PAID NEWS

Those articles in newspapers, magazines and the electronic media, which indicate favourable conditions for the institution that has paid for it is considered as paid news. The news is much like an advertisement but without the ad tag. This kind of news has been considered a serious malpractice since it deceives the citizens, not letting them know that the news is, in fact, an advertisement. Secondly, the payment modes usually violate tax laws and election spending laws. More seriously, it has raised electoral concerns because the media has a direct influence on voters.  This practice started in the 1950s and has become a widespread organized activity in India through formal contracts and “private treaties”. Times of India publication and widely adopted by groups such as The Hindustan Times, Outlook and others, the practice was brought to Western media attention in 2010. Paid news financially benefits the “individual journalists and specific media organizations” such as newspapers, magazines and television channels according to a 2010 investigative report of the Press Council of India. It is paid for by politicians, organizations (for profit and non-profit), brands, movies and celebrities who seek to improve their public image, increase favourable coverage and suppress unfavourable information.

The widespread “paid news” practice in India has been criticized because it diverts the coverage to whoever is willing to pay and selectively presents information to favour the payee, instead of what is significant, complete and necessary to inform the public.

Paid news corrupts the information and deceives the newspaper-magazine reader or the television audience, particularly given the Indian practice of “not making it clear that the news item has been paid for”, state James Painter and John Lloyd. The Press Council of India – the official Indian watchdog on media ethics – conducted a limited study of the widespread practice of “paid news” in India in 2010.

Criticism of paid news

Author Chandrahas Choudhury wrote in 2011 that paid news “is rotting India’s democracy.” The Analytic Monthly Review states that paid news is a fraud on its readers and the public, a tax fraud, as well as improperly manipulates the financial and real estate market.
In 2010, a two-person panel of the Press Council of India investigated the phenomenon of paid news in India. This resulted in a detailed 72 page report citing names and instances where information that had been paid for had been passed off as genuine news. However, the Press council voted to not release the full report, and published a shorter watered-down version of the report.

Need for empowered regulators and stricter punitive provisions

The Committee observed that statutory regulators like the PCI and Electronic Media Monitoring Centre (EMMC) lack adequate punitive powers while self-regulatory industry bodies like the News Broadcasting Standards Authority have even failed to take cognisance of the problem.  The PCI and self-regulatory bodies are also plagued by conflict of interest since a majority of their members are media-owners. The Committee recommended the establishment of either a single regulatory body for both print and electronic media or setting-up a statutory body for the electronic media on the lines of the PCI. Such regulator(s) should have the power to take strong action against offenders and should not include media owners as members. It highlighted the need for stricter punitive provisions to control paid news and sought further empowerment of the ECI to deal with cases of paid news during elections.

Paid news: Threat to media credibility

In post-independence era, Indian media helped democracy to take root, to grow and flourish on its soil.  But of late, democracy itself is in threat from the same media, especially during elections.
The phenomenon called ‘paid news’, like yellow journalism, is beginning to corrode the very system of participatory democracy besides corroding the credibility of media itself. Some of journalistic jargons to indicate paid news now a days are perks and package journalism, access journalism, suitcase journalism, exchange journalism, ad-based journalism, blackmail journalism, campaign journalism, junket journalism, subsidy journalism and relative journalism. Paid news, according to Press Council of India, is – “Any news or analysis appearing in any media (print and electronic) for a price in cash or kind as consideration.”

It is a systematic engagement of media outlets to publish favourable news items, articles and biased stories in newspapers and TV channels for money. Biased coverages, advertisements camouflaged as news favouring select candidates while denying coverage to some others are rather common practices now a days.

The Press Council of India  made a series of  guidelines for the media ; inter-alia, (a)objective reporting about elections and  the candidates , (b) eschewing news reports which tend to promote enmity and hatred among the people on grounds of caste, creed, religion, community or language (c) refraining from publishing false or critical statements regarding personal character and conduct of any candidate, (d) refraining from accepting any kind of inducement  in cash or kind to project a candidate or party, (e) not indulging in canvassing for a particular candidate or party, (f) the press shall not accept or publish any advertisement  at the cost of public exchequer (g) The press shall observe  the directions/orders/instructions of ECI. A serious hurdle to healthy journalism in the country today is that the media houses are owned by big political leaders and business men who use them to gains political mileage and money. Some turn their apparatus into propaganda machines.  The electronic media can be more dangerous when it chooses to go biased. For example, in the run up to the coming April 11 Parliamentary Elections in Assam, some news channels have been adopting an angle of coverage which is diagonally opposite of some others owned by rival political party leaders to the utter confusion of viewers who are not adept in reading between the lines.

CASE STUDY 1

The cases of paid news have badly hit the world of Indian media in recent years, and in this context one of most notable revealing has had been the paid news issue linked to radio Tapes. This has been the most notably talked about issues in the Indian media as far as paid news is concerned, where the nexus is found between corporate houses, government authorities, corporate lobbyists and eminent journalists. The radio tapes  have more drawn the attention towards the fact as how eminent senior journalists make use of their influence to strive and weaken the functioning of the government of India, than how media houses are taking money to publish or broadcast news. However, taking money to publish or broadcast news is worse, for the reason that it is all invasive from the smallest newspaper to the major news channel. We can understand that there are few sections in the media who have the sort of influence that is required to influence government, in the mode in which it was exposed in the Radia Tapes. But definitely the case is an eye-opening.

CASE STUDY 2

As regards a notable and serious case of paid news, the case of Maharashtra Assembly elections in 2009 is worth mentioning. During the elections of Maharashtra Assembly in 2009, the them Chief Minister Mr. Ashok Chavan as candidate made beneficial use of the print media in the forms of regional and national papers through giving advertisements. However, expression paid news does not essentially signify the news is paid for in the form of money or cash and this was made apparent during the Commonwealth Games

FACTS

The paid news syndrome has become a debateable topic for various platforms. When the credibility of the media is lost, its freedom gets restricted. Hamid Ansari, the Vice President of India said that the explosive growth in the media had highlighted the fact that the Fourth Estate is only one among the pillars of democracy that has an identifiable commercial and profit facade.

Disapproving paid news in any form, Sitaram Yechury says that paid news is not merely a serious matter influencing the functioning of a free press, but it is an issue that also concerns the future of parliamentary democracy in India. Providing access to unbiased, unfiltered and objective news or information is the role that media are supposed to play in a parliamentary democracy. This comes under very severe strain with the emergence of the paid news syndrome.

Strongly arguing against paid news, Arun Jaitley claims that those who are in a position to pay more for information expressed as paid news shape the human minds in this country accordingly. This cannot be free speech. At best, it could be trade, it could be business, and, therefore, the government has to take this out of the arena of free speech and put it in the arena of business or trade, all in public interest. Favouring deterrent penalty against those who indulge in such practices he suggests that ‘in the case of (a) candidate, it has to be an offence under election law (The phrase) ‘corrupt practice’ must be amended in the Representation of the People Act and this should be a ground for setting aside the election and disqualifying the candidate, and if parties indulge in this there must be action against this.

Cheshta Bhatia
Department of journalism
LADY SHRI RAM COLLEGE

(Disclaimer: The views expressed are personal)