it's, it'll just, just pass on and it'll be, it'll seem like, like little tea shop comments that are being said. No. They get established very fast. So
Abhinandan: in fact, what we started the decision, uh, this discussion with of the two symbols, they were art, the poetry.
Yes, absolutely. They're both poetry and they're both, and they're [01:15:00] both are commentaries of different ideologies, different way of seeing the country. So at the same time, different things may exist. The, you know, like you said, the majority will have their narrative push out. In fact, and that's a very lethal combination, art and politics and Korea has done very successfully, albeit not for within their borders, but there's this fantastic series of articles and uh, it's a economics podcast that has explained how the Korean government realized the power of pop culture.
Hmm. And the entire K-pop phenomenon was not like suddenly everyone said, the government actively subsidized, pushed, supported K-pop outside that if thriller can be a phenomenon here, why can't our K-pop? And they actually push that and with great success. So it's a very lethal combination.
TM Krishna: Absolutely. And the fact is that all art is political.
There's no art. That is not this whole idea, art for art's sakes is just bunkum bullshit. There is no art for art's sake. [01:16:00] All art is political. The more you know, especially in traditional art forms, you, you'll have people saying, no, no, I just learned this song. It's come for 200 years. I just sing. No, what you don't sing tells you.
Why you don't sing it? Where do you sing? What about the place of concerts? Why do certain performances happen in certain locations? Certain performances only happen on the street. These are, so, every art form is political. Every song is political. So this acceptance, we often do this, especially the middle class and the upper middle class, especially the upper cast people will say, no, no, our art forms are all divine.
It's all for somebody else. We are not, we are not associated with the everyday dirtiness of thing. You know, it's like, like similar to what they say about politics, right? You'll hear this middle class political thing, you know, we are not political. We don't talk the same thing. Right? So it's, it's in fact that's even more dangerous because you'll be utterly political.
Abhinandan: Yeah,
TM Krishna: you'll be,
Abhinandan: and you claim not
TM Krishna: to be, and you claim not to be political. That's even more dangerous. Right. At least those who are political and telling it, [01:17:00] telling you on your face, you can, you can spot it and you can counter it and you can, you can push through. This is even more dangerous and this happens every day.
Abhinandan: How difficult has it been for you to pursue your art form with all its commentary, all the context? You mentioned that there are a bunch of places where your book, you know, launch was canceled or your concerts, you have problems facing, but you're still visible. We still see you, we still hear you sing. Is it because you are based in the south?
You think that you still have a significant presence? As opposed to here, because I know when we were trying to screen a Rh Komar documentary mm-hmm. Most auditoriums in Delhi refused Yeah. To give us permission to screen it. Uh, so it's a serious problem. Is it that dire where you are?
TM Krishna: So I can't deny the fact that being in the Nadu definitely is helpful.
Mm-hmm. Without doubt that it gives you a certain degree of, uh, shield from this. [01:18:00] There are other issues that other artists will still find. If, if you, for example, push back on, say, the government in du I'm, and that, that problem will also set. Yeah. So let's not make this all Sure. Like totally hunky dory.
Yeah. Yeah. But the fact is, as far as, especially the communal agenda is concerned specifically, definitely the Nadu is a place where you feel okay, there is, there are enough people who will, who will, you know, cover your back. Definitely. That's one thing. But other very honest answer is, it's my cast and class and gender location that plays a huge role in me being able to survive.
You can't deny that. Mm-hmm. And the visibility helps you. It's like, I, you know, there are pushbacks, there are moments where you are concerned, but it stops there. Right. So it's a combination of my location. My physical location and also my social location. This is what allows me to still kind of find my way, minimal my way.
You know, go, go past all those months of [01:19:00] craziness and the cycle stops, and then you move on and then another cycle begins. So it's, it's, you get, that's how you play the game. But this is not true of say, so many other artists I know mm-hmm. Who don't have this kind of a support system who have sometimes given up and say, I don't wanna do this anymore, or I wanna take care of my family.
And it's just mental. It's not just like somebody's going to hit you. Right. Sure. It's, it's, it's, and I know it, I personally in know how tiring it can be. Yeah. It can be exhausting. It can be really exhausting. So, and the worst place to be, I've realized, is when you are going, especially states,
Abhinandan: Hmm.
TM Krishna: I mean, I had concerts canceled in the states.
I've had police being, yeah. I have had police actually having to surround an entire auditorium or performance arena because there was threats of some protest.
Abhinandan: Like, what?
TM Krishna: So, because I am anti-Indian, I'm anti Hindu, and I'm an urban axel and whatever, you know?
Abhinandan: Mm-hmm.
TM Krishna: So because of that, um, a temple in, in the US canceled my [01:20:00] concert because there were threats of a procession.
To come I anti-Christian protest nonsense.
Jayashree: Can you, can you tell us which state in the US it was?
TM Krishna: That was in Washington and,
Jayashree: and the group is what?
TM Krishna: Some affiliates of the right thing? There are tons of them. Mm. I've had concerts accepted and then I removed once what happened? I had a concert, I had shot tour, and I wrote this piece after, um, the consecration, uh, about the, uh, temple.
The concert was canceled on the basis of the piece I wrote in the, I think it was the Indian Express. And they said, no, we can't have this guy because he's anti Hindu. So stuff like this. Right. And now in Toronto, uh, I went to the concert and there were cops and it was a rotunda, the university out of all people.
And there was, there were cops there. I said, what's going on? I said, no, there may be a protest, but you know, if they come and shout, we'll have to stop. And they'll let them shout and they go. I said, fine. Nobody came. But I'm saying this, this happened there too. And they, in fact, you feel even more vulnerable actually.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
TM Krishna: [01:21:00] In some ways back
Abhinandan: home. It's
TM Krishna: familiar. Exactly. Right. So you feel even more vulnerable here. At least, you know, you feel that you can like wangle something Right. You know, could show you can do so. And there also the, the, a lot of the powerful voices are very homogeneous socially. Its a, if you look at who migrated, Hmm.
It is a middle, upper cast kind of migration. And they still hold a large voice, whether it's the university system, whether it is the doctors in the US or those who have made their millions. It's the same group of people. Right. Right. From. Different parts of India. So it's, there's a, it's a very, very different and we are, I think we are ignoring that a lot and I, because a lot of money by the way, is coming from
Abhinandan: there.
Manisha: Coming from there. And they leverage the minority status there also. So how white people also confused that, okay, the brown people are upset what to do and they dunno the past,
Abhinandan: it's, yeah, it's complicated. It's
Manisha: quite
Abhinandan: So, um, thank you TM for coming. Really appreciate it took out an hour for us. But before you go, we have a tradition of a Hafta guest [01:22:00] gives us and our audience some recommendations that could enrich their lives.
