Sharmistha Gooptu in London
Today, I was watching from my place at the head of the media box who was the first of the Indian team members coming into the ground. Straining my eyes, I caught the movements of Rishabh Pant, who was one of the first to enter. In between, I logged into our different streams — Bangla, English and Hindi to check the quality of the reception or audience feedback as I do every day. And in the Hindi live which was then 20 minutes in the stream, I saw our reporters Rohit Juglan and Subhayan Chakraborty in some discomfort. The stream was going haywire because they were trying to get into convenience stores or dodging around to avoid a drunken individual who was not only following them around but cursing and doing his best to disrupt the live show.
When we cover tournaments and multi-sport events as journalists, we do take a bit of joyful or even drunken exuberance from spectators and fans in our stride. It’s seen everywhere — and when individuals or groups enter the frame with something funny to say, we often invite them to join the discussion or to say something. But the individual in question today was not a fan. He was simply too drunk and abusive. And this is not a one-off for us this time around Lord’s. The day I was here to pick up my accreditation card, way before the Test series started — myself and another senior team member were almost deliberately assaulted right in front of the Lord’s tavern right after we finished recording a video.
Now these are not stray instances. And possibly the police cannot do much except let them off with a stern talking to. The individual troubling Subhayan and Rohit was reported by them and left to the police. Incredibly, some minutes later the same individual, completely blasé, appeared in the backdrop of the English live.
I am told by friends living in London that there is serious poverty and unemployment in areas which are cheek and jowl with some of the most prosperous neighbourhoods. A large part of communities are in decline and racism in high. The man abusing Rohit and Subhayan used the worst of cuss phrases. As journalists, when we endeavour to bring the best coverage this is a part of the trials that come in a day’s work.
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