Journalist covers poll across state on a horse
Amid angry debates and blown-up controversies surrounding election reporting, a curious pair in Kerala, involving a horse and a human, evokes more laughs than rage with their coverage of the Lok Sabha polls. When Arun Kumar struggles to climb down from his horse and calls it a “sahasam” – a risky adventure – one has to wonder why then does he want to ride one in the first place to do, of all things, election reporting. Arun is a pretty well-known public figure in Kerala, his methods of reporting always verging on the unusual, from his days as one of the main presenters in 24 News. It therefore took his audience little by surprise when Arun, now a part of the Reporter channel, hopped on a horse called Jacky to cover the Lok Sabha election from Kasargod to Thiruvananthapuram. Arun’s horse reporting – called ‘Aswamedham’ – involves him arriving at a location with Jacky, introducing his ‘vehicle’ to a few people gathering around and then asking the voters about the prospects of the candidates there. The videos are short and meant to be entertaining, with Arun cracking several jokes and getting the people to partake in all the fun, displaying their skills. In Kollam, he gets a voter to sing while in Kasargod he has the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate and a shopkeeper converse in four languages spoken in the neighbourhood - Malayalam, Tulu, Kannada and Konkani. Arun is also often joined by the candidates of the Left Democratic Front or the United Democratic Front, and sometimes the National Democratic Alliance. He keeps the contentious issues short, and keeps the whole thing light-hearted. Jacky the horse often gets a mention as a carrot-eater while Arun harps on local food and bakery items. This is not the first time that Arun went on horseback reporting for an election. Three years ago, he tried this for the Assembly election of Kerala while he was still with 24 News. Arun was also popular for his augmented reality visuals used for presenting news stories in which he too enacted a role.
AMID angry debates and blown-up controversies surrounding election reporting, a curious pair in Kerala, involving a horse and a human, evokes more laughs than rage with their coverage of the Lok Sabha polls.
When Arun Kumar struggles to climb down from his horse and calls it a “sahasam” – a risky adventure – one has to wonder why then does he want to ride one in the first place to do, of all things, election reporting.
Arun is a pretty well-known public figure in Kerala, his methods of reporting always verging on the unusual, from his days as one of the main presenters in 24 News.
It, therefore, took his audience little by surprise when Arun, now a part of the Reporter channel, hopped on a horse called Jacky to cover the Lok Sabha election from Kasargod to Thiruvananthapuram.
Arun’s horse reporting – called ‘Aswamedham’ – involves him arriving at a location with Jacky, introducing his ‘vehicle’ to a few people gathering around and then asking the voters about the prospects of the candidates there.
The videos are short and meant to be entertaining, with Arun cracking several jokes and getting the people to partake in all the fun, displaying their skills. In Kollam, he gets a voter to sing while in Kasaragod he has the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate and a shopkeeper converse in four languages spoken in the neighbourhood - Malayalam, Tulu, Kannada and Konkani.
Arun is also often joined by the candidates of the Left Democratic Front or the United Democratic Front, and sometimes the National Democratic Alliance. He keeps the contentious issues short, and keeps the whole thing light-hearted. Jacky the horse often gets a mention as a carrot-eater while Arun harps on local food and bakery items.
This is not the first time that Arun went on horseback reporting for an election. Three years ago, he tried this for the Assembly election of Kerala while he was still with 24 News. Arun was also popular for his augmented reality visuals used for presenting news stories in which he too enacted a role.
