On Press Freedom Day last year, The Quint spoke to some of India’s leading news editors and media commentators. Here is the article, reposted because it still remains deeply relevant to our discourse on the Fourth Estate.
Every morning at 7 am The Quint puts out the QBullet. We scan the major English language dailies for the best stories of the day - from an interesting take on the top headlines, to explosive exclusives, to balanced opinion pieces - and put out a collection of the “best from the Press”.
Most days, the problem isn’t finding enough, but rather choosing what to keep out - we are amazed by the quality of content and diversity of opinion the media landscape in India offers.
So, when Reporters Without Borders, a non-profit based in Paris ranked India 138th out of 180 countries on the amount of freedom afforded to its media, we were surprised.
Is the Indian media really that bad? Has the advent of the 24-hour news cycle changed things for the better, or not? What about regional language media?
On international Press Freedom Day, we spoke to three highly experienced and respected editors and analysts in Indian journalism for their take.
Rajdeep Sardesai is currently Consulting Editor with the India Today group, he was earlier the Editor-in-Chief of the IBN-18 network.
Raj Kamal Jha is the Chief Editor of The Indian Express, which has arguably the best investigative and reporting team in the country.
Vinod Dua was the face of TV news before the satellite revolution. He has been associated with several news channels, primarily in Hindi.
Q. In your experience, has editorial freedom and quality been compromised by interference from the government or corporate ownership?
Raj Kamal Jha: This is a cliché because it’s true: in a democracy, a newsroom is as free as it chooses to be. That said, given that those who run the newsroom don’t usually own it, perhaps it’s more precise to say that a newsroom is as free as its owners wish it to be. No one, no politician, ruling or in opposition, businessperson, artist, star, non-star, restaurant, fashion designer, even a college principal wants a story out that shows them in poor light. So they will try to spin, sweet talk, bully.
All newsrooms face this pressure from the subjects of their stories, how you handle it is what defines your freedom. At The Indian Express, the only test a story has to pass is the editorial one: accuracy and fairness. In some newsrooms, you can pay money and get stuff printed as news. Can’t blame the Government for that. Governments, politicians, business, the power elite, will always pose a challenge. They now use social media and ‘speak’ directly to the people. Journalists can sulk about it but that won’t help. We have to work harder, better and smarter. And then you may blend the best of both.
Rajdeep Sardesai: The glass is both half empty and half full. Some of the strongest independent journalism comes from media houses which have a strong monetary muscle. But ownership is an issue. There needs to be complete transparency and media houses can’t function as an extension of a business empire. Without a ‘chinese wall’ separating the media business, freedom of the press can be compromised.
Vinod Dua: The nature of money and ownership is, at least in part, responsible for the decline and direction of the media. Many owners now are not professional media people, rather, media is just an ancillary business. If their media holdings cease to be profitable or viable, they can just move on. The media in India is not so much under external threat as internal pressure. I was 21 when the Emergency was declared. I remember a famous saying from that time about the media. “They asked us to bend, we chose to crawl.” That holds true even today. It is understandable. Journalists are middle class people, more worried about their EMIs than the quality of their stories.
Q. How has the spread of new media, first TV and now Digital platforms effected news reporting?
RS: The public has a lot more access to information today from a variety of sources. But this hasn’t always led to a plurality of opinions. As much as information, the media today requires plurality.
The new technology and live news is also a double edged sword. During a catastrophe like the Nepal earthquake, the media plays a very useful and positive role. At the same time, in an event like Gajendra Singh’s suicide, there were errors and facts were not checked. The TV media ended up sensationalising the story.
RKJ: Newspapers can go to places where TV cameras do not or cannot go - speak to people who aren’t comfortable in TV studios, who wish to speak in private; do stories where you need to switch off a camera and sit down and read and think. TV is great for the spectacle, the instant, newspapers can step back and look, reflect. An editor of The Times, London, said it well: TV puts the dead baby on your dining table. The newspaper should tell you how did the dead baby end up there. Digital is blurring the line between mediums and our reporters are now also using the camera to add to their story.
Q. How has the growth in regional language channels and the use of techniques like ‘sting operations’ affected the national discourse and journalistic ethics?
VD: Hindi channels and most vernacular media tend to treat stories on regional loyalty rather than merit. Most journalists in these channels come from one or two states, and they carry a regional rather than national perspective. But they are also driven by their audience - the Badaun rape story ‘located’ in UP, may not attract channels from the South, and vice versa.
RKJ: A sting, by definition, means that you start with misrepresenting yourself, you entice, entrap, it’s based on deceit. So if you are doing these things and your defence is that it is all in the public interest, you better have an incredibly high bar for what you mean by public interest. Sting, at least the more common ones we have seen, is investigative journalism minus investigation minus journalism. You can see how it’s rapidly attracting the law of diminishing returns.
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