When I switched on my Telly on the evening of Saturday, I saw something about saving the prince. I initially thought that Prince Charles is in some sort of danger but I realised it is not that price. It is a 5-year-old boy named Prince who had fallen in a 1 feet wide and 57 feet deep ditch in a place in Haryana made famous by the battle of Kauravas and pandavs in Mahabharat.

Watching it further I realised that the army was trying to save the boy. There was a well quite close to the hole where he fell and the army was digging the well further and then a new tunnel to reach Prince. In the mean time someone informed the news channels and they went there as well. For the next 24 hours Zee News, Aaj tak, Star news and some other news channels as well were only showing one thing. Suddenly everything in the world stopped or there was nothing-newsworthy happening in the world.

I think Zee TV was the first to get there and after every 30 seconds they kept reminding the same to the viewers. Before I go on, let me be clear that I really appreciate that the news channels took interest in the battle of Prince and they gave it enough publicity to it to make even the prime minister interested in it. How much of it has actually helped in saving the boy I am not sure.

The presenter of Zee News kept saying "Prince ki bachane ki jo muhim chedi hai ZEE News ne..." (The mission to save Prince started by Zee News) I felt like asking him what exactly have they done. They had just gone their with their cameras, they didn't got army to get into action, and it is very unlikely that the army would have given up or had stopped mid way if the TV crew was not their either to cheer them up or to show the entire country what they are doing.

None of the news channel tried to find out why the hole was dug and why it was left open for anyone to fall in it. They announced that they will bear the expense of Prince's education. They became good samaritans by pledging help but will they keep their promise? With so many talent show winners accusing TV channels for not paying the prize money, I am not so sure.

It was very transparent, and the channels didn't even make any attempt to hide it either, that they are not interested in the wellbeing of Prince or anyone else. Their sole interest was the TRP; they were interested in how many people are watching their channel right now. I won't be surprised if they were secretly wishing that Prince stayed down there for one more day so that they can further exploit it.

When I was a kid, there were two news bulleting of half hour each, one in Hindi and one in English. Now they have so many news channels that are showing news 24 hours a day. How is that possible? Is it because there is a lot more news worthy events in the world today? I guess not. The news is not news anymore, it has become entertainment.

A state sponsored TV channel can afford to have a news bulletin the purpose of which is to keep people informed, make them aware of what is happening. A private channel has another agenda. It has a business plan and a business model. It has to meet its expenses, it has to pay the salary of the staff and then it has to make money for the investors and that is not going to be possible by just by telling us the news. What is required is a store with which people can relate to and something that can glue them to the TV.

More viewers= More ads/higher ad rates=MORE MONEY

This is not only limited to TV, the news papers are following the same with Times of India being the fore runner in this. How desperate having a higher reader base in important for them can be guessed by two things. In Delhi, they used to hand out a free paper who entered various parks for their morning walks and in Bombay they give away their tabloid Mumbai Mirror free of cost to everyone who buys a TOI and then claim that Mumbai Mirror is second in terms of circulation.

Coming back to the point, let's consider the case of Mumbai Mirror that demonstrates what the newspaper is willing to do to create a sensation and cashing it on it. On Thursday the front page featured the picture of a couple that was supposed to be the son of Pakistani cricketer Javed Miandad and a fugitive and underworld gangster Dawood Ibrahim. In reality the couple was from Chennai and had no connection with either Javed or Dawood. You would expect a newspaper to be responsible enough to make sure what they are printing is correct or not. Well that would have happened if their aim were to inform people and not create a sensation.

More readers= More ads/higher ad rates=MORE MONEY