Politician or scribe?

It is not often that an Urdu newspaper is in the so called national news but editor and owner of Nai Duniya Shahid Siddiqui managed just that with his interview of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. The long interview had Modi declaring the now television made famous, “hang me if I am guilty”, in response to a question on the Gujarat violence that left over 2200 persons dead and many more wounded and homeless across the state. Subsequently, Siddiqui has been expelled from the Samajwadi Party and is back on the television maintaining that the party that he only recently joined had “shot the messenger” and had still to get its act together in Uttar Pradesh.

 Journalistically there was nothing wrong for Siddiqui to interview Modi and splash it across his newspaper. And secularists who might find fault with the line of questioning will have to admit that it was largely a journalistic exercise with several questions also posed to the BJP leader and now aspirant for prime ministership. However, the problem here has arisen from the fact that Siddiqui has insisted on wearing two hats, flitting from party to party, even as he continues to run his little newspaper. Since the Samajwadi Party won the elections, he has been appearing regularly on television channels as its spokesperson, with scribes adding two and two together to make five and insisting that the interview had the Samajwadi Party’s backing. As speculation ran wild, many journalists insisted on writing and asserting on television that this could be the beginning of a new SP-Modi camaraderie.

 A panicky Samajwadi had no choice but to expel Siddiqui who has not been particularly close to the leadership anyhow, and scotch rumours that there was any underhand dealing with Modi. Siddiqui, who has gone through all the political parties in Uttar Pradesh, now says he will stick to journalism. And perhaps the next time he decides to join a political party, he should resign as the editor of Nai Duniya, leaving it to professionals to handle. This experience should convince him of the liabilities of working as a journalist and a politician together, as an interview taken as a scribe can acquire staggering political dimensions for no reason at all.

Several journalists have joined politics in the course of their careers, but in most cases they have resigned from their newspaper to represent the people in Parliament. This has to be woven into the unwritten but understood code of ethics guiding the media to ensure that there is no conflict of interest.