MAKE-BELIEVE MEDIA

What is the role played by the media during 2009? “South Asia Media Monitor 2009” has done a survey and it only confirms what every concerned citizen in the state has been complaining about the media – “hyper-commercialisation, monopolisation and excessive political clout”. What we have to add to this list, so far as Andhra Pradesh is concerned, is the absolutely unprofessional conduct of the channels both due to personal agenda of the owners and professional illiteracy of the operators. What is the result of this gross aberration in the media? The South Asia Media Commission (SAMC) says that this has chipped away at professional and ethical norms, most disturbingly in India and Pakistan. How true!

Keeping aside the sub-continent for a moment, let’s look at our own state. People of Andhra Pradesh do not need an analysis from SAMC to understand the media stink which became more unbearable after the pro-T or pro-U agitations were unleashed on them by self-centered politicians or family-oriented political outfits. The common man and the business class alike were of the view that if only the news channels were to be closed for a week, there will be no agitation. It is the most unhealthy competition among the Telugu channels that sustained the movements for and against Telangana. OB vans that are running like Maruti-800 around the state added to the problem with every provocative and abusive byte of ordinary workers going live. This is one example as to how technology can be a double-edged knife!

To whatever suffering the viewers of channels, growing like mushrooms, have been subjected to was given expression by the state High Court when it observed recently that the ”television news channels are turning irresponsible in their dissemination of news”. While warning television news channels against crossing the line, the court also directed the government to ensure that the channels follow the programme code as envisaged in the Cable Television Network Rules.

What did the state government, assuming there is one, do? It simply passed on the buck to the Centre. It urged the Central government to bring in a legislation to rein in private television channels from indulging in sensationalism.
What is the track record of the Centre in invoking the “reasonable restrictions” that the Constitution allows except issuing occasional notices to entertainment channels? Because of the nexus between the media and the political class, the all powerful national media has been blackmailing the government against any independent media monitor and instead insisting on a self-code? This has been going in for years and we are yet to see any code. Even if a self-code exists, with “hyper-commercialisation” being the basic drive engine of the media, will anyone stick to the code unless the government wields a stick? Yes, there are dangers in entrusting the government with a stick, but what is happening now is more dangerous. The stick is with the unscrupulous proprietors who use the channels for pursuing their political and business interests. This is very much true in Andhra Pradesh.
Press freedom makes sense only when the Press functions as it should in a non-partisan and objective manner with greater responsibility as it exemplified itself during the Freedom movement. Now, what we have is a partisan, subjective and irresponsible press with rare exceptions. What is worse, ownership is divided on party lines, especially in the states, funded by people with no commitment whatsoever to professional media. Should the privileges of a free press be applicable to these channels which are run like any other business listed in the stock market?

This is not a peculiar phenomenon to Andhra Pradesh alone. Let’s take the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu. Every political party has a dedicated channel. Atlast even the chief minister has a channel in his honorific name “Kalaignar” though one does not know the legal ownership pattern. Benami holdings are not something new to our politicians. Whatever be the legal ownership, the very title of the channel is enough to outbeat other channels in terms of commercials. Naturally! Which commercial organisation will not like to see its spots in the chief minister’s channel? Should such channels have the privileges of a free Press?
What are the privileges of free Press? If we go by the example set by TV5, NTV and Sakshi TV, no one can raise a finger at them even if they go seriously wrong throwing to winds all norms of journalistic fair play and ethics. They were brazen enough to justify their action when they lifted a report that was carried in a discredited Russian portal and were directly or indirectly responsible for the wanton destruction of private property in the state. Obviously this was done at the instance of some invisible hands.

Though the state government took half-hearted action against the channels, there was a hue and cry that there was an “assault” on the freedom of the Press. For nearly three days, TV5 was running the visuals of arrest of its editors and the “reaction” to such arrests as if nothing else was happening in the world. Viewers were made to believe that there was spontaneous outburst from the journalistic community by way of “rallies”, “dharnas” and “rasto rokhos”. Viewers were told that there were “rallies” in mandal-level places where there may hardly be a dozen stringers. “Effigies” burnt in front of a dozen people will be shot by the channel’s stringer and shown as if there were huge protests. In addition, there will be talk shows to justify their action. “What is wrong if we discuss the merits of a story carried in a Russian portal?” This was the central theme of the talk shows. It was disgusting to see these channels combining in themselves the dual role of news makers and presenters. They created “news” by way of made-to-order “rallies” and presented them. What sort of journalism is this? When the journos shouted slogans against the chief minister like street politicians, can the society expect them to be objective and behave with dignity that the profession demands? It was a sort of “Make Believe Media” that is in action in the state these days.

But to be fair to these johnys-come-lately, the “torch-bearer” for this pernicious trend in the profession is the Eenadu group. There was not even a thin line between its interests and state interests. Its interests were perceived to be in state interest. It started creating news through its stringer network whenever it took up a cause in its own interests and palmed it off as if in public interest. When the group launched a campaign for prohibition in the state two decades ago, it adopted the same “make-believe” technique that the present news channels are faithfully following today.

The Telangana agitation also exposed the intellectual bankruptcy of those who are manning the channels and there was no enlightened debate on the issue. Mandal level politicians were brought to talk shows and made to abuse each other aggravating the tension between the people of two regions besides provoking them for action. Talk shows were nothing but street-level fights enacted in the studios before the cameras with the hosts watching the fun as if they were enjoying cock fights that are common in the districts during Sankranti festival.

When the news channels have degenerated to this level and function as a mafia outfit, do they really need press freedom and the privileges that go with it?