News?

Main Entry: news
Pronunciation: 'nüz, 'nyüz
Function: noun plural but singular in construction
Usage: often attributive
1 a : a report of recent events b : previously unknown information (I've got news for you) c : something having a specified influence or effect (the rain was good news for lawns and gardens -- Garrison Keillor) (the virus was bad news)
2 a : material reported in a newspaper or news periodical or on a newscast b : matter that is newsworthy


So, when I read that "APJ Abdul Kalam, the country's top missile guru who rose to become President, was caned for being a naughty boy in school" as a news on ToI "News" page, my first thought was he visited some school, and was caught spraying ink on a teacher's back. Those were the days when we... oh, back to the point...

My second thought was that, this was definitely 1b and 2a, maybe a bit of 1c (it was a funny news for me), but definitely not 1a and 2b in Merriam Webster's definition of the word "news", as given above.

Now that we are on ToI, let's move to "Movies" page. There, you will find a piece called, "Upen is Akshay Kumar" Don't ask who is Upen, as that is beside the point here. The first line of the article reads, "No, Akshay Kumar is not going around impersonating a younger Upen Patel." Doesn't that sound a bit (completely) opposite to what the headline would suggest?

And then, let's go over to Rediff... which reports the PM, "We'll test Pakistan after giving terror evidence: PM" Nothing wrong at all in that, but am I the only one here who has visions of Pakistan (in guise of Gen. Musharraf) standing as a nervous, sweating schoolboy in front of our PM (who is wearing the typical school teacher dress, cane in hand) asking him to recite, err... evidence (or something like that) or he will give him a fatal beating?