It is an open secret that the media in Andhra Pradesh is completely divided on political lines.
A section of media is blatantly favouring the Telugu Desam Party and is opposing whatever the YSR Congress party government led by chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy says.
Then, there is pro-YSRC media which defends whatever decisions Jagan takes and targets the TDP and other opposition parties for whatever they do.
In the process, both the sections of media have forgotten to report and analyse what is correct and what is not.
It was once again evident from the way the media in Andhra Pradesh reported the Monday’s Supreme Court interim order on the Amaravati capital issue.
The order was, in fact, just a two-liner, saying the bench was staying the March 3 judgement of the Andhra Pradesh high court with regard to fixing time limit for the completion of works in Amaravati capital.
However, during the course of hearing, the judges in the Supreme Court bench raised several queries, some of which were questioning the government’s decision and others questioning the rationale of the Amaravati farmers.
Naturally, the pro- and anti-Jagan media gave different interpretations to the comments made by the judges to suit their respective political interests.
But what they forgot is that what matters is the final judgement and not the comments made by judges during the course of argument.
The fact of the matter is that the stalemate over retaining Amaravati as the capital of Andhra Pradesh continues, as the Supreme Court has not granted stay on the entire high court judgement, but only a part of it.
The crucial questions remain: whether the Jagan government has the right to form three capitals, whether it is necessary to have all the three wings of the democracy – executive, legislature and judiciary be at the same place; whether there is any precedent of having three capitals for any state; what is the role of the Centre or Parliament in the capital formation; what is the legal sanctity of the lands pooled from farmers in the name of capital city and what will happen to the expenditure incurred on the capital so far etc.
Answers to all these questions cannot be given by the media – whether it is pro-Jagan or anti-Jagan. It is for the judiciary to decide. Till such time, what is written in the media will only serve the political interests of the parties they are supporting.