Stressing that this kind of debate may have adverse effects on one’s health, NCP leader Nawab Malik told HW News that Rajiv Tyagi may have had extreme stress due to the TV channel debate he participated in.
The sudden passing away of Congress national spokesperson Rajiv Tyagi by a heart attack shortly after he finished a heated and intensive debate on Hindi TV channel, has now sparked a debate on the ‘toxic’ debate culture on television news channels.
Talking to HW News about the format of the TV debate shows, Congress Spokesperson prof. Gaurav Vallabh said, “You look at the titles of these shows. They all are divisive in nature. Secondly, the titles are always in favour of the government. Further into these debates, for one Congress spokesperson, there are 4 other “authorized” and “unauthorized” spokespersons of the ruling party.”
“The one person on the panel is from the BJP, one is from the RSS, then they have one specialist who is eventually a BJP supporter. And then there is an anchor. These four people argue with the Congress spokesperson. All questions are asked to the Congress, which is not even in power for the last six years,” Prof. Vallabh added.
Stressing that this kind of debates may have adverse effects on one’s health, NCP leader Nawab Malik told HW News that Rajiv Tyagi may have had extreme stress due to the TV channel debate he participated in that resulted into his tragic death.
“The format in which the debates are by the anchors is very wrong. Anchor has to give equal opportunities to speak to everyone. Instead, it turns into bullfighting. This is not fair. They should change the format of their shows,” Mr Malik added.
Senior journalist Abhisar Sharma, who has been a vocal critic of the way TV debates are conducted, told HW News that the kind of turn debates are taking right now is shocking.
“As far as the issue of “what should be debated” is concerned, the ineffective handling of coronavirus can be debated. Chinese incursion in Indian soil should be debated. These are the issues that should be debated,” Mr. Sharma added.
Answering whether such debates can affect one’s mental health, Mr. Sharma said, “Undoubtedly! These debates can have a toll. When you are part of such debates, your adrenaline is always high. To make matters worse, if you have a problem like hypertension, it kind of adds to that. ”
‘But the problem goes beyond that. Imagine the kind of poison these kind pf debates are injecting in the families of people who watch them. They can have a major impact on kids or vulnerable minds,” he said.
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