So since you're an artist, I'm hoping you'll suggest some good music that we should expose ourself to. My don't feel pressured. If it's Punjabi pop, you can do that as well. If it's this book, that's fine as well. Uh, but, uh, just any recommendation or recommendations that you think would be valuable way to spend our time?
TM Krishna: Well, I actually didn't come prepared thinking of any songs specifically. Um, well, I think I would recommend a lot of the Tamil Malayalam, uh, rap artists. Mm-hmm. Many of them around. Um, I think a lot of them have to be listened to. So my recommendation for everybody. Are the wild, wild women from Mumbai.
Abhinandan: Oh, okay.
TM Krishna: They are, they're fabulous hip hop rap group. And um, in fact, I curate a festival in Delhi and we had them.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
TM Krishna: They make incredible music. They are [01:23:00] very, they're Tamil, they're ti they multiple languages and very important music and my recommendation will be the Wild, wild World.
Abhinandan: That's good. Something new that we've launched.
Uh, but thank you so much for coming. Have a good book launch. We hope. See today Delhi a QI is I think cleared up a bit in your honor.
TM Krishna: So you can now just see. And now tell me the number. You've got that level expertise.
Abhinandan: Yeah, now we are, we're pro right now we're at about one 40 I think. Okay.
Alright, thanks.
TM Krishna: Thank you very much.
Abhinandan: Right now, once again I'm gonna plug, I built NL because it's her birthday. Here's another clip.
I BUILT NL: I'm a band. I wake up to smell the coffee. I built news, laundry. I'm deri. I believe in the power of conversations. I built news, laundry. I am mjo. Frankly, it took a whole village to build news, laundry, but I like to think I'm the one who wandered in, [01:24:00] hung a few satirical paintings and became the interior decorator of descent.
I didn't lay the foundation, but I definitely helped decorate the place. I helped. Build news, laundry.
TM Krishna: I built news, laundry. I built news laundry.
Madhu Trehan: I built news laundry.
Ajai Shukla: I built news laundry.
TM Krishna: I built
Ajai Shukla: news laundry.
TM Krishna: I
Abhinandan: do send your clip of you built news, laundry to podcasts@newsland.com at repeat. Here's a text podcast@newsroom.com. And now before we get Colonel Klein, Jesse, how does our audience get a signed copy of this book?
Jayashree: So if you want a book that covers everything that Krishna talked about and a lot more, all you [01:25:00] have to do is gift one and joint N-L-T-N-M subscription to a friend, a family member, or somebody you hate.
It's totally fine. You don't discriminate or buy one yourself. If you don't have one yet, though, I do hope you do. So yes, gift a subscription or buy one for yourself. Send us an email at podcasts@newslaundry.com. We will automatically enter you into a lucky draw where you could win a free copy of this book signed by TM Krishna with a special message inside from AB London as well.
So,
Abhinandan: great. Now people,
Jayashree: what a steal deal. Do it.
Abhinandan: Many people are planning to go for that have just said, fuck it, I don't want this anymore.
Jayashree: No, no, no, no. You need to, you need to get the book to see what he said.
Abhinandan: So I promise you I will not spoil your book by signing it. It'll only be signature, uh, but do you know, participate in this?
And importantly, do send in your messages. We really want to hear what you have to say. Yes, we want to show the world. It is not just the team that sits in our offices that built news, laundry. All of [01:26:00] you built news, laundry, and I genuinely mean it.
Manisha: It's a movement of which you're apart. So please tell us how you've been apart.
Abhinandan: Yes. With that, we can move on to our next discussion as we are joined by our next guest, Colonel Aja Shukla. Thank you Aja, for joining us.
Ajai Shukla: Always a pleasure.
Abhinandan: Uh, I'll just give you all. Formal introduction. Colonel Aja Shukla is a prominent Indian defense analyst. He's been a journalist, he's former army officer.
His expertise in is in South Asian security, military technology and defense economics. Colonel Shukla writes for the diplomat previously. He has been part of Business Standard also as a writer in his past avatar, and you manage the blog Broad Sword, which provides analysis of India Strategic Affairs.
The link to broad sort is in the show notes below, so you can check that out. Uh, so Aje, I'm sure you know what's happening with the Caravan article that, uh, Rahul GHI wanted to [01:27:00] quote, well, not the article. He wanted to read an excerpt from the book,
Manisha: which is in the article,
Abhinandan: which is in the article. So General Nirvana's book.
Has certain bits apparently, which also now have been made into a little AI related animation, which I saw of what was happening on the phone call. Uh, I dunno if you guys have seen that, which he was stopped from reading. Uh, under some rule. This book has been with the Ministry of Defense for two years now.
One, what are the new rules, AJE, that if someone from the Army or I think from any government, any government employees writes a book or even an article, does that apply to you as well as a writer of columns? What is the rule? Uh,
Ajai Shukla: to, to sort of, uh, put it very, uh, sort of, uh, succinctly? Uh, all people who are in sensitive government positions, uh, and that includes being a part of the [01:28:00] military, uh, are required to sign the Official Secrets Act.
And they are then for the rest of their lives, bound by the Official Secrets Act in accordance with the decree, with the sort of, uh, document that they signed at the time of joining. Uh, this is renewed the signature, uh, every year and, uh, it is assumed that, uh, it is also a degree of common sense and good, uh, judgment that goes in, uh, to the handling of sensitive, uh, information.
So that is the position, uh, general, uh, when he wrote, uh, the book and sort of sent it for publishing of, for clearance, uh, it was assumed, uh, and will continue to be assumed that he is, uh, aware of being bound by the Official Secrets Act, uh, and, uh, will act in accordance with that.
Abhinandan: So he was, um, chief of staff from December 21 to April [01:29:00]
Jayashree: 22nd, 2019, I think, to 2022,
Abhinandan: as he was chairman of the Chief of Staff Committee from 2122.
Yes, as Dan corrected, he was Chief of Army staff from 19 9, 20 19 to 22 because I think that position was created a little later, the earlier one. And he was vice chief of staff from 2019, uh, September. Now when you say if you've held a sensitive position, you are bound by that act is sensitive, defined, does that apply to every Army officer?
Does it also apply to some of these, uh, you know, former, I, I mean I don't even know if they're former or officers or not, who sit on Prime time saying some rather bizarre things, uh, is can they pick and choose who it applies to? Can the government pick and choose it?
Ajai Shukla: Oh, yeah. Bizarre is good provided it does not offend the government.
