Rhetoric of power play-political quest in the pages of TOI and Scroll.in

Pages: 2035-2039
S. Shantharaju and H. Naresh Rao (Department of Media Studies, CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bangalore, Karnataka)

Though the quest to gain the ‘Iron Throne’ (phrase popularly used in the TV show Game of Thrones) is common across the country, there are specific instances which make it into news periodically. Goa is one such fragile political space. With the state elections in 2016, the people’s mandate was fractured. None of the parties had a magic number to form a full-fledged government. However, before the party with the largest tally Congress could be given the chance to prove the majority, BJP formed the government with the support of independent MLAs and two legislative members of Congress. Congress continued to voice its dismay at being denied the opportunity at government formation. They voiced, urged, and even paraded their MLAs before the Governor seeking a chance to prove majority on various occasions. The deteriorating health of CM Parrikar added fuel to the ongoing power quest. With his demise on March 17, 2019 both parties started indulging in mud fight for power, one to form the government, other to retain. Sawant, a young BJP MLA, was anointed and sworn in as the new chief minister in the early hours of March 19 within 48 hours of former CM’s demise. Congress termed this as unconstitutional as BJP has a strength of only 12 MLAs in the House of 40. A study would be interesting to see how the media covered the crisis and voiced public opinion. This study involves content analysis of a print newspaper, TOI and the online publication Scroll.in, which then compared to see similarities and differences in their coverage of a high voltage drama being played out in the state of Goa.