Shillong, Feb 20: One person’s light snack could well be junk food to another person but Sports & Youth Affairs Minister Shakliar Warjri takes the difference seriously, especially when it could hurt the image of his department and the wider government.
It was last month when a photo from the inauguration of the 5th Meghalaya Games in Tura went viral for all the wrong reasons. It purported to show a box of (mostly) junk food given to athletes in lieu of lunch.
Organisers quickly tried to get on top of the problem and apologise in a statement for the “inconvenience” of the “insufficient” food but the image raced around the state and beyond. They never mentioned the words junk food or even light snacks but did say that the visit of the President of India to the opening ceremony did cause disruption to the supply of packaged food.
Yesterday, though, Warjri went on the offensive, calling the allegation that junk food was served to the athletes fake news. He was speaking in the Assembly after the issue was brought up by opposition MLA for Nongkrem Ardent M Basaiawmoit.
And yet he did not deny that the athletes, many of them teenagers, were not served lunch at the venue.
“Due to the visit of the President of India as chief guest, there were certain protocols we had to follow. So we had asked all the athletes to have a heavy breakfast. Before leaving their venues we had asked that they be served brunch. So during the day, only light snacks were served to them. But we also provided them with an early dinner,” he said by way of an attempted explanation. “We are not denying that we took a decision to serve only light snacks at the inaugural. In the world of social media everyone can spread anything and at any time and only 1 or 2 percent have taken that and spread it.”
Because the minister described the news beamed through the internet as false, Basaiawmoit wanted to know what action the government took against the media houses or members of the public who shared and published the ‘fake news’.
Here Warjri’s bluff evaporated. Since only “one or two” people shared the viral image, the government took no action against them, a laughable assertion that Basaiawmoit found hard to believe.
(File photo)
