Palakkad MP MB Rajesh explains that only when the national media covers an event does the gravity of the situation is brought to the immediate attention of everyone in the country, including the parliamentarians. “In Parliament, when it is in session, the matters of public importance are discussed during zero hour. And these matters of public importance are usually set by the media; what is given importance by the media,” says Rajesh. “When nearly a million people are in refugee camps and hundreds dead and if this does not count as news then what makes news? What we are seeing is a degeneration of a news sense and alienation of the media from ground reality.” That the political newspeak failed in their duty, or should we say that they succeeded in marginalising Kerala is a point to be discussed at length after the floods have abated.