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The Problem with Mr Vishweshwar Bhat and the Indian Media

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No, unfortunately, I haven’t returned to blogging regularly (I’m not missing it at all, sorry). And, this is one of the reasons why: Mr Vishweshwar Bhat, pictured above, and the Indian media. Apparently, Mr Bhat is a big shot editor in Karnataka, who heads the KanndaPrabha newspaper (Karnataka’s most popular Kannada newspaper) and also a Kannada news channel.

He doesn’t seem to care that his newspaper has used one of my personal copyrighted images, from my blog, in this article without my permission. I sent him a message earlier this week on Facebook, drawing his attention to the fact and asking for it to be removed. He read the message and didn’t bother to reply, despite me prompting him a second time. I also left a comment on the article. It hasn’t been responded to either.

Ah, but why should I be surprised? And, why should I only make an example of Mr Bhat.

I did a reverse Google image search for the image, which was taken from this blog post, and is of my mother in law and me. Much to my astonishment, I was presented with three pages of results. That’s three pages of links to Indian websites that have taken and used my image without my permission. Funnily enough, their articles have nothing to do with me.

I wonder, if I contacted them all, how many of them would bother to take the image down? Or, how many of them would be like Mr Bhat and not care that 1) I may not wish to have a personal image of my mother in law all over the media. 2) It violates copyright (and I have an explicit copyright clause on my blog post).

Based on my past experience, I expect the majority of them would do nothing. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve discovered photos of me being used inappropriately, on everything from websites to advertising brochures in India.

Who could forget the Marathi newspaper that digitally altered my picture to look like Katrina Kaif? The incident was so notorious it even ended up on a very popular Mumbai gossip blog. Of course, the editor of the Marathi newspaper didn’t care either, just like Mr Bhat.

Most recently, a mass distribution brochure from a local paint shop was delivered to my house. Can you imagine my shock to find this image of me featured on it!

The common attitude in India is that I should be thankful for the recognition and publicity — after all, any Indian woman would be. (Well thanks, but I get plenty of unwanted attention in this country already, and don’t want or need any more. I’m not an egomaniac).

However, it’s the reason why my image is constantly used that really pisses me off.

There are plenty of images of Indians to choose from, so why use an image of a white person, considering that the target audience is Indian?

Oh yes, it’s because this country is fascinated with white skin! And white skin gives interest and credibility to articles and advertising.

It is sad and pathetic. And, even more so because publications don’t care to be accountable for their actions. (Accountability in general isn’t India’s strong point really).

Over the years, I’ve contacted numerous publications and websites about the inappropriate use of my images without my permission. Only one has bothered to respond — the editor of a wedding magazine from Chennai, which took one of my personal wedding photos and published it. Not only did he apologize profusely for his staff’s action, he published the apology in the magazine, and sent me two copies of the magazine free of cost.

The moral of the story is that I should watermark my images. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. If I’d known how the Indian media would behave, I definitely would have. Silly me, I was naive to assume that the media in India had the same high standards about use of images and content as the western media, which I work in.

Indian websites have also blatantly stolen my content from my About.com India Travel Website. Last year, I discovered that a well known Indian news website had copied one of my articles about Durga Puja in Kolkata. It was a full cut and paste job. I reported it to Google, as I’ve done with many other Indian websites that have breached copyright, and the article was promptly de-indexed.

Thankfully, such matters are taken seriously in the western world.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering where I got Mr Bhat’s photo from, I took it from his Facebook profile. Without his permission of course. I don’t expect he’d mind. I’m giving him publicity of course.


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