An Act Too Late

NEARLY 20 years have elapsed and nine prime ministers have come and gone since the B.G. Verghese Working Group on Autonomy for Doordarshan and Akashvani submitted its watershed report. That was 1978. This is 1997. The electronic media scenario, thanks to the satellite TV boom of the ’90s, has undergone a sea-change. But the Prasar Bharati Act—framed by the Morarji Desai-led Janata Party government in 1979, when television meant a solitary Doordarshan channel which operated for only a few hours a day, and passed by Parliament during Viswanath Pratap Singh’s tenure as prime minister on July 22, 1990, many months before satellite TV arrived in India in the wake of the Gulf war—hasn’t. Yet, the rather flawed, anachronistic piece of legislation is scheduled to come into effect on September 15.

Will it make a difference in real terms? The Act has been pulled out of cold storage and notified without incorporating the amendments recommended by the Nitish Sengupta Committee—much-needed changes that would have eliminated the anomalies that riddle this ‘historic’ and long-overdue legislation. The Sengupta Committee submitted its report in August 1996 to the then information and broadcasting minister C.M. Ibrahim after a thorough review of the provisions of the Prasar Bharati Act, 1990, in the light of the dramatic changes that have occurred since the invasion from the sky.

Will the Act actually come into effect in six weeks? And even if it does, will it really free Mandi House from Shastri Bhavan’s shackles? The scepticism, not wholly unjustified, is deep-rooted. And not only because the Sengupta Committee recommendations seem to have been ignored. The fears that genuine autonomy will continue to elude the national broadcaster stems from the fact that the 15-member Prasar Bharati Corporation, which will run both DD and AIR under the provisions of the Act, will be accountable to three authorities—a 22-member parliamentary committee which will supervise its activities, a specially instituted broadcasting council which will receive and consider complaints, if any, against its functioning and, last but not least, the I&B ministry itself.

I&B minister S. Jaipal Reddy, on whose personal initiative the long-mothballed Act has been notified, is quick to dispel misgivings. "DD will be as free as the BBC," he asserts. "The Prasar Bharati Board will be accountable all right, but only to Parliament, not to the government of the day." The Board, he points out, will be selected by a special three-man panel headed by the Vice-President of India. The selection committee will include the Press Council chairman and an eminent person nominated by the President. So, its independence cannot be called into question.

BUT Verghese feels the structure that the Act will put in place is rather untidy. "It’s a Bill drafted in haste. Too many compromises have been made along the way," says the veteran media expert. "I don’t see any reason for setting up a separate statutory parliamentary committee to supervise the Prasar Bharati Corporation. " The Corporation will be accountable to Parliament anyway, because that’s where its budget will be approved, argues Verghese.

One of the key recommendations made by the Sengupta Committee was that a TV and radio authority should be set up under the Prasar Bharati Act itself to grant licences to and regulate private broadcasters. But the government is in the process of enacting a separate Broadcasting Bill, under which a Broadcasting Authority of India will be created to regulate the functioning of private TV channels. Verghese feels "a single set of rules, a single complaints cell, a single charter and a single licensing body for all broadcasters" would have been more in order. A senior I&B ministry official asserts that the Prasar Bharati Board will have enough powers to function without any interference from the government. This, despite the fact that it will include a nominee of the ministry, besides the DD and AIR director generals, ex-officio. "Nobody will be able to dictate to the board how it should conduct its day-to-day business. Gone are the days when a minister or a powerful politician can ring up the Doordarshan newsroom and alter the content of the news," he says.

Despite these assertions, doubts linger. The provision that is causing the greatest concern is the one that relates to the government’s relationship with the Prasar Bharati Corporation which, apart from the chairman, will include six part-time members, an executive member who will act as the chief executive officer, a member (finance) and a member (personnel). The Act empowers the government to seek any information from the Corporation that it considers necessary. Moreover, it says: "The Central government may, from time to time, as and when the occasion arises, issue to the Corporation such directions as it may think necessary in the interest of sovereignty, unity and integrity of India or the security of the state or preservation of public order, requiring it not to make a broadcast on a matter of public importance specified in the direction." If and when the government does issue such a direction, will it not amount to an act of blatant censorship?

 No, argues an I&B ministry official. "The government will lay down only the broad policy framework. Exactly how the Prasar Bharati Corporation interprets it and puts it into practice will be entirely up to the members of the Board," he says.

The Act empowers the government to seek any information from, or issue any directives to the Prasar Bharati Corporation that it considers necessary.

What about the Sengupta Committee recommendations? "They are still under consideration," says Jaipal Reddy. "Just because an Act isn’t perfect, it can’t be kept in cold storage forever. The amendments can be done later." Reassuring but not practical, says Verghese. "If you notify an Act today, you can’t start amending it tomorrow even before the ink is dry," he argues. Moreover, if the parliamentary committee set up to oversee the Prasar Bharati Corporation is sought to be scrapped at a later date, will Members of Parliament give up without a fight? Highly unlikely.

Apart from the fact that the Prasar Bharati Act was awaiting notification for seven years, there is another factor that contributed to the suddenness with which Jaipal Reddy announced that it was being given effect: the thinking in the I&B ministry and in certain political circles that DD should be strengthened sufficiently before the Broadcasting Bill is passed, so that it can take on the private channels on equal terms. "The Broadcasting Bill will be passed in the winter session of Parliament. By then, an autonomous Doordarshan, capable of responding to market forces without sacrificing its public service broadcasting goals, will be in a position to hold its own in a competitive environment," says a senior I&B ministry official.