Take Two

‘Reliable Sources’

Madhavankutty Pillai Madhavankutty Pillai | 09 Apr, 2012

It’s an abused provision in journalism, but trusting the Government is worse

There is nothing as abused in journalism as the use of the ‘source’. There are journalists who—out of corruption or desperation—write outright lies and put it down to sources. Then there are lazy dumb journalists who get told lies and parrot it in print because it has a ‘source’ behind it.

This is starkly evident on two beats—police stories and film gossip. The police use disinformation to show they are doing something on cases they are clueless about. The Arushi case, for example. Or the strange manner in which the Indian Mujahideen keeps cropping up after a terrorist attack and then just as quickly disappears. Film gossip is 90 per cent trash. But the assumption is that everyone from the reader to the writer to the film stars know it, and, therefore, it is alright to write it.

The only thing that makes dishonest people not lie is the fear of being caught. ‘Sources said’ gives them an easy way out. A source is useful as a lead to dig into a story, but as things stands today, a single unattributed source is enough for anything to get into print. But despite all this, it is an even greater danger to force the DNA journalist Saikat Datta to reveal his source under the Official Secrets Act following his scoop on General VK Singh’s letter to the Prime Minister on India’s state of armament readiness.

The Official Secrets Act is a hangover from a pre-independence age when the Government looked at its citizens as subjects of a foreign land who should only be told what is necessary. Whenever a government servant uses a nebulous term like ‘national interest’, it is usually to hide inefficiency or corruption. As long as information is controlled without any specific justification, ‘sources’ are the only way to arrive at any measure of truth. Decontrol information and you will be rid of ‘sources’. If the Government doesn’t want Pakistan and China to know there is no ammunition for India’s Army tanks, then get the ammunition.

What is at stake here is the idea of the Government as the arbiter of information. Leaking the letter is not against national interest. It is against government interest and the two are not the same.