GUWAHATI, Sept 7 � �At a time when there is no opposition to speak of, either within Parliament or outside, when a reconfiguration of power is being effected between the executive and the judiciary, and when all kinds of regressive social and political forces are making their presence felt, India needs fearless, objective, professional journalism.�
Touching the core of some of the most critical issues affecting journalism and functioning of media organization in India, Siddhartha Varadarajan, distinguished academic, journalist and former editor of The Hindu, delivered the 10th Brajamohan Sarma Memorial Lecture in Guwahati today on �Crisis of media in India.�
Organized in the memory of the Late Brajamohan Sarma, a philanthropic social worker and advocate, the annual lecture event saw a galaxy of distinguished personalities deliberating on the topics of significance. The list included Prabhat Patnaik, Dhiresh N Choudhury, Patricia Mukhim, Dr Hiren Gohain, Sitaram Yechury, Jayati Ghosh and Brinda Karat, among others.
Asserting that the media has lost its moorings when it was most needed, he said that it was drifting aimlessly, buffeted by the fickle headwinds of a business and governance model that prefers risk aversion, trivia, entertainment, ephemera and opinion mongering in the guise of news.
Making a comparative analysis of the growth of the Indian print and electronic media and the inroads of web journalism, he said that the apparent good health of media was also subjected to big financial crisis in terms of most of the news channels making losses and the obsolete business model of print media, which was very lowly priced, largely dependent on advertisements, low news gathering costs, revenue squeezing tactics like paid news and use a media property to develop additional business interests.
�Journalists at the media company are unlikely to be able to do critical stories about the businesses their owners are involved in,� he said.
Terming the Indian media as the watchdog that does not bark, he said that the silence with which the media accepted the appointment of Amit Shah as the president of the BJP despite his being chargesheeted in a serious murder case, and many decisions of the NDA government, passing below the radar, were just a few examples.
�If the business and governance model is the Achilles� heel of Indian journalism, surely the future lies in creating media that operates within a different financial and structural framework.
�Can we think of a model of journalism where the reader as citizen consciously decides to pay for news that she knows is essential to the political and social health of the society and country she lives in? Patient, philanthropic capital, coupled with citizens who recognize the intrinsic value of journalism and are willing to pay for what they read � this is the direction the media in India needs to take,� he said.
Rishikesh Kalita, who secured highest marks from Bajali High School in HSLC examination, was also presented the Brajamohan Sarma award. Every year, one meritorious student from Bajali High School, where late Sarma had studied, is given the award.
