Now, the dirty war enters blogdom

Politics - the omnipotent presence - has conquered the blogosphere too: where we thought ideas mattered and creativity reigned.

In a bizarre instance, the Trivandrum Bloggers Group, which has more than 150 members, is witnessing a warfare - a decayed version of Congress-CPM fight- that has almost taken the matters to the Kerala Police’s cyber cell.

Already eight bloggers have been thrown out of the group by the administrator (who is the owner of the group as per Google rules) and the admin himself claims to have resigned his role and handed over the seat to an ‘unknown’ admin. The thrown-aways are learnt to have met and decided to move the cyber cell against the admin. Things unheard of before.

A lens eye would reveal politics as the villain. The discord had actually stemmed out of the Lavalin issue, grown with the fanfare that Tharoor won in the group and branched out with every Tharoor-Pinarayi-posts.

The latest fight had, however, begun with a member, Pratheesh, using foul language against Rahul Gandhi and the Prime Minister while referring to the phone tapping issue. The admin, S.Chandrasekharan Nair (Kerala Farmer) reprimanded him, but things only turned worse and ended with the admin ousting Pratheesh and Riyad (who had supported Pratheesh in his arguments).

The group suddenly turned alive. The discussion thread grew long with members, many of whom had been passive till then, joining the fray. At the end of the discussions, the group saw seven others too being thrown out. Interestingly, four of them are journalists. Varun Ramesh, Sebin, Anu Warrier, Antony Boban, Mayoora, Anandan and Santhosh Kumar were the bloggers ousted. Santhosh was, however, taken back later.

‘’It is the bossy attitude of the admin which has resulted in the split. You may be young or old and pursuing different jobs, but in the blogosphere, what matters is your opinion. We are not talking about individuals, instead we argue on concepts and ideas. A group of individuals cannot dictate the general opinion of a group, which is what has happened here,’’ says T C Rajesh, a returnee to the group after he resigned a couple of months before alleging negative ambience in the group.

Chandrakumar (blogger name Uncle), who often dons the role of trouble-shooter in times of dispute, says: ‘’It is basically a matter of intolerance. Political divides must not be reflected in a group, but sadly, it has dominated the group.’’ He has stopped playing the mediator.

The group, which was started three years ago, strains to remember a healthy discussion that has happened for sometime now. Pratheesh, allegedly a staunch Pinarayi-fan, had snatched the issue to combat Kerala Farmer, a loyal Tharoor-fan, going by the comments of many bloggers. Posts supporting Tharoor were pouring in during the IPL controversy and Tharoor himself had expressed his gratitude to the group for supporting him. That, obviously, was indigestible to CPM-fellow travellers in the group. With many Left-loyalists taking sides of the ousted members, the split was only natural.

‘’Democracy has taken a new meaning in the group- keep your mouth shut. The negative vibes emanating from several bloggers are killing the spirit of blogging,’’ says a blogger. It, however, cannot be brushed away that 15 new members have joined the group recently.

Latest, the rebels met and are toying with the idea of taking the matter to the cyber cell. On the other hand, the admin says problems have ended. ‘’I only followed the Google laws which says admin is the owner of the group. True, I am a Tharoor supporter. That’s because I value the education and experience of a leader who has had international exposure,’’ he says.

The new admin, however, is unknown to the group. ‘’There is a tendency to irritate the admin and create problems. So, for the time being, admin is better left unidentified,’’ Kerala Farmer says.

Opposition group points out that this exactly is the authoritarian attitude that they are against. It only remains to be seen if another party..oops..group will be formed by the rebels or whether they decide to merge once again.

ashapnair@expressbuzz.com