Face of the News

Hi All,

News, in the crude sense stands for North-East-West-South ( atleast i interpret it like that only ':-)' ) And the responsibility of News Channels, News Papers and Magazines etc is to make news available to the people living in the different part of the globe. People related to news channel work 24x7 to gather the information, edit them and make them presentable for the general public to read. Hence the life of the people involved with the business of news is very tough and hectic. It’s already a long time since the first news paper was published in India (pre-independence) and post-independence Indians are maintaining this business all by themselves. Over the year news-paper (and later on channels) have earned a respectable position in the society and a lot of the people believe that what is shown or told there is right i.e. the impact on these people is so deep that some people will bet anything based on the news and opinion of the news-papers and channels. Hence the print and e-media hold a very responsible role and position in the society.

The purpose of writing this blog is to point out certain crucial changes in the Indian print and e-media that has been brought in due period of time and how is it affecting people’s opinion.

As we all know that over the period of time the news channels have evolved from half and hour news daily to 24x7 news channel. Earlier this decision was welcomed by the mob of having 24x7 news channel as then the people were confirmed of having much more detailed coverage to certain important news. But the system, in fact, have evolved to the one in which the private life of individuals are getting affected more and more and instead of just providing the news which is their duty, the channels are also trying to build up the opinion of public in one way or other. Take for an instance the programs that are well recognized: sansani on star news, crime reporter on zee news, vardaat on aaj tak, all these programs deals with the crime done in the country and making people aware of the criminal, something which was done by India's Most Wanted by Suhaib Iliyasi sometime back. On one hand Suhaib's program was more informative and formal in the sense that they worked as the agent or bridge between the law and order and general public and beware them of the incident that might seem usual but may turn to be a sabotage but on the other hand in these new programs what the anchor looks like is some theator actor or an artist and not a usual news reporter (no offence made but a feeling that comes to mind by watching them)... my question: is this the way a news presented ?

Taking some more instances: Recently there were MMS in news and suddenly a lot of MMS came into picture, surely a big news to show. Shahid-Kareena's smooching scene, DPS MMS clip, Miss Jammu Anara's clip and many other such things came into picture. Agreed that these things do make news but how were these presented in some news channels ? Some of them showed that 10 sec kissing scene for 10 min... now, who has done mistake or the wrong thing ? The stars in news or the news channel itself ? Some way or another, due to increasing compitition in the field or anything else the way information (news) is presented is changing very rapidly and somehow it has started crossing the barrier of information presenter as a whole.

Its not just me or someone like me who has felt the changes in the Indian media but also some of the people who hold a key position in the government also have felt this change. H'ble President of India Dr. APJ Abul Kalam also once in his speech pointed out why its the case that Indian media is so negative ? Why do they show the negative things first and not other development news ? He also said that while his visit to some country a blast occured there but on the news paper published just after the blast it was not the main news but the news of a person who did some research etc (don't exactly rem the thing ':-)' ) was their cover story. So can't this attitude be taken by Indian media too ?

Many many other things are there that I have noticed but I think the feeling I wanted to share with you all is already conveyed. I am not saying that its the duty of us to change Indian media although upto some extent we can but its the duty of these news channels itself not to harm their image and present the things the way they have to be presented otherwise I am afraid that this amiable relationship between the mob and channels may come to an abrupt end. What say you dear reader ?

Enjoy
Arun Tangri