Mangaluru: “The news which really needs to be covered is ignored and irrelevant news gets prominence today”, said Siddharth Varadarajan, Founder President of the ‘The Wire’ during a talk on “What is Happening to the Media in India”, organised at B V Kakkilaya Oration-2017 programme in Eric Mathias Hall, St. Aloysius College here on November 4.
“If the government is pursuing the policies which are faulty and erroneous, it is the role of the media to highlight such issues. But now the media has become a business. Today there is a perception that media on the whole is failing in the society because of the unprecedented level of pressure. The media remains reluctant to report various issues because of the pressure. Pressure comes in a variety of ways from outside and within the firm”, he explained.
Siddharth, analysing media pressure, stated that the pressure on the media was extremely harmful for the future of the country, the democracy and the rights of the people.
“In the present day, the media is less willing to cover the issues that the government finds embarrassing. Instead, they are more willing to cover the issues that promote the news that the governments prefer. Another complication is that despite the large number of newspapers in circulation and TV channels in operation, a vast majority of them have the business model which doesn’t encourage editorial integrity. They run TV channels and newspaper industries as they would run other businesses. Large sections of media owners are not bothered about editorial standards or serving the public interest and devoting resources to covering the issues that need to be covered in a country like India”, Siddharth added.
Coming down heavily on the central government for pressuring the media, he said, “Two national dailies, after posting the report on Jay Sha’s company’s increased turnover, have removed the reports from their websites. There is a media department at the PM Office which monitors the media and puts pressure or leans on proprietors. Proprietors are can be relied on by the government in such cases as most of the proprietors have multiple business interests other than the media.”