Uh, it is, uh, it is, uh, sort of assumed, uh, to answer your question directly, that when I sit on your show just now as I'm [01:30:00] doing, uh, I will be aware of being bound by the Official Secrets Act and I will, uh, be able to, uh, divulge some things that I, that I, that, uh, I say, uh, I will be able to be in line with, uh, uh, you know, with the Official Secrets Act.
But there are some things that I will not go into, uh, as a consequence of, uh, my subjection to the act.
Abhinandan: But why is that logic not extend to books?
Ajai Shukla: Uh, the logic extends to books as well. So then what, what would've had to get this book cleared? And the reason why we are sitting and having this discussion is because the ministry did not clear the book.
Abhinandan: No. Uh, what I'm saying is why doesn't extend the books as in you don't have to get cleared or anyone doesn't have to get cleared. This is what I'm gonna say on this show. The assumption is that you will abide by that act. Why can't the same not apply to a book? That the assumption is that the written word has a different rule from the spoken word?
Ajai Shukla: No. Uh, the, the, let me, let me [01:31:00] make it very clear, uh, the, uh, uh, book that is written by any person of the armed forces,
I BUILT NL: yes. To,
Ajai Shukla: uh, in which there is the possibility of, uh, any kind of, uh, uh, secret or, uh, confidential information being divulged has to get clearance before he writes the book. If I am to write a book tomorrow mm-hmm.
I will have to get it cleared from the military. Uh, unless, uh, unless the military is very short, that, uh, you know, and there are, there are such people who, uh, enjoy the confidence of the military, uh, who, uh, sort of, uh, who will always get their books cleared. But, uh, in the case of a, of a serving chief or a retired chief, uh, the, uh, the, the sort of, uh, the, the parameters that will apply will naturally be more stringent and more sort of, uh, uh, the more [01:32:00] sort of, uh, rigid because this will then have come from the, from the sort of, uh, source of a serving army chief and therefore.
Uh, is is sort of bound by much more strict rules.
Abhinandan: I see. So what happened in Parliament, just Manisha, and what did it lead
Manisha: to? So in fact, I'm really curious to know from Ajay what his various army WhatsApp groups that he's part of, how are they buzzing? Because, okay. The central thing is that, uh, what the controversy is around that the Army chief was faced with the situation that China was coming with its tanks.
He wanted a very clear direction from the PMO, which came a little late, which said that, do whatever you want. And I'm keen to, so the allegation of the opposition is that you left the army without, you know, instructions, support any clear instructions, and you threw a hot potato situation on them. So I wanna know from AJ one, uh, again, like, like I said, like a lot of people in the Army, veterans would [01:33:00] be discussing what they would do if they were in the Army chief's situation.
And I have two questions on that One. Like, for something like this, a situation like this, do you really need the Prime Minister's approval? Because you are not going into enemy territory, you're not doing an operations Hindu, you're defending yourself. Uh, thanks are coming at you. You defend yourself. What is the protocol?
Because there would be commanders, uh, you know, on the field there to take that decision that, okay, we have to defend ourselves. So this accusation of the opposition that the PMO had to say something, how operationally, if you could evaluate it and. For the Prime Minister to say, do what you think is right.
Is it really that bad? Because that's basically it. It doesn't mean that they're gonna blame the army the next day if something goes wrong. But it says that, okay, you're on the field, you are the right person to take decisions there. We'll go with what you decide.
Ajai Shukla: Well, it's, uh, uh, it's like this for people who are there on the front lines, on the [01:34:00] ground, at the cutting edge of the country's defense.
Uh, you have to force leave, uh, certain things to the application of good old common sense. Uh, if tanks are coming at you from the enemy, uh, uh, or for that matter, any other kind of offensive action is being taken by the enemy against your troops on the front line. Uh, you'll, as a senior commander, I'm sure, especially when it comes to the question of dealing with China, you will want clear directions from the government, uh, before you set off a war with China.
So to that extent, uh, the, the Army Chief General, after having been informed by his commanders up the line, that this is what is happening. There are Chinese tanks advancing, will naturally, uh, approach the government. Uh, but at the same time, the people on the ground who are sort of, [01:35:00] uh, facing the brunt of what is happening are not expected to just sit there and wait for orders.
There is going to be a clear sort of, uh, understanding amongst my, if I'm a commander on the ground, whether a battalion commander or a brigade commander or higher, uh, I am going to be clear that my troops are not going to sit there and, uh, allow Chinese strengths to run over them. Mm. They will take action and, uh, while the, uh, the government is taking, uh, its decision and, uh, uh, and sort of arriving at a, a clear set of directions for its soldiers on the ground, uh, the soldiers on the ground will also be fighting back at that stage and, uh, dealing with whatever threat is being.
Uh, aid.
Manisha: If you could comment on the, the political controversy around it, which is the Prime Minister saying, Joe, do you think it's that?
Abhinandan: Is it a controversial, is it a controversial instruction?
Ajai Shukla: Uh, [01:36:00] this is, uh, uh, an instruction that, uh, wreaks of abdication of responsibility. The government cannot give directions in a, in a, in a manner as cavalier as you are not going to set off a war, a shooting war with the second biggest power in the world, uh, just on the basis of what the, uh, the army chief might feel like doing that, that moment or not.
Song: Mm-hmm.
Ajai Shukla: Uh, so I, I think that, uh. Uh, while, uh, general cannot take shelter behind, uh, the, the sort of instruction that, uh, you know, the chief said, uh, or the, the government said, Jo Ro, uh, at the same time, the government cannot, uh, hide behind the, the, the blanket that we give him a free hand. You don't give [01:37:00] free hands.
Governments in, uh, democracies exercise tight control over their militaries, both in the matter of, uh, peace time activities as well as what they are required to do in war Wars are fought in tightly circumscribed environments where the military is not allowed to go beyond the remit. And, uh, uh, consequently the government is not allowed to or is not, uh, uh, one that would allow it to, uh, allow itself to be sort of bulldozed into a certain line of action, which may not be to the national interest of all.
Abhinandan: And there's always a level of escalation that, scenario, A, do this scenario B, do this scenario C do I mean that entire, you know, there is a prescribed level of escalation, which is a political decision. I mean,
Manisha: and I'm guess you guessing you go with option A, B, C, then the government
says,
Abhinandan: okay, no B. Exactly.
