Anjana Om Kashyap, executive editor from the India Today group has decided to take it upon herself to display exactly what vulture journalism means. An Encephalitis outbreak in Bihar has taken the lives of more than a hundred children and panic has struck the administration and hospitals as they try to overcome the disaster and avert more deaths. But in such a sensitive period, a video has come out in which Kashyap is shown heckling and questioning a doctor in Muzaffarpur, during his duty hours in the ICU. It is clear from the video that the journalist was creating a hindrance in the treatment process and was wasting the time of the doctor by bombarding him with questions, not paying any heed to the answers.
Who allowed @anjanaomkashyap inside the ICU? Is she a Doctor? Is she a Nurse? She is just uttering illogical words and wasting valuable time of the doctor. She is creating nuisance inside the ICU. Is this Journalism?I am shocked. Shame On You Anjana. #MuzaffarpurChildrenDeath pic.twitter.com/JDTAw9YntF
— Mohammad Anas (@anasinbox) June 18, 2019
An Encephalitis outbreak is an unfortunate outcome of the Litchi harvesting season in the district. Every year, many children die due to the twin factor of eating unripe litchis coupled with malnourishment and unhygienic surroundings. Anjana Om Kashyap, on the pretext of checking the conditions of treatment of children, heckled the doctors on duty as if to malign them for medical negligence.
In the video, she is shown questioning the doctor who is trying his best to answer her accurately as Kashyap seems to be twisting his words. Included in her incessant questioning was a blatant statement that a child wasn’t being attended to. The doctor, clearly agitated, explained that the child had just come in and will be tended to soon enough. Yet Kashyap kept on stating that the arrangements aren’t sufficient and the doctors are inadequate. At one occasion, the doctor even stated, “This is not what I said” when Kashyap had blatantly twisted his statement to imply that they will not tend to the children. Moreover, her presence in the ICU was completely unwarranted as only the medical fraternity is supposed to be in there. A reporter, who is being an obstacle in the treatment by wasting the doctors’ and nurses’ time, is completely unwelcome.
In the ICU room, the beds were filled with patients and in order to accommodate maximum number of diseased children, the beds were even shared by 2 or 3 children. The doctors were indulging in this practice solely so that a large number of children can be tended to, at the same time. They were going beyond what a reasonable duty of a doctor is and yet Anjana Om Kashyap was keen on finding faults. She meant to insinuate that the doctors weren’t taking proper care of the children.
After she was done bombarding the doctor with questions, who scurried off to tend to the patients, Anjana Om Kashyap moved on to the nurses of the hospital. She started questioning a nurse by saying that the children aren’t being looked after. The nurse stated that all the children coming in are being looked after to the best of their abilities.
During such a challenging time, when the hospital staff is neck deep in tending to the diseased children, trying their best to save as many lives as possible, Anjana Om Kashyap questioned their pro-active actions and intent. Apart from being a hindrance to the treatment, the overall manner in which Kashyap conducted her reporting in the ICU of the hospital is not only vulture journalism driven by hunger for TRP but also dangerous and irresponsible as, by distracting the doctors, she endangered the lives of children and other patients for whom every minute counts in the event of such an unfortunate encephalitis outbreak.