There is a sense of palpable relief among Hindu activists in Tamil Nadu after a Christian home for the destitute, St Joseph’s Hospice, finally emerged as the focus of adverse media attention as gruesome details emerged about possible bone trafficking of the deceased. Local authorities announced yesterday (26 February) that they will shut down the institution with immediate effect and inmates will be shifted to other homes.

The protests culminating in the closure of the institution once again brought to the fore the festering issue of deep-rooted anti-Hindu bias in Tamil news channels. Tamil Hindu field activists and social media warriors point out many instances to make their case. When two adult women, exercising their free will, took up brahmacharya (monkhood) as a spiritual path, there was widespread debate in Tamil media, often portraying the Isha Center negatively, with news anchors often taking a visibly hostile anti-Hindu position.

But why is there no such commensurate coverage on the shocking allegations leveled by villagers in the vicinity involving the disposal of 1,600 destitute bodies by a foreign-funded Christian non-governmental organisation (NGO) run by a Kerala pastor?

A section of the media could well counter the charge of anti-Hindu bias by pointing out that at least two to three mainstream news channels did extensively cover the murky happenings inside the St Joseph’s Hospice. While conceding on the limited coverage of the horrifying events in the hospice, the activists point to a deeper structural anti-Hindu bias deeply embedded in the Tamil news media. If a Hindu “Swami” is caught in a scandalous situation, it is portrayed as an essential and inevitable outcome of the superstitious and exploitative nature of Hinduism, while the case of the Christian NGO is shown as an exception – a tiny island in the ocean of Christian charity and love.

In the summer of 2010, the Nithyananda ‘scandal’ burst forth upon Tamil Nadu. The media went berserk. The Hindu spiritual leader himself went into a confused defensive mode and provided explanations ranging from ‘it was a morphed video’ and they were in a ‘state of higher consciousness’ to arguments like ‘whatever happened was not illegal’ and so on. The loyal members of the sect also claimed that the video was fake.

The Real Scandal

What was really scandalous was the prime-time airing of the video – an obscene violation of the privacy of two individuals, two consenting adults. Whether the act is unethical is something the believers of the cult need to debate among themselves. The media in Tamil Nadu, however, became obsessed with the ‘Swami’ and the actress. It should have been an unimaginable torture for the actress. If at all this writer has to credit the so-called Swami with a miracle, it is that the actress survived the media’s onslaught bravely. It was as if the media had turned into a lynch mob. Cartoons flooded the magazines. Spoof videos abounded on social media. Nithyananda and his saffron attire became a symbol of sex scandal in the collective psyche of people. Dravidianists and anti-Hindu intellectuals vied with each other to pen opinion-editorials condemning not just Nithyananda but the entire sanyasi legacy of Hinduism.

Nithyananda was just a name; the real target was Hinduism. It was an opportunity for some to pour out the visceral hatred that the dominant elements in the media have for Hinduism.