News cant move an inch forward these days without the new development being christened as . Impact; fill in the blanks with the name of the news broadcaster of your choice. Sometimes,indeed frequently,the same news development is claimed by more than one broadcaster. The message is clear: all the exciting things that are happening in government are happening because of something you saw on the box. This is impressive. But I think it needs to be institutionalised. The government should make this official. A dedicated group of government spokespersons should do nothing but announce official decisions and officially give credit to news channel(s). Some examples. Minister A resigned from the Union cabinet today,the spokesperson would say,and this is Channels X,Y and Z Impact. Now,some print media type may ask,what about the PM,didnt he ask for the ministers resignation? The proper answer from the spokesperson should be on these lines: that the issue was brought to the PMs notice was Channel X Impact,that he understood the gravity of the
situation was Channel Y Impact,and that he realised something had to be done was Channel Z Impact. Therefore,the resignation of the minister is Channel X,Y and Z Impact.
Political party spokespersons can adopt the same formula. The chief ministers views on corruption allegations will be heard by the central committee and this is a Channel X Impact. The central leadership is reviewing all possibilities and this is a Channel Y Impact. State leaders are holding a special meeting and thats a Channel Z Impact.
The government and political parties should,however,extract one condition before institutionalising the new compact on Impact: news channels cant black out each others official credits. That is,once it has been decided to the satisfaction of all parties which official/political development is to be designated as the Impact of which channel,all broadcasters must carry the information. Channel Y must say the PMO met today and thats officially a Channel X Impact,just as Channel X must say the meetings agenda is such and such and thats officially a Channel Y Impact.
The penalty for not mentioning a rival channels officially designated Impact should be forfeiture of two future official Impacts. That should be sufficient incentive.
The other point to remember is that the government must distribute news TV Impacts in an inclusive,balanced and equitable fashion. Care should be taken to include weaker sections of news broadcasting. Small and marginal news channels should perhaps have a separate Impacts quota.
There also needs to be cross-party consensus. Were the PM to make a parliamentary intervention and mention that the decision to review this policy is a Channel X Impact,and the Opposition jumps up and says no thats a Channel Y Impact,the whole system will break down. There also needs to be intra-Opposition unity; the BJP and CPM in particular need to be on the same page. As long as A Raja is not put in charge of allocating the Impacts,this system should work beautifully.
saubhik.chakrabarti@expressindia.com
