“A bridge may connect
Isolate quarters
But it does nothing
To calm troubled waters.”
From Join the Rejoinders
by Bachchoo
In the ’90s, when I worked for Channel 4 (UK), a news and views programme I supervised, called The Bandung File, set out to examine the procedures by which Labour Party candidates were allocated what the Indian electoral system calls “tickets” — the nomination to stand as a party’s representative in an election.

This may not sound today like the most pressing news story, but that investigation was instigated by a revolt in the Birmingham Labour Party against the then deputy leader and sitting MP Roy Hattersley. He was facing a noisy revolt from the Left-wing of his constituency party, the noise being about de-selecting him and nominating a more Left-wing candidate.
This Midlands constituency has a large minority of Asian immigrants, mostly Mirpuris from Pakistan, and a substantial number of Bangladeshis.
Roy Hattersley had over the years cultivated this “vote bank” by attending their functions and weddings, speaking up in favour of Pakistan in any debate on the Kashmir issue and being careful to seem pro-Islamic in a mild way. This was way before some local lads of Birmingham and the north turned to fundamentalist and terrorist “jihad”, so Roy wasn’t in any mealy-mouthed way defending, as some parliamentarians have done since, the indefensible.
Our camera crew interviewed several people in the constituency and its Labour Party and was in the process of getting the testimony of an Asian gentleman who had rendered the party some service and was looked upon as an elder and leader of the Muslim community. The crew spent some time in the front room of his small terraced house talking about the selection process which entailed all the registered and paid-up members of the constituency Labour Party casting their votes for or against Hattersley.
The interviewer on this occasion was one of the producers of The Bandung File, the writer Tariq Ali. The interviewee was enthusiastic about being interviewed for national TV and was well aware that this particular local party election was seen as significant to the future of Labour and had aroused the interest of the whole country.
Tariq came back from the interview rather excited. He had a scoop, he told me, and ran the clips for me to view. The interviewee, sitting in a relaxed position on his sofa was telling Tariq that he and a contingent of his fellow Labour Party members unequivocally supported “Roy” and had bolstered their support of him by inventing fictitious members who lived at non-existent addresses and registered them as members of the Labour Party, paid their subscriptions and then cast votes in their name for Hattersley.
Tariq and the crew obtained the fictitious names and went down to the supposed addresses. They had shot footage to demonstrate, for instance, that number 124 and 125 of, shall we say, Kipling Street did not exist. Kipling Street’s houses ran out at number 122.
The interviewee seemed very satisfied that this invention of ghost voters had fixed the election for his mate Roy.
This was dynamite.
“Why did he tell you all this? It could put him in jail.”
Tariq smiled.
“He thought the camera and recorder were off. The cameraman and crew had left it on and walked away to have their tea.”
“Did your crew leave the equipment on deliberately?”
“What do you think?” Tariq asked.
Of course it was a scoop, but some years in the industry had taught me that I couldn’t automatically assume that it could be shown on TV. It was the producer’s job to get the scoop — it was my editorial duty to ensure that the rules of broadcasting had not been breached. I told Tariq I would have to refer the footage to the Channel Controller.
It was tricky. I would show the footage to my boss before having it edited. I was well aware that one factor in the equation was that the chairman of the board of Channel 4 at the time was one Edmund Dell, an ex-minister in the Labour government, an acknowledged Right-winger in the party and a personal friend of Roy Hattersley.
Of course I would plead that broadcasting the information my crew had obtained was “in the public interest”. This is the sole, sane reason for broadcasting anything that has been obtained by stealth or subterfuge.
What we had done wasn’t of course a sting or “hacking” (or “tapping” as the live interception of phone-calls was known), as in News International’s journalistic armoury. Our interviewee was unaware that he was being recorded and had, therefore, boastfully volunteered information which he thought would remain secret.
It was quite a dilemma for our chief executive. He was partially persuaded by my argument — this was a deputy leader of the Opposition having his selection gerrymandered by his well-wishers. In the end it was decided that we could transmit selected passages of the clandestinely obtained footage as long as there wasn’t the faintest allegation that Hattersley himself knew anything about it. The story went out and caused something of a political stink.
The “sting” has established itself as a legitimate weapon of the exposure of wrong-doing. It is obviously in the public interest to know that a defence minister’s entourage accepts bribes in exchange for official favours done. It is arguable that the hacked recordings of international diplomats’ conversations should be transmitted on WikiLeaks.
It has been deemed perfectly okay for Niira Radia’s conversations with politicians and capitalists to be tapped, taped and transmitted by a government agency. If, however, Rupert Murdoch was heard to say that he found the messages left on the poor late Amy Winehouse’s phone very moving, we would be entitled to raise more than an eyebrow. I don’t think the sexual lives of footballers, cricketers, movie stars etc are worth more than a yawn even though vast readerships of sleazy newspapers are interested and think they are fair game.
In the case of the exposure of corruption in India by politicians, political parties, government departments, corporations, civil servants, policemen, the Army, judges or anyone that owes a responsibility to the public, the means of exposure, at this point in our national life, justify the end. It is clearly in the interests of the public to have every piece of corruption, petty and large, exposed. A little hacking towards this end never hurts nobody.