Much is being said about leaks at the moment. How is it that dressing-room and team-management issues are regularly finding their way to the media in Indian cricket? ‘Leak’ and ‘gossip’ are the two buzzwords at the moment. Frankly, every exclusive story is a leak. If there were no leaks, there would be no exclusives. The entire industry would then work on press releases. No journalist would ever break a story and it would all be boring. It is only natural that a journalist would seek an exclusive. It is part of his or her job. When I recruit someone for RevSportz, I will always check if he or she has broken exclusive stories. It is part of our DNA.
Go to any editor or journalist worth his or her salt, and check if they haven’t asked for an exclusive and the privilege of getting it first. If someone says that he or she hasn’t, all I will say is that it’s a bare-faced lie. Each of us wants our exclusives, because our professional standing depends on it. We all want to be the ones to get it first. That’s the nature of the game. The media has forever operated like that. A story is passed on to someone who can make it worth the trouble. Would the Prime Minister or Home Minister or any other senior politician speak to any and every journalist? Why do only some newsmakers get to speak to them? Does every media house get the same number of exclusives? And why do the top media houses play up these very same exclusives?
For the Latest Sports News: Click Here
In fact, what is more interesting is that there was apparently a discussion in the BCCI review meeting over leaks. And this discussion from the review meeting too got leaked! The truth is there have always been leaks, and there will always be going forward. To blame a young player without evidence is wrong. To target someone like Sarfaraz Khan is utter nonsense. Just like targeting Sahil Malhotra’s family for getting the Jasprit Bumrah story wrong is disgusting. Sahil could have got the story wrong. His family had nothing to do with it. And there is not one journalist in the entire world who can claim to have got everything right. In such a case, he or she is not a journalist. Such a person is God and there are no Gods in journalism.
When a story acquires a life of its own on Twitter or Instagram, like the Bumrah one, a public spectacle will inevitably follow. And it has in this case as well. That’s when things get out of control. It is for us all to realise that it is time to draw the line. I don’t really know Sahil well. In fact, I hardly know him. But I can tell him one thing – he will be more resilient after this incident. He will know that trolls don’t matter and it is all of little relevance in the end. Rather, he will do many more exclusives in the future and even if he gets a few wrong, that won’t matter to him. And trust me when I say this – the exclusives he or any of us do will always be based on some leak or the other!
Also Read: Getting India stars back into the Ranji Trophy is a welcome change
The post Leaks are every-day part of the journalism game, but it’s wrong to target players or journalists for them appeared first on Sports News Portal | Latest Sports Articles | Revsports.
