Sakshi thinks petitions won’t achieve much:

So thank you. But no on Petitions. Not even the one that says ban Barkha Dutt. Well, I might think over that one.

And commenting on that observation, bongopondit pleads:

“But no on Petitions. Not even the one that says ban Barkha Dutt.”

Please…..please…..PLEASE ……I want to sign this one and forward it to ten people I know…..

I have seen a lot of criticism of the media in general, and Barkha Dutt and a few other popular mediapersons in particular, in the past one week. Like in this post, for instance, an angry Harini calls mediapersons maut ke bhadwe:

On the first night - there was CNN IBN giving a blow by blow account of the movement of the Rapid Action Force commando’s. I shouted, impotently at the TV screen, they get TV reception at the Taj. but the details increased. it is the point where i more or less muted the volume and moved to twitter.

And, then it progressively got worse. every idiot with an OB van parked themselves outside the Taj and the Trident and began not only broadcasting live from the scene - compromising the lives of the security forces & the hostages - but also began speculating and putting out rumours in the name of news.

The channels put out the identity of those inside - risking their lives. “The Global CEO of Unilever is having a meeting with his top brass at the Taj” — they blared. Luckily those people got out.

Rajdeep Saredesai screeched, on Friday, that the CST was under attack again. Half an hour later he bleated out an apology.

Barkha Dutt, the other doyen of journalism, asked a relative waiting outside the Taj if they considered the possiblity of their dear one being dead. soon she began getting emotional sounding like a frog on LSD.

Barkha Dutt again. What’s with bloggers and Barkha Dutt? So, as an exception (and in the interest of that elusive ideal called fairness that mainstream mediapersons talk so much about), we’re going to link to a column (not a blog post) by Barkha Dutt which appeared today on the NDTV site. In this column Ms.Dutt has tried to respond to the kind of criticism I had referred to earlier:

I would also like to stress though that this eruption of allegations is only one small part of a larger picture. In the past week, we have also received countless words of support and encouragement- from thousands of people - Indian citizens of every hue and ilk across the country, as well as some better known ones, like Narayan Murthy, Salman Rushdie, Shashi Tharoor, Sunil Khilnani and Suketu Mehta, to name just a few. When asked in an interview on NDTV, what struck him watching the events unfold on television, Narayan Murthy, said it was the “finest piece of TV journalism in a decade.”

But in journalism, we know that, praise and criticism are twins that travel together. And we welcome both and try and listen to both carefully.

So, for those who wrote in to tell us that we got it right- Thank you so much. Your words encourage us.

But for those who charged us with crimes we absolutely assert we have not committed, here is our response. Some of it is answer to general questions about the media and some to specific charges made against our organization.

Narayan Murthy, Salman Rushdie, Shashi Tharoor, Sunil Khilnani and Suketu Mehta! Those are big names. How easily does your criticism travel together with their praise, fellow bloggers? Go check Barkha Dutt’s response.