Journalist, author and a distinguished fellow at the Vivekananda International Foundation, A. Surya Prakash, who recently took charge as Prasar Bharati chairperson, may be the remedy to fix the ailing state broadcaster of the nation. He speaks to Nitin Mahajan on the controversy regarding his appointment being termed as taking over of the right wing and the way forward for Doordarshan and All-India Radio.
Questions have been raised regarding your appointment as Prasar Bharati chairperson. Political parties and a section of the media has dubbed this as a virtual takeover of the state broadcaster by the right wing. What do you have to say to these critics?
People who controlled the country’s intellectual space for 60 years want everyone to be left wing. In democratic India, are you permitted only to be left wing? There have been only two ideologies that have been recognised in this country, you can either be a Nehruvian or a Marxist. I am not left wing but does that make me right wing? Is it unconstitutional to be right wing in democratic India? I want to ask everyone whether it would have been newsworthy if I had a left leaning. I was pained to see that many reports referred to me as a right-winger and completely ignored the contribution I made to the field of journalism, both print and electronic over three decades. I have devoted myself to democracy studies and even written two books, What Ails Indian Parliament and Public Money, Private Agenda — The Use and Misuse of MPLADs. The third one, on the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India is likely to be published next year. If my critics want to look the other way it is their wish.
How do you plan to restore the credibility of our state broadcasters, Doordarshan and All India Radio, which have been facing criticism over political interference with incidents like the curtailing of the then chief minister of Gujarat and BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi at the height of poll campaigning during the Lok Sabha polls? How do you plan to provide autonomy to Prasar Bharati?
I have seen the days of the Emergency. I have reported for newspapers when my copies were sent to the inspector-general of police for vetting and approval. The copies used to come back after being stamped what was to be printed and portions of it being cut. I will always root for a strong and vibrant media, because never again do I want to see the return of the days of Emergency when the local IG of police was to decide what was to be read by the people residing in his area. From that era of the 70s, we have come a long way.
The government should not control the media and we should not allow it. If there are any shortcomings, we should self-regulate without external interference. Looking at the Prasar Bharati Act, it is clear that the will of Parliament is that the corporation should function as a genuinely autonomous body — innovative, dynamic and flexible and that is what I intend to pursue. Prasar Bharati is an autonomous corporation and there is no question of revoking that.
How do you plan to financially restructure Prasar Bharati and fill up the existing vacancies in the public broadcasters which will also go a long way in strengthening its independence?
I am of the view that as we go along, this corporation must generate more revenues, monetise its assets and one fine day stand on its own feet. If you want to get to full autonomy, you must become financially independent. It is very important. My understanding is that several of the assets have not been transferred to Prasar Bharati and I am going to soon take up the issue with the information and broadcasting ministry.
Once we are able to monetise these we will be able to generate enough revenue to bring it out of government revenue dependency. Currently, the power of recruitment and promotion of employees is with the Central government and half of the funding, almost '2,000 crore, every year comes from the government. Plus we have thousands of vacancies. The Prasar Bharati recruitment board should have come into existence when the Prasar Bharati Act was introduced, but even after 14 years we have no cadre control as most of our staff are from the Centre. This needs to be addressed immediately. I shall take up the issue of creation of Prasar Bharati recruitment board with the government at the earliest.
With cut-throat competition in news media in today’s scenario, how do you plan to take on the current masters of TRPs? How do you plan to remove and avoid repeated goof-ups that state broadcasters have become infamous for?
My first agenda will be to develop DD News as a world-class news channel. For a start, professionalising the functioning of DD News will be on the cards and you will begin to see the difference within the next couple of months. I believe that the audience will definitely come to us. Common people have become tired of slanging matches that are aired in the name of news at prime-time during dinner time.
They want credible, structured news and if Doordarshan provides it the audience will come back to us. We will also be making changes in the look and feel of news telecast and provide credible reporting instead of the decibel levels. There is also a need to infuse new blood into the newsrooms of the two state broadcasters.
As per my estimate, the average employee age in these organisations would be over 50 years. This needs to be addressed immediately. I feel once the Prasar Bharati board is in place we will also raise professional environment by infusion of new people. We need to change the working environment, have more in-house programmes, increase the number of programmes and the budget allotted to programming. We have talented people, but we need to set standards of credible news to grab eyeballs. The current TRP system is flawed, I am told that the new system should be in place by April when we would be better placed to gauge the exact reach of all channels.
With Prime Minister Modi himself leading the way and most media outlets pursuing their agenda on social media, what are your plans for the national broadcasters to utilise this space? And how is Doordarshan gearing up to improve its content?
We plan to utilise the social media space to good effect. DD and AIR would soon take on the competition in the world of social media. The use of hashtags to promote the news being aired is a new concept and we are studying the feasibility of competing successfully with an array of private channels. As far as the issue of content is concerned we are planning major initiatives on that front as well. Recently, we held a meeting with country’s top 12 producers.
We invited them to produce programmes for us. They have also raised some issue like enhancement of packages or commission rates for making these programmes for Doordarshan, which is being worked out. If we want good content to be aired on our channels and want to improve our viewership numbers we will need to spend more on production of our serials and other programmes. We would definitely be giving other channels tough competition in the coming few months.
