The Washington Post’s Disparagement of India, Even in the Guise of Space News Reporting!
Recently, a friend of mine from California shared an article from The Washington Post with me. The title of the piece reads, ‘India’s lunar landing leaves a nation enthralled and briefly unified.’
‘Briefly Unified!’
It’s truly hard to fathom this non sense!
Having resided in the USA for over a decade, I maintain strong connections with many American friends. In fact, my professional network is more extensive in America than in India. However, it’s a stark reality that American media often portrays India in a negative light, and this applies to many other countries as well. Americans are good, not their media!
I urge my fellow Indians not to be swayed by articles like these. Personally, I rarely read these newspapers. Occasionally, people message me about such instances, shedding light on the inaccuracies and biases against India.
India has always demonstrated unity. There’s no such thing as ‘brief moments’ of it. Can Washington Post educate us on other brief moments in history India was united? Being an Engineer and Space Scientist, I myself wonder, if this newspaper measured the brief moment of Unity in India in seconds or milliseconds! I’m left wondering under what capacity these publications even make such claims.
This is just one example highlighting why Indians shouldn’t take articles from newspapers like The New York Times or The Washington Post, or any American publication, too seriously.”
Incase if you want to read the whole article here is the link. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/08/24/india-moon-lunar-landing-modi/
Similarly, another author of Indian origin, Barkha Dutt, wrote an article asserting that ISRO scientists were underpaid. The original title was “Underpaid scientist made India moon landing..” Later she changed the title to ” The unsung heroes of India’s moon landing”. However, google got a good capture and we got a snapshot on google capture! It’s possible this author moonlights as ISRO’s payroll manager.
In the same article, (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/08/31/india-moon-landing-brain-drain/) she asserts that the ISRO chairman is an unknown figure and may not be invited to a White House dinner. When I encounter statements like these, it’s disheartening! Why should we concern ourselves with a White House dinner and its relevance to the Indian space program? The identity of the ISRO chairman need not be in the limelight. We, as scientists and engineers, are here to work diligently. That’s all. Sometimes our work gets noticed by society and sometimes not. Thats about it. That’s the nature of our profession. We’re not chasing ratings or seeking publicity. I can go on and on about these type of people and their dis-illusional mentality. It is best to ignore such people and keep focus on development agenda for India.