CJI NV Ramana nails media rot, blames it on business interests
By Manish Anand
New Delhi, July 26: Indian media is at a crossroad, while television channels compete with their entertainment counterparts, amid deepening crisis in the press, which supposedly exercises the freedom of speech and expression on behalf of the people.
The Chief Justice of India NV Ramana on Tuesday shade light on the worsening crisis within the India media, which has largely been blinded by the big events of the day, with their vision focused merely on happenings in New Delhi.
“Independent journalism is the backbone of democracy. Journalists are the eyes and the ears of people, and it is the responsibility of media to present facts. Media must confine itself to honest journalism, while not using it as a tool to expand influence and business interests,” Ramana said on Tuesday.
The CJI indeed nailed the malaise as majority of the mainstream media houses are owned by the business interests or their promoters have vast business exposure outside the domains of journalism.
While some of the media houses in the last two decades have been functioning as realtor, earning fat money from the rental money out of the buildings they have built on land given in the name of press, while engaging in journalistic activities for the namesake.
‘When a media house has other business interests, it becomes vulnerable to external pressures. Often, the business interests prevail over the spirit of independent journalism. As a result, democracy gets compromised,” Live Law quoted Ramana making the remarks at the launch of the book titled ‘The Gita Vijnana Upanishad’, penned by Gulab Chand Kothari, in the national capital on Tuesday.
The CJI gave expression to the pains and sufferings of scores of media persons who leave the profession midway after being disillusioned by the tricks played by the editorial stooges of the media management.
“After taking risks and putting in a lot of hard work, a brilliant story filed by a journalist is killed at the desk. It is thoroughly demoralizing for a genuine journalist. You cannot blame him or her, if they encounter such situations repeatedly & lose faith in the profession,” Live Law quoted the CJI.
It may be known that the large media houses are prisoner of the government advertisements, which are their bread and butter, and thus they kill stories, as mentioned by the CJI, without any remorse.
Ramana had this week also castigated the media for running kangaroo courts.
It is also pertinent that the print media lobby hasn’t allowed the foreign direct investment to be allowed at a level where serious players can enter India in their bids to protect their hegemony.
The media rot can be gauged from the fact that a large media house after committing financial frauds with almost a dozen banks remain afloat even after not paying salaries to its journalists for many months, while the Central and the State government looked the other way.
Ironically, the media rot is only commented upon the people in top offices, and no serious attempts are made to clean up the mess.
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