No CI mean, I think that kind of complexity of thinking, I don't know if the top man, uh, in a government [01:38:00] has
Manisha: certainly flies in the face of claims that it is Modi's chap and shahi that scared China away. Like
Abhinandan: Yeah,
Manisha: exactly. The central thing is that there's a lot of fear around you tackling China.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Not just that chap, like I just said, I just find bizarre that such an instruction is, is what is given in something that could have enormous implications, especially considering our history with China. Uh, but
Ajai Shukla: this is, uh, this is, this is the biggest and most consequential decision that any government anywhere takes, whether to take its country into war or not.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
Ajai Shukla: Uh, and to suggest for even a moment that a government can leave entirely to the, uh, sort of, uh, conclusion of a, of a government. Is, uh, sort of completely bizarre. I have not read the book. I have to start by telling you that.
Song: Hmm.
Ajai Shukla: But I can tell you this, that any, uh, sort of, [01:39:00] uh, chief who approaches his government and says, we are going to war with China, uh, because they are Chinese tanks rolling up to our defenses, and the government says it is what I would call an application of responsibility.
Abhinandan: Right. So, Shu you wanna comment on there before we fire next few questions to Aja?
Jayashree: Yeah. I'll just briefly talk about what happened in Parliament, because that's the thing that I saw play out. So the context was that I think the HSV Syria said something about the Congress not being a patriotic party or questioning the patriotism, whatever.
So during that motion of thanks, Rahul GHI said, well, I wasn't gonna bring this up, but now I will. And then he tried to read out the article. He read out, I think one sentence, and then everybody started screaming and heckling. And one woman like jumped to her feet and she raced outta the lobar and protest.
It was just unreal sort of scenarios. And so they're saying that he's broken some rules of code of conduct, but that is a very debatable sort of point. But I think for me, just the idea that [01:40:00] in what world can you say that Parliament is not allowed to debate what is published in a newspaper or a news magazine?
I mean, before it was discussed, the radio tapes were discussed. You can't just pick and choose and say, now you can't discuss this. The only grounds, I guess, to not permit it would be if he or caravan said the cortex was incorrect, but they didn't. And you can't disallow. A person who's speaking altogether, surely.
And I just think and said, I'm very pleased with this phrase I have coined, which is, I think this is like, I think this government is like a vampire of democracy. This instinct for secrecy above all else is so strong. As Isha said, yes, this story paints the government in a poor light. But at the end of the day, we are.
So, this instinct for secrecy is too strong. Like sunlight is supposed to be the best disinfectant. You're supposed to let things be open, you're supposed to let things be transparent, allow them to come into the light. But here we're doing exactly the opposite. We don't know whether Jet was shot down or not shot down.
We're still debating on it. Donald Trump has said 90 times that he intervened, but the Indian government has said no, he hasn't intervened. I think also the support base runs on the fantasy that, [01:41:00] um, it support runs on a fantasy that is constantly being constructed and reinforced, and that fantasy is being fed and supported at every turn to the extent where the amount of knowledge that we the public have on things that have publicly taken place is so far below minimum that I think it's surprising.
I think the PSLV, uh, failed. The report was filed with A PMO, it was never made public. But why? These are basic things that are done. As a matter of course, if a scientific mission goes wrong, publicizing the reason is a healthy, transparent thing to do in a democracy. So I think here, the fact that Raul GHI was reading out of this memoir that is yet unpublished, and yes, that falls under the remit of being extremely sort of sensitive information and yet.
Even if, if it had been very trivial, I still feel like we see the same sort of reaction because we, the public just are not supposed to know things that happened. So yeah,
Abhinandan: Danisha,
Manisha: no, and I think the [01:42:00] one way where, where, and Aja can, has kind of touched on it, but how they've defended all of this is that, what else could you ask for?
But a government that gives the army a free hand, this is the dream. They're not constrained like earlier they were, you know, now they can just, so, and they've spun it around to say that we're, you know, we're supporting them in such a big way that previous governments didn't. But I think, yeah, I mean certainly even if the book is not in publishing, the fact that Raul Gandhi was not allowed to read an article is ridiculous and none of the justifications add up.
None of them. Yeah, because the next thing went on to say such crap NE's affairs, you know, like he, he brought his own Gandhi's affairs. Like suddenly you are talking about way personal lives. But here this is a national security, uh, issue. It's a political issue that you're, oh, suddenly you can't talk about it because it's not allowed.
Abhinandan: And the speaker saying that the Prime Minister will not attend because he has credible information that there will be some attack on him. Also, the,
Jayashree: the caravan story very clearly does indicate that at no [01:43:00] point does the former army chief criticize Nere Modi, his memoir. They said, on the contrary, they said a memoir is full of praise often for very minor gestures.
So, but we are just not allowed to read it
Abhinandan: now.
Ajai Shukla: I would, I would, I would, uh, inject a note of, uh, sort of, uh, caution here. Uh, I would say that there are certain issues that are secret, uh, in matters relating to defense. And there are certain things that can be and must be debated because they are in the national interest.
So, uh, in between these two, uh, sort of, uh, circumscribing, uh, factors, there is a very large battleground that, uh, is a, uh, that should be debated and should be used for the government and the opposition [01:44:00] to both decide, argue, debate, uh, and do it publicly, uh, in order to arrive at the best way of conducting your national defense.
Uh, I think that, uh, first of all, uh, the, the, uh, the, uh, the Army chiefs, and I'm going to choose my words very carefully over here, uh, over the years, have trivialized this, uh, subject. Uh, it's began with General Ban in 2004, who wrote a book called Writing on the Wall, India something in which India Teaches America Lesson and so on.
Hmm. Uh, it, it went on to, uh, uh, uh, writing another book called Cantonment Conspiracies In 2025. Uh, there was, uh, general Sing who wrote a book basically praising himself because, uh, there are [01:45:00] not many who would do that, do that job for him. Uh, and, uh, there was, there is also one very, very good book that was written.
Mm-hmm. Which, uh, is an example of how, uh, you can sort of, uh, deal with all these factors in one book. That is the book on Cargill, which was written by a general, uh, victory Malik. Mm. So the fact of the matter is that you, you, you can't have chiefs, uh, occupying positions of real gravitas and writing detective novels called Con containment.
Conspiracies. It sort of doesn't gel together. Uh, so I would say that, uh, you know, uh, the, the, the sort of chief, uh, who accepts an order from the government like. Is, uh, sort of, there is certainly a, a large lapse in both the conduct of the government as well as what the chief is willing to [01:46:00] accept.
Abhinandan: Uh, so with that, thanks so much, Aja, for joining us.
Um, can you give us a recommendation that could enrich the lives of our listeners of viewers? Something you've read, watched, or heard that is worth their time?
