West Bengal’s three leading language dailies showed their political leanings in the coverage of the arrest of Congress MP from Berhampore, Adhir Chowdhury.
KOLKATA: West Bengal’s three leading language dailies - Ganashakti, Bartaman and Anandabazar Patrika - showed their political leanings in the coverage of the arrest of Congress MP from Berhampore, Adhir Chowdhury. He was remanded to 14 days judicial custody on charges of murder.
Bartaman, with its strong Congress leanings, carried the news in a small single column on Page 1. It reported how Adhir “babu” who was released on bail was arrested the same day again for two other charges.
One involved murdering CPI(M) panchayat leader of Ketugram, Govardhan Ghosh in 2003, and the other pertained to ransacking a Congress office in Bharatpur, Kandi last year.
The paper added that Congress supporters opposed the arrest and quoted Chowdhury saying, the CPI(M) was a loser in his district. There was no quote from any CPI(M) functionary.
Ganashakti, the CPI(M) mouthpiece, went overboard in splashing the news across four columns and ensured that the Congress MP was simply referred to as Adhir on more than one occasion instead of the servile “babu.”
The paper traced the history of Govardhan Ghosh’s murder and dwelt on the causes. According to Ganashakti, it boiled down to control of the Mougram panchayat which has an equal number of CPI(M) and Congress members.
The panchayat leader, Ghosh, was decided upon through a toss-up and, according to the report, was eliminated to pave the way for Congress control of the panchayat.
Ganashakti also reported that the Congress wanted control of Ketugram, which came under the Berhampur constituency, during the 2004 Lok Sabha polls.
It had quotes from CPI(M) state secretary Biman Bose while Adhir Chowdhury’s comments were couched in irony and hinting that he had pinned the onus of the Ketugram murder on the CPI(M)!
Anandabazar Patrika interspersed the copy with humour on Page One. It captured the mood of the arrest which included Chowdhury’s SOS calls to Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi and Pranab Mukherjee and the arrival of his wife, Arpita on the scene.
This was heady stuff for the middle-class Bengali who was familiar with the recent suicide news of the Chowdhurys’ daughter, an aspiring model.
There were quotes from state Congress chief, Pradip Bhattacharya as well as Dasmunsi in the copy.
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