Open Forum

New Delhi, 11 November 2011

Corruption In Press

PAID NEWS, ANYONE?

By Proloy Bagchi

Who would have ever thought that there could be corruption in dissemination of news? True, one knew of unscrupulous and slimy businessmen, with the help of politicians, cornering subsidised newsprint and then disposing it of at a profit. Generally, this happened in the backwaters where affordable tabloids rule. But big press barons indulging in corrupt practices like “paid news” was unthinkable.

And yet, “paid news” has drawn its first blood. Whereby, a MLA of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly Umlesh Yadav has been disqualified by the Election Commission (EC) from contesting any election for three years. The reason? She failed to include the monies spent by her on advertisements eulogising herself which were published as news items in two Hindi papers in her election expenses. The EC doled out this punishment after a reference from the Press Council of India (PCI) holding the two Hindi newspapers guilty.

Another politician, former Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan too has just lost his case against the EC in Delhi High Court. He had challenged the Election Commission’s powers to investigate expenses incurred by him during the 2009 Assembly elections. As a national English  newspaper reported, Chavan’s case was one which “embarrassed major newspapers that had run scores of hagiographic full pages of ‘news’ on the ex Chief Minister during the poll campaign....pages without a single advertisement on them....and so much as a mention of his rivals in his Bhokar constituency...” The High Court dismissed the petition as “devoid of merit” but Chavan has since gone in appeal to the Supreme Court.

Significantly, the media watch dog Press Council of India (PCI) which is statutorily charged with the responsibility of governing the conduct of the Indian print (and broadcast) media, defines ‘paid news’ as “any news or analysis appearing in any media (print or electronic) for a price in cash or kind as consideration”.

According to a seasoned journalist, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, who headed the PCI sub-committee to investigate the phenomenon of paid news, substantial sections of the media have become participants and players in practices that contribute to this growing use of money-power in politics.

“The entire clandestine operation has become widespread and now cuts across newspapers and TV channels, small and large, in different languages.... Worse, these illegal operations have become organised involving ad agencies and public relation firms besides journalists, managers and owners of media companies. The so-called ‘rate cards’ or ‘packages’ are distributed which often include rates for publication of ‘news items’ not merely for praising particular candidates but also criticise their political opponents.”

Accordingly, numerous favourable or complimentary ‘paid news’ reports on certain candidates appeared in newspapers across the country in the run-up to the last general and State Assembly elections without disclosing that these were actually advertisements published on payment.

Thus, the deception by media houses assumed three facets. One, the reader was led into believing that it was ‘news’ and not an advertisement. Two, the candidates did not include the expenditure on the “ad” in their election expenses. The last but not least, media houses, having received the moneys in cash, did not include it in their balance sheets.

Another former senior journalist who left the profession having got fed up with the commercialisation of the newspaper industry is scathing about the goings-on within. Said he, “The Indian media industry has unapologetic clarity about the nature of its business: It sells media platform to commercial clients, not news to readers.”

Arguably, with proprietors least interested in selling what good journalists produce, the crisis in India is not one of the media industry but of the profession of journalism. “News today is paid news by politicians, ‘private treaties’ with advertisers, celebrity coverage for a fee, PR feeds masquerading as reportage, a business story slanted to serve the stock market, the deserving story not done, he added disgusted with the current scenario.

Consequently, with the marketing departments of media houses setting the agenda for the editors, India’s media barons are not really in the news business. Look at the dichotomy. And yet, news is unavoidable --- to fill the gaps between the advertisements.

Underscoring what famous American philosopher and activist Noam Chomsky calls them: “News holes” which are filled up by news after the advertising layout is decided. This happens even in the prestigious newspaper New York Times which has been accused of “distorting, censoring and suppressing truth”, influenced as it is by the Establishment and various large US corporations.

According to renowned American author and researcher Stephen Lendman the US media delivers “a daily diet of ‘managed news’, infotainment and ‘junk food news’...” keeping people uninformed about what matters most.

Undoubtedly, this description snugly fits the Indian media too. News today serves various commercial interests or those of the Establishment in accordance with predilections of the owners, who hardly bother about the interests of the readers. States Chomsky, barring the singular exception of The Hindu, Indian media is “pretty restricted, very narrow and provincial and not very informative, leaving out lots of things.”

While most of the national dailies have their respective patrons and/or benefactors whose agenda they necessarily have to push, the regional and sub-regional press is generally out for sale. Though it is the second biggest market for newspapers with around 40,000 odd newspapers published country-wide and the reading public consumed 99 million copies in 2007, its independence is something which one cannot vouch for.

Any wonder, the country was placed at 122^nd out of 178 on assessment of press freedom last year by the Reporters Without Borders --- For Press Freedom, a non-profit organisation that works for freedom of information. Therefore, frequent claims of the Indian media being independent, unbiased and pillars of our vibrant democracy have to be taken with fistfuls of salt. 

In the ultimate, indeed it is a pity that the report of the Thakurta sub-committee was buried. Reportedly under the pressure of media houses who were caught sinning by the Press Council. Flexing their muscles, the large media houses, who should have been in the dock, successfully foiled all attempts to bring out the truth.

The new PCI Chairman Justice Markandey Katju has already condemned the Council as “ineffective” but has at the same time called for more teeth and enlargement of its scope to include even the electronic media.

It would perhaps be more desirable for him, for the present, to whittle down the hegemony of the press in the Council. If necessary by amendment of the Press Council Act 1978, and reduce its overwhelming representation (almost 66%) to lend to the Council greater objectivity in dealing with its aberrant conduct. ---- INFA

(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)