Ajai Shukla: Uh, I would, I have already given the, the punchline a way. Uh, I would recommend everybody reads this book, uh, Cargill from Surprise to Victory written by one of our most sober and well spoken and well judged army chiefs that we've had in recent times.
General VP Malik. Uh, it deals with, uh, a lot of the stuff that we are talking about in this show, which is the relationship between the government and the, the, uh, military and the, the sort of the relation, uh, the way that this navigates difficult problems like civil military relations. I would say give general, uh, Malik Bo read, you'll, you'll enjoy it as [01:47:00] well.
Abhinandan: Thank you so much, Aja. Always a pleasure having you. Have a good weekend.
Ajai Shukla: Pleasure being here.
Abhinandan: Bye-bye. Okay, so with that, uh, should we get into the emails? We only entertain the critique, criticism, feedback, and suggestions of subscribers. So you can mail us@podcastatnewsroom.com. You can please write HTA in the title, or you can click on the link in the show notes below a little formal popup.
You can give your feedback there. Please keep it below one 50 words so we can include as many of your feedback as possible. Right. This week's emails have been, uh, curated by Jeri. So Jeri, please do the honors.
Jayashree: Yes. So the first email is from s who says regarding the previous hta. I agree with Aand on the format of I agree interviews.
It can, although only further, fra further the fragments of our society into fishers. As I've seen in the US from my lived experience, the anti-intellectual sentiment will only grow stronger. Frankly, I was quite shocked to learn that guests are not informed about the f-for satirical undertone. So the references that a said he feels, I agree, could be a little [01:48:00] cruel because like it's in bad
Manisha: faith.
He, he feels
Jayashree: that's one. And number two s says on news, laundries, editorials and regional biases. I feel as a whole, stories from Eastern and Northeastern India are neglected. They only appear something ghastly happens or if central BJP people are involved. Speaking as someone hailing from West Ngal. Keep up the great work.
I love the stories from TNM and NL. Equally,
Manisha: I agree. With the second point. The first point, I'm a little confused. First point.
Jayashree: Yeah,
Manisha: second point. I confused about, I'm not sure, but is it, does it feel like a page fry sometimes? Like you call somebody and then they don't know that they're being made fun of, but they're being made fun of?
Like is it cruel?
Abhinandan: Well, I personally think it can be cruel. It depends on the power dynamic. I mean, for example, if I were younger, I'd, I'd do it to a lot more people. When you're older, it's sometimes not unequal. But no, I don't think it's cruel. I think it is a legitimate way of taking something to [01:49:00] the extreme.
For example, and this is actually what LEG used to use, like the whole idea for I agree, came after a long discussion when I was had with uh, Sabrina who's been on this show and we used to love watching Allergy, and she dissected. She says, what he does is he takes a position with like it's a white supremacist or someone who's anti L-G-B-T-Q or anti-trans.
And he'll take it so far that either that person has to completely withdraw from their established position or they will agree with you and go that far where you actually can, can show that person up for what they are. For example, he was, um, interviewing this guy who does the fashion shows for this.
Major, you know, brand, I think it was one of the Armani type, the top brand and, uh, how these, and how a lot of the fashion shows that they do. So Ji had three avatars. One was Ji, who was this white, wannabe black rapper. One was Bruno, who was [01:50:00] this gay fashion designer, Austrian, I think. And the third avatar was who?
Uh, I forget. Oh, the Kaza report. Bora Bora. So Bruno is interviewing this, um, choreographer for this fashion show where they are doing a fashion show with people, with models, with disabilities, you know, whether that're deaf, et cetera. And that is this whole thing. Oh, we are. And he wants to show up for it.
It's such bullshit. You are just making super rich people feel good about something that's just crap. So he's entering this guy and this guy is really sweet and in his Armani suit type. Yeah. So we are doing this. That is so beautiful. So the deaf ones, they can throw here a cue, so you push them onto stage how it work.
He says, yeah, yeah. You know, we just calling nudge them. Yeah. You use pro or you just use hand. Now that guy doesn't realize he's how fucking stupid it looks. Is it true? Yes, it is. But that is a great way of show showing them up for what they are. [01:51:00] Hmm. So I personally would do it even more. Uh, in fact when Madhu, uh, some of the things that I had ideas for Madhu said, dude.
The audience here does not have that sense of humor. I think there are certain people who do, but the kind of people who like it you'd notice are the ones who have a sense of humor and have a sense of irony. So no, if it, if it entirely up to me, if it, if it was a news laundry, if it was just a banana nuns YouTube channel, I'd fucking roast people.
Even if they were like 15, 20 years younger than me. Like the, I'd like confront him as someone else. But no, I wouldn't do the news laundry. But I don't think it's cruel at all. I wouldn't do that to a rational person, but someone who has a position that is bizarre.
Jayashree: Mm-hmm. And I think the power thing is what matters, right?
You're not like punching down at somebody who has no cloud, who has no standing. They are,
Abhinandan: yeah. They
Jayashree: have their own people, their own right, who have their own platforms. So they're not suffering artists. Sheena [01:52:00] says, another subscriber's question about what you cover versus what you don't on. Have them made me wonder if you'll be willing to pull back the curtain on how you make your editorial choices.
How does NL make judgment calls about what's in public interest? On a lighter note, I think Manisha recommended N Fat Hans is an out song on Hafta a few weeks ago. Yes. I wanted suggest a more recent version from Coke Studio Pakistan. If you haven't heard it yet. It's a great, listen. I've
All: heard it.
Jayashree: The, the following might be apocryphal, but I heard somewhere that this was the first instance of an Indian artist au being part of a Coke studio, Pakistan project.
Enjoy.
Abhinandan: Although Coke, studio Pakistan, at least an applied you on a. Apple music is blocked. Hmm.
Jayashree: Really? Did it also get blocked on Spotify or something?
Manisha: How crazy. Yeah, I've heard both the, I've heard Paris and other, I quite like it.
Jayashree: Right. So how do we make judgment calls for hta?
Abhinandan: Hta? If it's kind of topical, we can have an interesting discussion.
Like today, TM was in town, so while [01:53:00] Jman and the issues of the week, it is an issue. It's interesting. So we'll take that decision. The bit about the what happened in Parliament and the book of the former army chief that was very current. So it's a combination of many things, but importantly for hafta, it has to have an element where a discussion would be interesting.
It cannot be something that is just a piece of news and that's that.
Jayashree: Hmm. I think a lot of our news discussions though, are shaped by also whether we can get a good, a good guest who can good guess, sort of contribute to it. Because we don't want it to be just us sort of.
Abhinandan: Yeah.
