Media - needs to be Tamed

Media is known to be the 4th pillar of democracy, yet it fails in achieving the constitutional goals of our democracy, as rather than being a mode of achieving the ideals, it digraces itself into trivial matters that act more as an irritants than something fruitful.
The pre-independent India saw the media churning out nationalism and creating patriots out of common people, by writing extremely well articulated, precise and detailed news reports, where every word had a meaning. Next came the warrior media, up in the arms against the political turmoil when Emergency was declared in the country.
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With privatisation and mad race of TRPs, the news quality and media ethics has taken a backseat. Today we see media persons of various channels, sometimes mobbing hospitals where a celebrity is admitted or forcing each other to capture the best possible image of a celebrity who has died or making a mockery of his/her relatives and friends, about what they are wearing and whether there make up is upto the mark, when all these friends and relatives want is to be left alone.
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Myriad issues have been plaguing the Indian media since last few decades. The first among it being the menace of 'Paid news', wherein the media houses are paid handsomely to broadcast a sensational news, boasting ones image or tarnishing other' image. According to the Press Council of India's report, paid news is “any news or analysis appearing in any media (print & electronic) for a price in cash or kind as consideration”.The Election Commission feels that paid news, “plays a very vitiating role in the context of free and fair elections” since electors attach greater values and trust news reports more compared to clearly specified advertisements. It has further observed thay, “Paid news is masquerading as news and publishes advertisements in the garb of news items, totally misleading the electors. To make matters worse, the whole exercise involves use of unaccounted money and underreporting of election expenses in the accounts of election expenses of the candidate…”.In the year 2008, The Election Commission of India found around 42 cases of “paid news” which led to Mr. Narottam Mishra's victory in the 2008 Assembly elections of Madhya Pradesh.
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The second ethical aspect that has affected the media in the recent years, is the constant TRP war amongst them. The Broadcast Audience Research Council is a real time Television Rating Point (TRP) measurement system which gives the points based on what viewers are seeing the most, leading to competiton among newsrooms to keep on giving 'Breaking News', even if that means the journalists following the ambulance carrying mortal remains of Actress Sridevi or giving out last frail pictures of Actor Rajesh Khanna or even giving out sensitive information regarding Army's position when Mumbai was under siege, as terrorists attacked vital locations. These measurements of popularity can be seriously flawed.When we see a glaring example of such survey being conducted among National newspaper readership, It was found that, a leading newspaper of Nagpur, The Hitvada with a readership of around 660000 people, it was shown to be having zero readership in the survey, hence trusting such surveys becomes difficult for a common man.
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An ethical and a moral problem today is the increasing blackmailing tactics being used by media houses using sting operations to make a news out of trivial issues.The year 2012 saw Senior Editors of a Television Channel being arrested for demanding Rs 100 crore from Jindal Power and Steel Ltd,for diluting their channel’s campaign against the company in the an alleged Coal scam. The blackmail was exposed when JSPL chairman and Congress Member of Parliament Mr. Naveen Jindal conducted a reverse sting on the network’s executives, bringing out in open the glaring example of big media houses blackmailing persons of repute to earn some quick gains
Circulation of fake news, through social media and visual media, where on one channel a snake gets married to tree and on another we see the God of various religions crying real tears seeing the devotees not putting enough money in the donation box, to reading messages being forwarded by concerned families and friends about impending danger of earthquake in Delhi, which the message claims to have been attested by some random site belonging to NASA, do nothing more than spreading rumours and increasing superstition and fear in the society.
This needs to be halted or at least regulated!
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Indian media is still self-regulated with no comprehensive framework for tackling the growing sensationalising tendencies of business houses. Recently The Standing Committee on Information Technology has identified reasons behind ethical problems affecting the Indian media. From corporatisation of media, desegregation of ownership and editorial roles, to decline in autonomy of editors and journalists and poor wage levels of journalists are the key reasons found responsible for the rise in incidence of concocted news reporting. For this it has urged the Government of India to ensure periodic review of the autonomy of editor and journalists along with their wage conditions. It has also recommended mandatory disclosure of ‘private treaties’ and details of advertising revenue earned by the media houses.
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The Standing Committee highlighted that statutory regulators like the Press Council Of India and the Electronic Media Monitoring Centre (EMMC) lack enough regulatory and punitive powers while self-regulatory industry bodies like the News Broadcasting Standards Authority have overlooked these problems. As most of the higly placed officials of these bodies belong to renowned media houses.
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The Committee has further recommended the establishment of a single Regulatory Body for both print and electronic media or setting-up a Statutory Body for the electronic media on the lines of the PCI. Such regulator should have the power to take strong action against offenders and should certainly not include media owners as members. It highlighted the need for stricter punitive provisions to control paid news and sought further empowerment of the Election Commission of India to deal with cases of paid news during elections.
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With close to 650 television channels, more than 2500 publications and more than 30 FM radio operators, running 245 stations, it is high time that we have crisp yet elaborate Media Laws in our country, so that incidences like above do not occur and reoccur, even if prominent Journalists are of the view that "Such things as sensationalism, exaggeration, mistaken judgements and even false statements made honestly are likely to occur, or at least cannot be totally eliminated, in an environment in which free speech is guaranteed".If not the above then atleast National Press complaint Commission on the lines of United Kingdom should be established, where people can outpour their grievances against the such institutions.
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Author Name: Kalyani Buche