Multiple truths are neither a lie nor a

contradiction
Journalism is increasingly being subjected to various forms of
attack. Some cast aspersions on journalists, some accuse
journalists of being ideologically blinkered. A news ombudsman’s
observations too are subjected to scrutiny. Once you recognise
that journalism is an interlocking public, you tend to draw
journalistic lessons from diverse sources. But there is a catch.
When a practitioner makes a distinction between contradiction and
multiple truths, it may be seen as a misleading exercise for some
distant observers.

I never thought that an answer to the question of trust would lie in

the science pages of this newspaper. In his weekly column,
Speaking of Science (July 7), D. Balasubramanian cited a recent
study to prove an important point: “Individual people are
actually more honest than they think they are”. The study
sought “to examine whether people act more dishonestly when
they have a greater economic incentive to do so, and found the
opposite to be true.” It found that civic honesty is much more
prevalent than what cynics would like us to believe.

The line between news and views

I interact with readers as well as journalists to address questions
relating to journalism, ethics and fairness. Some of them used the
latest anthology of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Scandal of the
Century and Other Writings, to question the arguments advanced
in this column. A person on the desk asked me how I reconcile my
respect for Marquez with my column, “The adjective filter”
(September 30, 2013), in which I had argued that the dividing line
between news and views must be maintained. Marquez’s
journalistic writing is rich with adjectives, and his effortless
editorialising is what gave him global readership, she said. How
do we relate to this journalism which has no line between news
and views?

Another young reporter pulled out sentences from The Story of a

Shipwrecked Sailor and When I Was Happy and Undocumented,
major journalistic works of Marquez, to again point out his liberal
use of adjectives. A third said that I had once praised author
Salman Rushdie for his coverage of the U.S. presidential election
in which he had written “…the motorcades of two largely
interchangeable and certainly unlovable presidential candidates
(Gush, Bore)...”. Wasn’t Mr. Rushdie essentially editorialising to
assert that George W. Bush’s rhetoric was empty and gushing and
that Al Gore’s arguments failed to resonate with the electorate
because they were boring, he asked. And how about the overt
editorialising in Amitav Ghosh’s journalistic essay “Countdown”,
which appeared after the nuclear tests in India and Pakistan in
1998, in which he wrote: “The pursuit of nuclear weapons in the
subcontinent is the moral equivalent of civil war: the targets the
rulers have in mind for these weapons are, in the end, none other
than their own people.”

My columns deal with the rules that govern journalism as well as

some of the finest writings that have shaped our lives. Is there an
inherent contradiction in citing and celebrating the journalistic
writings of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Zadie Smith, Amitav Ghosh
and Salman Rushdie on the one hand and insisting on the firm line
that separates news and opinion on the other?

Information and insight

There is a vast difference between these exceptionally gifted
writers covering a specific event and general reporting. These
writers are commissioned to provide insights into what is
happening, while a reporter is expected to provide information.
The distinction is not an arbitrary one but a considered effort to
help readers get both information and insight. I still believe that
the adjective filter helps news to emerge from the emotional
cauldron of the on-field experience without being judgemental. It
reinforces that cardinal principle of good journalism: let the facts
speak for themselves.

The reason for celebrating the journalistic works of these great

writers is not for the exemplary writing style, but for their
journalistic rigour. When talking about his fiction, Marquez said:
“But those books have such an amount of research and fact
checking and historical rigour that in fact they are basically great
fictional or fantastic reports, but the method of investigation and
the way of handling the information and the facts is that of a
journalist.” We need to recognise this fact to celebrate the multiple
forms of writings that constitute journalism.