Jayashree: Trying to come up with opinions on it
Abhinandan: and the logic in what report is covered is completely different.
The logic of hafta selection and the report, what is public in journalism, the two are not the same.
Jayashree: Right. Amer says your panel, this is with regards to your discussion on the UGC equity rules. My observations, one government is good with coming up with names that sound great, at least to their vote. Banks [01:54:00] equity is one such label.
Sarto and others were correct in their analysis that the rules don't amount to much. Also following Rito. I'm en, I'm enjoying the SNA sense of victimhood against their own beloved government. You can imagine my amusement at the turn of events, especially after finishing Ravi K's book, meet the SNAs and Manu Josephs, why the Poor Don't Kill Us.
Number two, as far as the anti ragging rules go Aans, right? All students are required to do is fill up an online undertaking, but they do it without going through the rules of the UGC or the Supreme Court's guidelines. I try hard to explain the rules and tive measures to all students, but clearly they aren't interested in understanding.
The institution is small. Students are in close contact with teachers, so we haven't seen the menace of racking, but I still find it tough to understand that students don't even spend 10 minutes to read the rules, which is there in most languages. There's also a provision for an anti ragging squad. I guess no one has ever conducted surprise visits in different part of campus, including hostels.
Also, no principal or vice chancellor has ever been removed for a ragging incident. [01:55:00]
Manisha: I don't blame the students for not reading anti ragging rules because there is a militant fear of notices that at least I went through when I was in college. Anything that came in the form of a notice, you just ran away from it.
Jayashree: Also, it's not like a student is gonna read it and say, ah, yes, now I won't do ragging. You'll
Manisha: find better ways of talking to students. Yeah. In fact, I just came to me that so many people have been talking about Manu sources, why the poor Don't Kill Us. I really wanna read it. Suddenly like everyone's.
Talking about how great the book is.
Abhinandan: I said so long ago
Manisha: that
Abhinandan: you didn't believe
Manisha: that. No, no, I did believe you. Then also, did you not watch but me For our media Rumbled, RA k and Manu Joseph should be in conversation. Both these books get, uh, talked about so much, this awareness and
Abhinandan: fantastic.
Manisha: We're very good.
Uh,
Abhinandan: yes, please
Manisha: talk with Manu, our curator
Abhinandan: of Rumble. This is a fantastic
Manisha: idea and you can host it. It'll be fun.
Abhinandan: Then it'll be a man. I'll not
Jayashree: host it.
Manisha: That's okay.
Abhinandan: That's okay. Okay.
Manisha: But as a woman, I allow,
Abhinandan: thank you so much. Also, what I wanted to challenge you on is I finally watched the Run
Manisha: Ah, [01:56:00]
Abhinandan: and, and you had nice things about that film.
Manisha: I don't have nice things to say. I'd say it's not as terrible as what it's being made out to be, but I'll tell you one thing. So I watched it again on Netflix because, uh, my mother-in-law was in town and she wanted to see it. So she hated it because of the go and everything. But I watched it again with her.
It's actually really bad on Netflix. Somehow. I don't know what it is. Is it the sound or is it what, but it was way more watchable in a theater than on Netflix.
Abhinandan: That's true for any film.
Jayashree: Maybe it's just a really bad
Manisha: movie. No, but I could notice how bad Ana was on Netflix. Like when I watched on Netflix, like why were people praising Ana?
Even I thought AK was so good. Yeah. Over acting
Abhinandan: of that, but
Manisha: somehow theater no. Some technical thing to it.
Abhinandan: No, I
Manisha: think like,
Abhinandan: I just thought that, I mean, I just,
Manisha: but you like Bei the Pakistani politician. He was
Abhinandan: nice. I, I just had my. Held my head on so many instances, I was like, fuck, I cannot believe people.
And again, I'm, I don't always watch every film with my politics there. Maybe I'm getting old and I do, and I [01:57:00] don't realize it. I can enjoy a film irrespective of, like, for example, I think Sanjay Ali's films are fucking shit films, but I enjoy them because of the spectacle. I think there's so many films that are shit films, but I enjoyed it.
Like I said, it's a shit film. But I enjoyed the film. There's a shit film, but I didn't even enjoy it other than the song, which was,
Manisha: the songs were great. Yeah,
Abhinandan: those are,
Manisha: but also, um, my, uh, level of comparing it was also animal because the same sort of hype came for animal. Animal. I couldn't watch for five minutes.
It was so bad here. I felt like at least the music, the dialogues am sing fan also. So that worked.
Song: Oh God.
Abhinandan: Okay. We will, uh, I'll Rahi and me will be discussing, uh, theda at length in the, the next episode. Awesome. Often awesome. And hopefully, uh, Manishh will join us and
Manisha: Manish Manish will join us.
Abhinandan: Manisha will join us, and there'll be combat as too.
Why did she enjoy it and why did I hate it? Hmm.
Jayashree: Poor Manish. [01:58:00] Next email is from ti. Hi. I'm a regular subscriber. I listen to Hafta while working on the new UGC law. I think the mentality where the general category has a lower uprising. Not all people, just some, and also some S-T-S-C-O-V-C people have a victim mindset.
As for history, also rito that to torture other people, which happened in history in a country like India where women are worshiped. But in reality, that is not what happens. So maybe your, so maybe you don't agree with this, but of course we're not the same in the end. Please continue your work like this.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
Jayashree: I feel like I've read this out incorrectly, but I can't actually figure out what she's saying.
Abhinandan: Hmm
All: hmm.
Jayashree: Okay. The next email is from Anish who says this is a rant regarding the apps podcast player who, he says it's gotten worse, it doesn't play, it gets stuck on loading. I've tried switching between shows.
It doesn't help. It's getting to a point where I feel like giving up. Can you please look into it? Okay. I also tried to upgrade the subscription so I can get RSS feeds, but I couldn't find [01:59:00] an option. We will email you Anish. Uh, sorry about this,
Abhinandan: but haven't we fixed that issue, right? Jhi? I'll
Jayashree: just, I think this might be a slightly older email, so I'll just check.
Abhinandan: Just check when this email, because Anish, we've updated those bug fixes on the podcast play, but we will definitely check this out. Our tech team will
Jayashree: Yeah. Also if we can't find the RSS feed you, so he also says, otherwise, keep up the good work. I love listening to s and re's optimistic views on everything.
Mm, do not want to miss those. We are very optimistic. It's true. Digital prisoner has sent us an email, this is the last one, saying Hi. I want to share my experience with digital safety. I regularly listen to ab my elder brother who inspires me with his bravado attitude. Once when I received a scam call, I confronted the scammer with BC and C what happened next to his terrifying.
