A tragic car accident took place and an innocent life was brutally cut short. Incidentally, one of the parties involved was actress and current BJP MP Hema Malini. From initial concern about the health of the Dream Girl, the attention swiftly changed to picking fault with the media and Hema Malini's attitude in the aftermath of the incident. A lot of people on social media branded Hema Malini as insensitive, selfish and aloof for not caring about the family in the other vehicle, particularly the little girl Sonam who passed away in the accident. The media was crucified for keeping the focus on Hema Malini, when it should have been on the little girl. The tragic incident went on to provide quite some fodder for dual outrage on social media. Let's venture into the media part later, and first examine Hema Malini's role in the entire incident.

The accident happened in Dausa, 60 odd kms away from Rajasthan's capital Jaipur. Late on Thursday, Hema Malini's Mercedes crashed into a Maruti Alto. There are contradictory reports about which car was going in the wrong direction, but the end result is that the five people travelling in the Alto were injured, including little Sonam, whose injuries turned fatal. Hema Malini's driver was later arrested based on a complaint filed by the Khandelwal family, but was released on bail. From the pictures that have regrettably made their way to social media and from eyewitness accounts in the media, Malini was in an utter state of shock. A doctor who was passing by the same road promptly took her to the Fortis hospital in Jaipur for treatment. According to a PTI report, an eyewitness said that the actress was in great pain. "She was hurt on the back, on her legs and on the forehead. Doctors checked her for internal injuries".

Obviously, the Khandelwal family is well within their rights to believe that prompt treatment could have saved Sonam's life. But it is difficult to understand how Hema Malini can be directly blamed in the entire incident. A 66-year-old veteran hit by the shock and intensity of a car accident would certainly like to reach the safety of a hospital for treatment. The threshold of politically-correct sane reactions often get blurred at a moment of great chaos and hostility. With an ever intrusive media ready to thrust the mike literally into a celebrity's face, the disconnect between them and commoners is growing wide. It's not a sin for Hema Malini to choose the easier way to get out of harm's way. Perhaps the doctor who rescued Hema Malini can be called out for not enquiring about passengers in the other car. Yet again, in a time of emergency, with not much time at hand, sometimes wrong calls are taken.

But the backlash that the actress received simply looked like a case where social media was eager to flog a celebrity just for being rich, influential and well-connected, without trying to understand details of the incident. Bashing Hema Malini was like a low lying fruit, an easy way to shop for cheap Twitter RTs and favourites. In all the brouhaha, the main points worth outraging were missed. Whether companies are making cheap cars compromising on basic safety standards, or why most people only wear seat belts due to the fear of getting a challan from traffic cops. These are deeply uncomfortable questions that most are not ready to debate about. Often, people have a lackadaisical attitude about safety, with a misplaced sense of security that accidents happen to others. These are issues with no easy solutions and slow structural changes in many spheres of public life may save the life of another Sonam, trapped in a similar incident one day. But till then, slamming Hema Malini will only give vent to our collective angst against people who are 'privileged' and nothing else.

Now, for the second issue of why Hema Malini became the cornerstone of media coverage. To quote statistics from 2013, a serious road accident happens every minute in India and on an average, 377 people die in road accidents every day. However, not every accident is highlighted and most get buried as just another statistic. This is the plain truth, however disconcerting it may sound. Celebrities are feted in India by their legions of fans and the media coverage is merely a mirror of this.

The media is often put to sword for covering 'frivolous' content instead of real issues, yet the page views on any website inevitably prove that most people are more interested about Shahid Kapoor's wedding than global warming. This is not to say the media should give away its moral responsibility and merely cater to the lowest common denominator. But it would definitely help if people also start reading what they believe in preaching on social media. So as much as the media is responsible for "apko kaisa lag rahe" type journalism, the mass audience is equally to be pulled up for lapping up sensational bits of coverage more than other news. Even as I type this, Amitabh Bachchan's post on how disgusting it is for people to take selfies at a crematorium has popped up. A voyeuristic society that feeds on every tiny detail about celebrities is what makes the likes of Gautam Gulati an overnight star. Blame the media as much as you want, but also pause for some self introspection while you're at it.