By Roney Lyndem
I have been meaning to write a letter of appreciation for the OP-EDs and ‘Letters’ you choose to publish about Thma U Rangli-Juki (TUR) & its various irritable, ideologically motivated. leftist, progressive, even ‘anti-national’ activities. For a small progressive group, critical engagement with our ideas, intellectually low-grade name-calling, ad-hominem attacks and slander, gets our message and name across. These days our mailbox, although not overflowing, has had heartening mails from citizens inquiring about our ideology, ways to join TUR or simply asking for a copy of our three-year-old manifesto. So Thank You.
But in a typical TUR killjoy fashion,I cannot but add two caveats to this Thank You note because some of the letters and op-eds raise serious journalistic questions about facts, opinions and disclosures.
Some of the letters you have recently published, especially by A.Lyngdoh, Yogesh Narain & PK Dwivedi, muddy the waters between FACTS and OPINIONS. As a group which believes in going beyond the consensus – we are fully aware that our progressive politics may not be to everyone’s liking but this disagreement should not to be trollish name-calling and factually incorrect statements. I don’t know who chooses the letters which are published in your daily, but that person has been responsible for allowing Opinions to masquerade as facts and in some cases allow the space to be used for outright slander.
Cursory readings of the recent letters reveal errors of fact and slander by association, for example, calling TUR ‘moles’ for Pakistan, provoking “misguided local elements” and “TUR’s muteness on coal mining could perhaps be linked to some of its members being miners, too.”The maliciousness of the first allegation is not even worth a response. For the second, I can only assume that Mr. Dwivedi must be suffering a grand Brahminical/Vedic ignorance of local political history so as not to have noticed TUR’s rather unpopular critique and opposition to Coal/Limestone mining.
For any ethical newspaper, fact-checking is paramount to prevent OP-EDs & Letters to the Editor becoming platforms of unsubstantiated defamation. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan said, “You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your OWN facts” meaning it is not right to make up facts or plainly to lie in order to confirm your prejudices.
Anyhow, rather than being peeved, TUR invites all three letter writers to meet us in our office in the coming week to collect copies of our manifesto and to quiz us on our interests and motivations so that they can criticize TUR in a slightly more informed and intelligent manner. They could write at thma.u.rangli.juki@gamil.
On the issue of disclosures, unlike The Shillong Times, it is today a ‘normal’ journalistic practice to offer Full Disclosures about the involvement of writers in the issues which they write about. Like the one we encountered on theconversation.com:
“Ms/Mr. X does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the biographical information given”
The same applies for any OP-ED writer or Editorial writer in your paper. For example, if there is an essay on Solid Waste Management, Local Self Governance or Wahumkhrah etc. and the writer is a member of a committee or a consultant, resource person or project implementer for those issues, that qualifies for a disclosure. Similarly any reference to MLCU or National Security, specific seminars, consortiums, films and other events which are written about, the Editor needs to make public her association with these institutions so that the pieces are not public relations exercises or embedded and paid journalism.
TUR has always defended Independent and free media. Whether it was in opposing the defamation case against one of your Columnist when he wrote about coal mining, or defending freedom of the press in light of the Meghalaya High Court judgment. TUR believes an adversarial press is healthy and needs to be defended, and that it is our duty to guard against hijacking of the fourth estate by embedded and paid interests. A press promoting civilised discourse based on facts will go a long way in creating a Democratic culture in our society where dissent can be contested not shut down and discussions made more meaningful rather than being mere gossip mongering. To that end, this letter is offered in a comradely spirit.
Lastly, TUR does not believe in leaders or prominent individuals which is why the “Award -Waapsi Filmmaker” and the “Pastor” or the “PhD scholars” have been shown their place in the organisation and that place is in the dark corner of our small, rented, pentagonal office.
The writer is Co-ordinator, Thma U Rangli-Juki (TUR) and can be contacted at [email protected])