While driving home from work, my phone started beeping nonstop. I kept receiving OTPs from various websites and the SMS messages wouldn't [02:00:00] stop. I turned off notifications. The OTP calls then began flooding my phone. I had no choice but to put my phone on airplane mode, and this harassment lasted for two or three days.
All: Wow.
Jayashree: Complaining to the service provider didn't help. I had to spend two days without a phone. After researching, I learned I was a victim of SMS bombing. This experience made me realize how vulnerable we all are digitally. I wanna share my story. Ignoring scammers is safer than confronting them. Wow.
Manisha: No.
Jayashree: Basically he's saying he swore at the scammer because he was inspired by we then, and then he got fucked for it. So
Manisha: don't get inspired by then.
Jayashree: Yeah.
Manisha: And but know so many people have this story of scammers that actually, like, once you confront them, it really descends into very like scary terrain. Yeah. A lot of them get back at you with like the choices of abuses and a few women, you get taken aback.
I remember ni during the height of COVID.
I BUILT NL: Yeah.
Manisha: Uh, somebody scam and she, it was very terrifying how that guy kind of just launched at her after she called him out. So it can be [02:01:00] very, because I think these guys are like, you know, they're professional. Criminals in that sense. So they're very like, it can be scary.
Yeah, maybe ignore them if you can't take the,
Abhinandan: so I mean, like I said, there's no, it's not a mathematical theorem that there's one answer. You have to play it by ear that these all judgment calls and there'll be different, different people. But I have
Manisha: poor guy took your advice.
Abhinandan: I would still say, if someone asked me, for example, I interviewed uh, uncle Ku earlier this week.
We'll play a little clip at the end of this. And I discussed with them, I said, you know, you tell your students that everything is good, everything is nice. Ignore the negativity. I was like, that's bullshit. You gotta be a shock. You, you can't be gentle If you wanna succeed, you gotta be fucking aggressive like a mad dog.
Otherwise you're gonna get, and I think uncle's answer is really good. He said, look, you do you, yeah, for you that may work. If you try to the gentle approach, it won't work for you. If I try your upset, it won't [02:02:00] work for me. So I think that was actually really a smart answer that Ancor gave. And I was quite impressed with him actually, to be honest.
Uh, although I disagreed with him on a bunch of stuff.
Madhu Trehan: It's important to have that positive,
Abhinandan: kind of stay positive, you know, smile. I mean, like you said, you, you're physically very attractive man. You have a great smile, which you use to great effect in your videos, but. I mean, if God forbidden, I mean, if I were to conduct courses, no one would even attend them.
But if I were to train kids, I'd it. Dude, you gotta have the aggression
TM Krishna: of
Abhinandan: a wild dog.
TM Krishna: Yeah.
Abhinandan: You gotta have the aggression of a shock. If you're not a shock, you're fucked.
TM Krishna: I think that people succeed when they're true to themselves.
Abhinandan: Hmm.
TM Krishna: And whenever they're trying to put up a facade, they will almost inevitably falter.
Song: Hmm.
TM Krishna: What you are saying is who you are.
Song: Hmm.
TM Krishna: Or have always been. What you see of me is who I have been, and I've always been, you will [02:03:00] never see me in a different avatar. I found myself saying, show up every day.
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: And be that hustler who will win every single fucking second. And don't ever give up. Don't you dare sleep without knowing that you've won their day.
Abhinandan: Mm.
TM Krishna: I will feel like a fake because that's not who I am. I sleep at nine 30 every day,
Abhinandan: even I'm early. But I think if someone is trying to fuck you over, you should not be apologetic in figuratively kicking them in the nuts. So that'll come with some inconveniences, but an inconvenience is okay. We live with a lot of inconveniences.
Look at us in Delhi. We play football in 500 A QI. Is it lovely? No. Our throats are fucked through the year, but do we enjoy it? Yes. So wait three. The incoming says, it is still always nice to knock out someone who's trying to fuck you over. It
Jayashree: is, again, going [02:04:00] from bad to worse. First we like swear at them.
Then he is like, yeah, kick them. And I knock
Abhinandan: them out. I'm just saying knock speech. It's so literal. It's a vi speech. You guys are just making it literal, right? Come with
Jayashree: your car. Next,
Manisha: next to we'll be like, I am now in jail. I took a und advice.
Abhinandan: I took a und advice and him,
Manisha: I'm writing this mail from a jail.
Abhinandan: But yeah, so, uh, thank you so much Duke. You write to us, but more importantly, send us on podcast@newsroom.com. I built NL during your style, during the gentle style, you the gentle type during non gentle, not gentle type. You do you. So recommendations for the week. Let's start a Jeri.
Jayashree: Yeah, I have, uh, okay, so two recommendations.
One is I'm recommending bus documentary on Ayurveda. I found it fascinating. I think it's also a really good thing to show people. 'cause we all have that one family member who is really into [02:05:00] Ayurveda and will say, no, no, nothing, it's super safe. I'll just take it. Or, I'm dying. But it's fine. Like, I'm just gonna take these random things, put them in my body, and then hope for the best.
So I think it's, you wanna do it, go ahead. Like it's totally fine, but it's also good to know. What it is and what your industry is either doing or not doing to regulate it. So watch it. It's, we're an R in a bit, but it'll go really fast because it's just quite fascinating. And second, and it's got
Manisha: Ravi's VO for Ish fans.
Abhinandan: Yeah, it's got Ravi's Vo. Yes.
Jayashree: And uh, second is a long story in Activist magazine. So when I was growing up, I was very taken by the story of Captain Robert Scott. He was that tragic hero who wanted to be the first man to go to Antarctica. He made some shockingly bad, but very British decisions like carrying a lot of China so he could eat on lovely plates while going.
Anyway, he made it to Antarctica only to, to the South Pole, only to realize role Amunson had beat him to it. He and his party then [02:06:00] turned back and they died. So I remember reading his all this to say, I remember reading his diary growing up and I was just very fascinated by it. And I, that's maybe why I got very into reading about PO nonfiction.
So this is a very, very long, superb story about an unknown romance between two members of Scott's party who did survive. Two men, two very British men, very tragic in their own lives once they went back home. But it's just a very moving, fascinating story. So read it over the weekend when you have some time.
It's called. From Antarctica with love.
Abhinandan: Thank you. That's an interesting recommendation, Manisha.
Manisha: So I have two recommendations from News Laundry, and this made me think of what you were saying right now, that you know it's okay to inconvenience yourself a little bit, but push back. So there's a fascinating story of a lawyer on news laundry who gets, uh, he's on his way back, uh, from a hospital and he, the police stops him and charges him falsely with a [02:07:00] drunken case that you are drunk and pay up or whatever.
