“Paid news” in Parliament: Speaking in the Lok Sabha on March 3, 2010, the then Leader of the Opposition and senior BJP leader Shri L.K. Advani said election campaigns should be publicly funded while expressing concern about the phenomenon of paid news which he described as a very serious issue. He said publications and television channels should be made to account for the revenue generated from paid news. On March 5, 2010, the Rajya Sabha took up a discussion on paid news on the basis of a calling attention motion moved by Shri Sitaram Yechuri of the Communist Party of India -Marxist, in which the Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting Ambika Soni and the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Shri Arun Jaitley of the BJP participated. Here are excerpts from their speeches. Smt Soni stated: In recent months there have been a number of media reports that sections of the electronic and print media have received monetary considerations for publishing or broadcasting news in favour of particular individuals or organizations or corporate entities, what is essentially advertisements disguised as news. This has been commonly referred to as the paid news syndrome. While this is not a new phenomenon, it has attracted greater public attention of late, and is being widely discussed and debated across the country. It has been reported that the owners of some media organizations have financial relationships, including share-holdings, with advertisers. Further, cases have been reported wherein identical articles with photographs and headlines have appeared in competing publications carrying bylines of different authors or sometimes even without bylines, around the same time. On the same page of specific newspapers, articles have been printed during elections, projecting rival candidates, both as winning candidates! While it is widely agreed that it is not easy to find proof for such malpractices, there exists strong circumstantial evidence. Shri Yechuri stated that paid news was not merely a serious matter influencing the functioning of a free press, but it is an issue that also concerns the future of parliamentary democracy in India. He added: …the role of the Fourth Estate or the media has always been very crucial in disseminating unbiased information to the people and helps them understand the policies that are involved in governance as also to decide as to who would be capable of effective governance in the country. So, this is an issue that not only affects the media or the Fourth Estate but it also affects the future of parliamentary democracy in our country….providing access to unbiased, unfiltered and objective news or information is the role that media is supposed to play. This comes under very severe strain with the emergence of the paid news syndrome. The Honble Minister has said that the phenomenon of paid news is not a new phenomenon. But it is a completely new phenomenon in terms of the staggering proportion it has reached and the corporatization of media houses has actually led to a situation whereby this sort of paid news is no longer confined to any one print medium or electronic media. There are instances where large media houses not only own print media but also own electronic media and radio waves. These media houses offer packages for the projection of certain individuals in all the forms of media that they own and control. This distorts parliamentary democracy in multiple ways: (a) (the) media ceases to be objective and, therefore, distorts public perception; (b) it distorts the electoral political choices of the people by providing undue advantage to those candidates/political parties who are able to afford these packages, (c) it manipulates democracy, negating it completely by denying or by not providing equal access to those who cannot afford to indulge in such malpractices thereby breaching the provisions of the Constitution of India, and (d) it demeans the idea and essence of journalism itself. There are of course well-meaning and good journalists, who have actually played a stellar role in shaping public policy in our country and in guiding political parties into directions that are better for the country and its people. Such journalists have been completely weeded out of this sort of system. In order to protect journalism from getting into this abyss, it is necessary to prevent journalism from being muscled by corporate powers. …I draw the attention of the Honble Minister and the government that it is not enough to deliver morally sanctimonious lectures. A serious effort needs to be made to ensure probity and accountability on the part of media houses. As per reports, the size of the paid news market in Andhra Pradesh in the elections in 2009 alone was over Rs 1,000 crore (this is a very gross underestimation). In Maharashtra, which is the cradle of paid news, the size of the market has reached a figure of some thousands of crores. It was for this reason that I said on some other occasion that elections in India are the single largest stimulus for the economy. Huge amounts of money are being spent on paid news and this completely distorts news. I, therefore, suggest that there needs to be accountability on the part of media houses and journalists. I cannot, however, specify how this accountability is to be ensured. But, one method is to institute an enquiry wherever such complaints come up. If it is established that any newspaper or news channel has been indulging in this practice, the government must stop doling out its advertisements in that newspaper or news channel. Unless some deterrents of this sort are thought out, it will not be possible, at least, to control this phenomenon which is a very serious malady affecting our parliamentary democracy. Apart from putting in place such deterrent action, a consciousness against paid news needs to be generated in society. Shri Arun Jaitley stated: … I completely share the spirit and substance of what my friend, Shri Yechury, said. I only disagree with him partly on his suggestion of possible solutions. The menace has assumed such large proportions that a solution cannot be to just deny them government advertisements. I have read the statement of the Honble Minister, which is actually based on two premises - first, that this constitutes free speech; second, that the Press Council of India, which I would state is a toothless wonder, is already looking into the matter. And, therefore, both these premises, that the Press Council of India is capable of finding a solution to this, and that this is an expression of free speech, are fundamentally erroneous. Therefore, if we are to suggest a solution, as Shri Yechury has suggested of not releasing advertisements from governments in those newspapers, the magnitude of the problem, which is so large, is to be kept in mind and the solution suggested has to be proportionate to the problem and the evil that is sought to be curbed. And, what is the problem? The problem is that about a decade ago we noticed that during elections some strange media organizations would ask for money over and above the money paid for advertisements. In the last two years, the phenomenon has grown disproportionately in the sense that there has been the evolution of paid packages which are news packages. Whatever the Honble Minister has highlighted in the statement is all evidence of that. Not only this, political parties and candidates are being compelled to pay to prevent blackout of their campaigns by media houses and to prevent disproportionate coverage to rival candidates. Some respectable media organizations, as I witnessed in the last general elections, legitimized this practice. It was legitimized by the former organization of broadcasters, saying to its members that all of you must, now, form a cartel and increase your rates over and above commercial advertising for political advertisement. This was called election premium. And, when candidates and political parties protested as to why they were being charged more, they were told that they would be compensated by way of live coverage of rallies and of press conferences. Therefore, coverage of rallies and press conferences got linked to those who paid this extra election premium. This is where the problem stands. Therefore, if the government has a will to stand up and find a solution, it would be possible to find solutions. Once paid news is sent to the arena of business, it would be clear to establish that it is nothing more than trade and that too a trade with an unlawful objective. It is unlawful because there is violation of the Income Tax Act. You are taking money in a colour which is not permitted. You are inciting people and involving people by wholesale violation of electoral laws. You are subverting one of the basic features of Indias Constitution which is the conduct of free and fair elections, and, therefore, the entire exercise that is being done is a complete corruption of the electoral process and is a trade or a business with an unlawful purpose. The government needs to set up a regulator. The world over, regulators have now started a new system. Prosecutions take years and years and nobody is scared of them and so the regulators hear these matters and deterrent penalties are imposed. Look at the competition law. If somebody is accused of cartelization, the penalty will be ten times the volume of business. So, it may be Rs 50 crore or Rs 100 crore. In the case of media organizations, you need not be so harsh; it could be lesser. But certainly, it has to be a deterrent penalty. In the case of (a) candidate, it has to be an offence under election laws of the world…. (The phrase) corrupt practice must be amended in the Representation of the People Act and this should be a ground for setting aside the election and disqualifying the candidate and if parties indulge in this…there must be action against this. My question therefore to the Honble Minister is, (whether) the government is willing to accept (the) position that this is a trade and business with an unlawful purpose which has started…It threatens Indian democracy. Are you merely going to ask the Press Council to look into this matter or are you going to take some precipitate action as far as this is concerned?
Posted on: Mon, 20 Jan 2014 02:25:34 +0000
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