Kolkata-based The Telegraph’s ‘blah blah’ description of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech in parliament has brought the spotlight on the newspaper’s owner, Ananda Bazar Patrika and how the media group is exploiting its consumers with different political ideologies.
This was after The Telegraph carried its front page headline describing Modi’s parliament speech as “The ‘record-breaking’ blah-sphemy.” It wrote, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke for 2 hours and 13 minutes in reply to the no-confidence motion that was defeated with the Opposition walking out. Some Right-wing social media posts claimed Modi broke Lal Bahadur Shastri’s speech record by duration.”
The report added, “Modi spoke about Manipur for around 5 minutes and again for 30 seconds. A figurative representation of what it felt like to wait for Modi to speak on the Manipur carnage.”
The report then simply printed ‘blah, blah’ 370 times on its front page, triggering strong reactions from both the supporters and detractors of Modi.
While Modi haters hailed the newspaper for being courageous, supporters of the Indian prime minister sought to highlight the hypocrisy of the ABP for exploiting the news-consuming public for its financial gains. They reminded how the parent company of the Telegraph also owned ABP News TV channel, which is widely viewed as a member of the lapdog media.
User ‘The Hawk Eye’ wrote on Twitter, “Do you know that the cheap troll newspaper ‘The Telegraph‘ is owned by the Sarkar family of ABP media group? At same time ABP tv news is considered as “godi media”! That’s how they exploit third class journalism at each side of political.”
User ‘The Principle’ wrote, “Only The Telegraph is saving journalism in India.”
User ‘Amock’ wrote, “The Telegraph has trolled PM in style, probably the best possible way.”
User Priyanshi Kushwaha wrote, “The owner of The Telegraph and ABP News is the same. Both are parts of the same group. ABP’s audience is more in Gobarpatti, the elite class reads The Telegraph. Look at their business. ABP News indulges in kissing the feet (of Modi government). The Telegraph is leading the revolution. This is the real truth of Manu Media.”