Committed media crucial for nation
Ranen Kumar Goswami
Eminent economist Amartya Sen, who is also
a keen observer of the socio-political developments around the globe, says no
substantial famine has ever occurred in any independent country with a
democratic form of government and a relatively free Press. In an address
delivered at the general assembly of the International Press Institute in New
Delhi on January 29, 2001, he said: “Consider, for example, the Chinese famine
of 1958-61, in
which between 23 and 30 million people died. Despite the fact that the Chinese
Government was quite committed to eliminating hunger in the country, it did not
substantially revise its disastrous policies (associated with the ill-advised
Great Leap Forward) during the three famine years. This was possible because of
the lack of a political Opposition and absence of an independent critique from
the media. But the Chinese Government did not see the need to change its
policies, partly because it did not have enough information on the extent to
which the Great Leap Forward had failed. Because of the absence of an uncensored
Press and other mode of public communication, the local officials across China
were under the impression that while they themselves had failed, the other
regions had done well. This gave incentive to local units (collectives or
communes in various formations) to concoct their agricultural data to pretend
that they too were doing well enough. The totality of these reported numbers
vastly inflated the Chinese Government's own estimate of the total amount of
foodgrains that the country had. Indeed, it led the Chinese central
authorities, at the peak of the famine, to the mistaken belief that they had
100 million more metric tons of grain than they actually had.”
The Nobel-recipient economist further
points out that a similar story can be seen in other major famines, which
include the Soviet famines of the 1970s,
or the Cambodian famines of the 1970s, or famines under African military
dictatorships in the last three decades of the 20th century, or in Sudan or
North Korea in not a
very distant past, not to mention the famines under colonial rule. Indeed, the
Bengal famine of 1943, Sen says, was made viable not only by a lack of
democracy, but also by severe restrictions on the local Press on reporting and
criticism. The disaster received attention only after Ian Stephens, the
courageous editor of The Statesman of Calcutta (then British-owned)
decided to break ranks by publishing graphic accounts and stinging editorials
on October 14 and 16, 1943. This was immediately followed on October 18 by a
“mea culpa” letter on the size of the death toll by the Governor of Bengal to
the Secretary of State for India in London, followed by further confessions of
“culpas” on the subsequent days, followed by heated parliamentary discussions
in Westminister, and followed ultimately by the beginning of public relief
arrangements the following month, when the famine, which had already killed
millions, ended.
In the same speech, Amartya Sen
expressed concerns over the state of the post-Independence Indian media. He
said: “while Press freedom, along with other democratic freedoms, has certainly
helped independent India in its entire
half a century of existence (in 2001), nevertheless less striking but also
important deprivations (such as endemic undernourishment, or persistent
illiteracy,
or inadequate healthcare) have not received the attention they deserve from the
Indian Press.” Amartya Sen said these words more than a decade ago. Today the
big media outlets in the country are in the hands of big corporate houses. They
blur the borderline between corporate interests and the interests of the
commoners. Neo-liberal economy is their editorial philosophy and market is
their guide. They
are staunch advocates of economic reforms (read privatisation). For them
economic growth is the reigning deity, to which they pay their editorial
obeisance day in and day out. Not that growth is not important. It is
important. But more important is its fair and equitable distribution. In the
last one decade about 2.5 lakh farmers have committed suicide after losing all
hopes of a decent life. This information the observers extracted from none
other than the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) reports. In 2007, the NCRB,
in its Accidental Deaths and Suicide Report, said 46 farmers commit suicide
every day in this country. But major media outlets behave as if these things do
not exist at all. Some other aspirations of neo-liberalism
include unrestricted entry of foreign multi-national companies into the
country's economy, hand-over of profit-making public sector units to the
private sector, ending government role in social sectors like education and
health. The disinvestment target in 2012-13 Union Budget is Rs 30,000 crore,
which means PSU shares worth Rs 30,000 crore will go to private pockets. Foreign
direct investment (FDI) in retail sector would have been a foregone conclusion
by now, but for the resistance of some allies of the Government and some
Opposition parties. Health and education sectors have already been thrown open
as a result of which higher education and healthcare have become unrealisable
dreams for the commoners. The corporate sector is happy. The corporate media
outlets too have banished these worries from their minds.
Another top priority on the corporate
wish-list is doing away with subsidies. Subsidies are ailing our economy, say
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek
Singh Ahluwalia at the slightest available opportunity. Fiscal deficits are
ascribed mainly to these subsidies. Corporate-owned media sing the same tune.
Union Government's subsidy bill on food, petroleum and fertilizers was Rs
2,08,503 crore in 2011-12. In the Budget
this fiscal (2012-13) this has been reduced to Rs 1,79,554 crore. In 2011-12,
fiscal deficit stood at Rs 5,21,980 crore or 5.9 per cent of the gross domestic
product. In the same year, the total tax revenue foregone amounted to Rs
5,29,432 crore, which means if these amounts were collected there would not
have been fiscal deficit at all. Was not this tax break a disguised subsidy for
the rich? Are the corporate media trying mould public opinion against this?
In his Ramon Magasaysay Award
acceptance speech in Manila in August, 2007, renowned journalist P. Sainath
said: “There are essentially two streams in what we call journalism: 1.
Journalism, 2) Stenography. The latter is by far the bigger stream. It reduces
a noble field to the service of the power. The latter can reach more of the
nation than the former, but it can never touch the conscience of the nation.
Corporate-led media see journalism as a revenue stream.............But if we
are talking about journalism that can touch the conscience of a nation, that
has got to be the journalism of dissent. A journalism that questions and
interrogates for the public good, not private profit...........It has to
comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable”
According to Sainath, good or great
journalism will be judged by how it relates to the great processes of its time.
That's why the kind of journalism Mahatma Gandhi and other freedom fighters
practised was so important. A tiny Indian Press during the country's freedom
struggle fulfilled a gigantic social. It took on the world's mightiest empire
and sought to articulate the aspirations of the voiceless. Today, Sainath said,
the gigantic Indian media serve a very narrow social function. Corporate and
elite interests. He pointed out: “In India inequality is the foremost. But the
corporate media celebrate it. India now
(in 2007) ranks fourth in the world in the number of dollar billionaires she
has. But ranks 126th in human development. We address the same and
celebrate the former everyday on our channels and in our newspapers. We barely
look at the latter.”
Are the corporate media confronting
the problems eating into the vitals of our society? Fruits of economic growth
are being siphoned off by a privileged few, millions of people are deprived of
their share; there is notable growth of industries, but it's a jobless growth;
prices of essential commodities have skyrocketed, but the poverty line has been
artificially lowered to show there are only a few poor in the country; an
agrarian crisis has gripped the countryside, farmers in thousands are taking
their own lives. Corporate media outlets carefully avoid these issues.
Stenographer
journalists look the other way. No wonder, they have failed to touch the
conscience of the country. What the country needs today is inclusive growth, an
equitable distribution of the fruits of growth; the people need a life of
dignity, free from hunger and poverty. And for this, the society needs
journalism dedicated to public good, not stenography committed to private
profit. (From The Assam Tribune, June 09, 2012)
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