Aren't our daily problems newsworthy anymore?

The ongoing daily spat between Narendra Modi and the Congress party serves to cover up the real problems being faced by the people, says A Ganesh Nadar

What are the problems facing the country today? The rising price of diesel/petrol and what it does to the prices of essential goods. The falling rupee and what it does to our imports.

As the dollar goes through the roof what happens to our students overseas who are already working in KFCs and such to manage two meals a day?

Uttarakhand has been devastated by floods and it will take another three years to get it back on its feet.

Jammu and Kashmir sees firing everyday across the border and many Kashmiris consider New Delhi a bigger enemy than Pakistan.

The Armed Forces Special Protection Act has totally alienated the North East and we are doing nothing about it.

A big chunk of the nation is in the grip of Naxalism and the intellectuals support them by saying most of our rulers need to be gunned down. But the Naxalites are not gunning down politicians, they are killing cops and ordinary people.

Assam is flooding and no one knows whether we will see another Uttarakhand there. And even if we do see an Uttarakhand there, no one knows what to do except call in the army and the air force.

While Pakistan tries to slip in militants secretly, China openly violates our border, puts up tents here one day, walks away with our camera there another day. In the South, the Sri Lankan navy harasses our fishermen so happily that one cannot believe that it is smaller in size than most of our states. Maldives, which is smaller than Andaman and Nicobar islands, ignores us totally.

While the North is dealing with floods, the South is reeling under a drought. No one is wiser, no one has an action plan, no one is accountable and no one cares.

This government’s term ends in 2014, so what right does it have to fix the price of gas from 2014 to 2019? The Congress does this brazenly and the BJP does not even whimper. Reliance obviously has both of them on its side, and probably ignores Jayalalithaa so she is the only one who points this out. The national press ignores the issue.

There are more scams in this government than ever before. Does anyone know the status of even one scam? The media, after announcing it, just goes on to the next one.

Okay, I have told you about most of the problems we are facing today. Now I will tell you what we are busy doing.

Narendra Modi said he would be sad if a puppy came under his car. That makes for 24 hours TV time and miles and miles of newsprint. Then Digvijaya Singh, whose only claim to fame is that he is the Lalu Prasad Yadav of Madhya Pradesh, jumps into the fray. Then we devote 24 hours TV time to what Digvijaya said and miles and miles of newsprint.

Next Modi says the Congress is hiding under the burqa of secularism. This gives us 48 hours of TV time and light years of newsprint. The Congress’s reply takes up 96 hours of TV time and a few light years of newsprint.

Not had enough? You have to pay five rupees to attend Modi’s meeting in Hyderabad, and this is also taken up by the Congress as if it’s the biggest announcement since petrol prices went up more than five rupees in six weeks.

Why is the press so hung up on what one chief minister says or does? Just because he has been named to a top post in a party with a difference? Does that party realise that to win elections you need to show results, not sensational announcements?

Are they trying to make it to magazine covers or to Parliament?

And why does the Congress and its numerous spokesmen, women and child have to reply to everything that Modi says?

A chief minister once said, ‘I do not reply to every dog that barks at me’. I am not calling anyone a dog, or a puppy. All I am saying is that there are myriad issues that are crying for attention.

In Tamil Nadu, S Ramadoss has lit a powder keg of caste politics that can flare up and engulf the state. Jayalalithaa is normally very firm with trouble-makers but this time she is strangely silent.

Mamata Banerjee calls whoever opposes her a Maoist and no one takes it up with her. I mean the media.

The media has to grow up beyond Narendra Modi and his utterances. The Congress has to get on with the job at hand and ignore him.

There are people dying in Uttarakhand without food, there are bodies rotting which can lead to an epidemic. The north-east needs a healing touch and so does Kashmir. Naxalites have to be brought out of their forest hideouts.

Caste wars have to be stopped in Tamil Nadu. Preparations are needed to deal with the impending floods in Assam.

The upward run of fuel prices and the downward run of the rupee have to be stopped.

Come on, guys, get real, farmers in Vidharba have not stopped committing suicide, rapes are still being reported every day from all over.

Why this fixation with what Modi says and about the Congress’s response to him?

We want to know what the Congress plans to do about each of the problems I have mentioned, or what they plan to do in the Opposition benches after the next elections. Not what Modi says, and certainly not what they replied.