Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Not just the Times of India
In response to my previous post about collablogging and monitoring what passes for news in the TOI, many of you wrote in to say that we should be monitoring not just the Times, but all Indian media outlets. As if prove your point, I came across this interview with Adi Godrej on the Rediff website. They start by calling him a middle-class billionaire, which is a funny thing to say about a billionaire, leave alone the scion of one of the oldest and wealthiest families in India. But, they do save the best for last.
Russia, a Communist country? Tell that to Gennadiy Zyuganov and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), who last saw executive power in 1991. Vladimir Putin rules with the support of the centrist United Russia party, while the Commies are among the major opposition parties in Russian politics.
Now, how much effort would it have taken the reporters or the sub-editors to correct such a glaring factual error? Or is it that both the reporters and the sub-editors are caught in a time-warp and haven't quite come to terms with the death of communism in the former Soviet Union?
As for his next travel plans, he would love to go to Russia, which fascinates him, even though he isn't too enamoured of the concept of socialism and communism. "If at 20, you are not a socialist, you are heartless. But at 40, if you are a socialist, you are headless. I agree with Winston Churchill's famous remarks that socialism is nothing but equal distribution of poverty."
His strong dislike for the concept, however, will not stop Godrej from including the Communist country as his 76th port of destination shortly.
Russia, a Communist country? Tell that to Gennadiy Zyuganov and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), who last saw executive power in 1991. Vladimir Putin rules with the support of the centrist United Russia party, while the Commies are among the major opposition parties in Russian politics.
Now, how much effort would it have taken the reporters or the sub-editors to correct such a glaring factual error? Or is it that both the reporters and the sub-editors are caught in a time-warp and haven't quite come to terms with the death of communism in the former Soviet Union?
