The demise of Rohit Sardana is a loss for India
One of the four pillars of any democracy is media, the other three being Legislation, Executive, and Judiciary. While the other three work for citizens, the media gives voice to people. Through media, people put pressure on the government and other functionaries to look into those areas that are generally being ignored. In India, people have always been very vocal about their rights, and the media strengthened their voices. Initially, it was only print media that used to speak for the people and give them support outside the ambit of government. However, with the rise of TV media networks, media became an even stronger face. These TV networks which run 24*7 cover every aspect. Even if a piece of particular news is avoided by one media agency, the other one picks it.
One of the icons of the TV news network was Rohit Sardana. He was known for his good oratory skills and amazing sense of humour. National Media of India is mainly into two languages: Hindi and English. Hindi is the most spoken language of India and is referred to on multiple occasions as the national language of India while English is the official language of India and a bridge between India and other countries. Rohit Sardana, who had a good command of Hindi, was one of the prime faces on Hindi News Channels. Having worked in Sahara Samay and Zee News in the past, he has been working with Aajtak for some time which is a leading Hindi News Channel of India. At Aajtak, Rohit Sardana was given a prime-time slot where he used to moderate the debates on various issues among spokesperson of different Political parties.
Rohit Sardana was a pro-Indian news anchor and was often seen as someone who would slam anyone irrespective of his ideology or Political affiliation if they spoke against India’s interests. Despite him being called a Right-wing ideologue by many, he was liked equally by people from all quarters due to his liberal approach and logical thinking.
From India’s time facing the Covid-19 crisis, he tried helping as many people as possible through his Social Media presence. He was quite active on the Micro-blogging website- Twitter and often seen posting SOS messages for people he often didn’t know to help someone or the other.
Recently, he contracted Covid-19, and being a Media personnel, he had to go to his office for shows and debates. Despite the media agencies following strict Covid protocols, he got Corona positive and was shifted to Hospital in Noida. He almost recovered there and even conveyed to his close friends of him returning to his home soon when certainly his death came to light. He is told of dying due to a heart attack. Senior doctors were not there with him at his last moments and he was not treated properly. He was given steroids so to help him stop coughing, however it resulted in his heart failure as he was having high blood pressure problem. As per medical norms, the patient who is having high blood pressure is given steroids under strict monitoring. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that considering India’s medical situation right now, such monitoring was absent which resulted in such a disastrous result making this a clear case of medical negligence.
After news of Rohit Sardana expiring due to a heart attack, millions of people in India were shocked and in grief. Rohit Sardana had a short lifespan of about 41 years, but his work has been exponentially good which not only got him awarded with the prestigious Ganesh Vidyarthi Puraskar Award in 2018 but has made himself known to common household across the nation.
However, there is a saying that you can’t keep everyone happy and even Rohit Sardana was not shielded with criticism. There was a segment that wasn’t very happy with his work and criticized him throughout. But it came as a shock when this group openly celebrated his demise on Social Media platforms including Facebook and Twitter. They openly called him names and mocked him when he wasn’t even there to defend himself. While mocking, these people didn’t even consider the grief of the family of Rohit Sardana which includes his wife and two minor daughters, who he was very fond of. These people even tried to damage his reputation after his demise by wrongly editing his Wikipedia page. These people are trying to defame him for his shows or his stance which they failed to do when he was alive. In public life, differences are obvious. But how this set of groups is celebrating the demise of Rohit Sardana is not only pathetic but is morally low.
No departed soul should face such a low and thus there is a huge population that is standing with his family at this point and have started demanding a probe into his death. They are standing firm with the idea advocated by Rohit Sardana in his life. These heartless people with callous attitudes are being openly condemned by every rational person whatsoever. May the government order a probe into his death because this is not only a demise of a media person but a big loss to India. He was not only a rising star in his field but was the true son of this soil trying to help it reach its glory.
Author: Adv. Shashank Shekhar Jha
Legal Editor, GoaChronicle.com