So he gets booked and everything and he finds curiously that there are witnesses to this. So a normal person would've just taken it and said, okay, because he ultimately gets out. The police was not able to, you know, prove the case. Normal person was like a bad incident. Forget about it. And he wondered like, who was this witness?
And so he started looking into FIS of that same police station and he found that the same two witnesses in his case were there in 165 cases out of hundred 70. Yeah,
Abhinandan: the perpetual witnesses
Manisha: of stopping basic and police can take stock witnesses when they're reading because they need, so that's a normal thing.
But not for murder. Like you can't produce a witness for murder or for drunken driving. So he actually took this all the way up to Supreme Court and I'm, it is such a nice thing to read that he took that effort to kind of really dig and find something and expose the system enough for the Supreme Court to say that this is a big problem.
How can the police stations do this? It's a complete anthem, the rule of law. The second one is an interview with Moed Dipa. [02:08:00] And more has done it. I think again, the fact that he stood up for what he believed is right for something so basic. But you know, something that we are forgetting that there's this old Muslim man and he should not be, you know, at the mercy of the mob.
And the interview is so good because he's saying such basic things, but so clearly you know that, why are you targeting Muslims? I'm a Ang Bully fan, but I don't understand these Ang guys.
Song: Mm.
Manisha: And I think a lot of the time the liberals also over the last 10 years, because the Bjp wins politically, we assume that this is common.
You know, popular vote means popular rejection of secularism.
Song: Mm.
Manisha: It's very important to remember people have not rejected it. Right. In smaller towns, smaller places, people believe that we have to live peacefully together. So do watch that interview Good Samaritan and great Jim, bro.
Abhinandan: Yeah. Also, I think this is, again, uh, I, I, I will not generalize by saying all liberals think so, but many Twitter liberals from the journalistic community [02:09:00] have a certain disdain for religiosity, which I think is stupid.
You may not be religious, but don't assume anybody who is has a value system that is fucked.
Manisha: Yeah.
Abhinandan: Uh, so you know, whether it's someone who has a tika or sometimes, you know, if there is, I mean, I understand. I judge eus for different reasons, uh, but not every reli religious symbol. Something to be scoffed at.
And I just think that's a really dumb attitude to have. So, so I have several recommendations. One is the Atlantics piece on the Murder of the Washington Post by Ashley Parker. Do check that out.
Manisha: Yeah.
Abhinandan: And but more important than that, I have some really important news that various news organizations have put on the Insta, which I will just tell you in quick succession.
India Day has posted, importantly Yumi Gotama, Samantha Pbu, whose stake on the same dress wins. So you do tell us, 'cause this, these are important issues. Uh, [02:10:00] then Ananya pane drops major nostalgia as she shares throwback photos from 2016 captioning. Captioning them. 2016 was really lit. Was really it. And she shares really it, man swipe to take a look, stay updated, all stories that matter.
Download in those downtime. They've
Manisha: also said this,
Abhinandan: yes, in the same posts, stay updated. All the stories that matter from 2016, she has 26. Really eight man. Then India today, throw back photos of Karina SEF from their early years. 'cause these are all important stories. Then Newport San shares pictures from her Chopra ceremony, URA ceremonies with family, in case you want those tutor ceremonies, then.
India today. Tik Russian admits his obsession with Bollywood biceps in a throwback post where he's flexing his bicep. These are all important
Manisha: stories, who you guys start charging royalty or something,
Abhinandan: right?
Manisha: Whatever they put on, instead, they just making news out of it.
Abhinandan: Then, uh, India today again, uh, [02:11:00] Anja Pande shared a serene glimpse on Instagram expressing her devotional side with the caption
Manisha: inside.
Abhinandan: Then, uh, one that is truly, I think, worthy of gender justice and what any man should hope to be. Hindu Heim tells us with a photograph, which is just a bunch of people, and you can see half of Sonny Leone, Salman Han was seen patiently standing in the queue, allowing Sonny Leone to go ahead of him first.
A courteous gesture that caught attention, stay updated with all the stories that matter. So
Manisha: this is
Abhinandan: you fucking stay updated with these stories that matter if you're not fucking staying updated stories that you don't deserve journalism.
Manisha: But this is amazing that he patiently waited
Abhinandan: for Aly, waited a sweet gesture, and then
Manisha: everyone
Abhinandan: noticed in a courteous gesture.
Everyone noticed. And we've posted on Instagram and finally Hindu sand times, uh, has a picture. My hd, [02:12:00] that cricketer, uh, who's a husband, uh, and uh
Jayashree: huh
Abhinandan: she's married to a cricketer, right? A sheti. Ra? No. A Sheti ra.
Jayashree: Oh,
Abhinandan: athe. Sheti has shared a photo with her husband, IL Ra as they clocked the third wedding anniversary taking to Instagram.
She posted the loved up pictures stay updated with all the stories that matter down within the sun table. So I'll
Manisha: just follow them on Instagram now where I follow Hindu sand sometimes and directly follow on in. You
Abhinandan: gotta stay updated. Stories that matter. Indu, sometimes you are doing a service that is beyond any journalistic exercise that has ever happened.
So do continue to give us these stories, 'cause I'm gonna recommend this every week. On that note, I would like to thank all of you for making News is at 14 and at 14, be a part of IBU Tunnel campaign. I'd also like to thank my wonderful co-panelists, RI Manisha Pande.
Jayashree: Thank you. Thank you.
Abhinandan: Our crew who has made this hafta possible.
Anil who has been [02:13:00] with News Laundry since we started, even before that, she has tolerated me for many shows where we traveled around the country. Our wonderful producer, PRI Ali, and our wonderful other producer, Ashish, uh, and all of you of course, thank you for making us what we are. Have a fantastic weekend.
Have a good who, by the way, doing the song song this week. Is it me you can do since it's your
Jayashree: birthday?
Abhinandan: It's on my birthday. My birthday is in August
Jayashree: for the birthday. You can pick a song. I think
Abhinandan: so, yes. I will leave you with this song that I dedicate to all of you who made news Laundry possible.
Song: Looks like we made
Long way. We knew we'd get there. They said they'll never make it, but.[02:14:00]
We are still together, still strong.
You still the
Manisha: cue for your subscription. You're changing the world by changing the way news is funded for the smoothest news laundry experience. Download the news Laundry app. It is the best way to listen to our paywall podcasts. And you'll also get access to all free news laundry shows. Keep us ad free and subscriber funded.
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