Mighty laws!!

All journalists must know essential Media Law and Regulation boundaries for what they can do and what they cannot. This may include Press Complaints Commission and Ofcom codes of practice. This even covers all the media law essentials as well as an introduction to court reporting.

India’s media have grown tremendously in the past two decades. From a handful of state-owned channels run by Doordarshan, a few radio stations including the BBC World Service and Voice of America, the electronic media environment in the country has changed beyond recognition since 1991. Foreign-owned channels and joint ventures from Star and NDTV to Zee and MTV abound, and there has been talk of raising the trp. Alongside international and foreign channels and websites, national, regional and local broadcasters have multiplied, often owned and run by Indian capital linked to powerful elite interests, including regional and national politicians and large newspaper groups.

There is currently no single Indian media body which oversees either the content and ethics or the ownership of all of these diverse media platforms. In fact unrestricted cross-media ownership has at times raised red flags with government bodies. For instance, the Telecoms Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) However, a range of unethical and even illegal practices point towards the urgent and unavoidable need for strong, well-thought-out and sustainable regulatory mechanisms, codes and frameworks. The following have all become all too common in Indian media: media misreporting and sustained defamation of particular social groups or individuals; threats by elites and political interests to the independence of journalists and citizen sources; scandals involving millions of rupees in exchange for favorable coverage of particular political and investment interests;etc.

The Indian media industry, including both information and general entertainment channels, are often in the news for violations of industry ethics codes. Entertainment channels often air inappropriate content and exceed the number of advertising minutes per hour as prescribed by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. News channels, too, have been in the limelight because of the paid news phenomenon, which has been the subject of a Parliament report, and their complicated ownership structures that belie a deep connection between business and politicians.

The Indian media industry itself has been unequivocal in stating that it is capable of self-regulation.  However, the heads of the currently regulatory bodies pointed out that despite the current system of self-regulation, many channels simply opt out of voluntary membership of these associations if they do not want to follows its rules or pay fines. It is clear that regulators in India are of the view that even if self-regulation is the way forward, it cannot be voluntary. The lack of professionalism in journalism, ‘trials by media’, and the urban slant of national news channels have led to skewed and uneven growth in the Indian media industry.

In this age of media explosion, one cannot simply remain confined to the boundaries of the traditional media. The media world has expanded its dimensions by encompassing within its orbit, the widening vistas of cyber media etc. As a consequence, the laws governing them are also numerous. It is not within the scope of this Article to deal with the whole subject of media laws, but this Article makes a person aware of the various important legislations affecting the various branches of Media Communication, making him aware of his rights and facilitating him to exercise them within the framework of law existing in India.

Cyber Law Of India Must Be Scrapped

Law and technology are never on the same page. While law takes its own time to formulate and mature yet technology marches at a speed much beyond the law to catch and grasp. The same is happening in the case of Indian cyber law.

In the year 2000 a regulatory framework was introduced by Indian parliament to regulate transactions in the Indian cyberspace. India was new to this field and it considered the models suggested by foreign countries. That is well understandable as at that point of time India lacked the expertise in this regard.

However, what is frustrating is that even after 13 years of enactment of the information technology act, 2000, Indian parliament still lacks the techno legal expertise to enact a proper cyber law. According to media reports, the cyber law of India is in a bad condition. The Indian cyber law has started showing signs of decaying cyber law legislation rather than a maturing enactment. Even the techno legal experts have expressed their dissatisfaction with the present cyber law of India.

According to Praveen Dalal, managing partner of New Delhi based ICT law firm Perry4Law and leading techno legal expert of Asia, the Cyber Law of India should be repealed. According to Dalal, the present Cyber Law of India is suffering from many Irregularities and Unconstitutionalities. He believes that the Cyber Law of India must be scrapped and dedicated laws must be enacted for various fields like Cyber Law, Cyber Security, Cyber Forensics, E-Governance, etc.

These concerns are valid and genuine. The information technology act started as a piece of legislation for e-commerce and e-governance. Now it is transformed into an instrumentality of state oppression and e-surveillance. However, the real problem is how Indian parliament would enact these techno legal frameworks that required sound techno legal expertise that is presently missing.

Many provisions of the IT Act 2000 are violating of civil liberties protection in cyberspace. Some of the rules and regulations made under the IT Act, 2000 are already challenges before none other than the Supreme Court of India. It would be only prudent if Indian government scraps the IT Act, 2000 and come up with constitutionally valid legal framework. India has been trying to get its cyber security infrastructure proper and up to date. India has also formulated the cyber security policy, 2013 to assert its seriousness about cyber security. However, cyber security in India is still in a bad shape despite all these efforts of Indian government. So what is the problem that is plaguing Indian cyber security initiatives?

According to experts although the national cyber security policy of India has been declared yet it still to have to achieve a lot. The biggest hurdle before the Indian cyber security initiatives is the lack of implementation of various cyber securities polices and strategies as formulated from time to time.

Take the example of the recent declaration of establishment of a cyber-command force for armed forces of India. This is the second time such a declaration has been made by Indian government. Similarly, declaration about putting in place a cyber-crisis management plan of India has been made from time to time. However, till now we have no implementable cyber-attacks crisis management plan of India.

It seems the necessary will power to execute various cyber security initiatives of India is missing. Similarly, the offensive and defensive cyber security capabilities of India are also missing. Indian government must consider all these aspects and come up with implementable cyber security initiatives.

Media in India: fine line between regulation and freedom

If you are a journalist in India or have been around people who work in the field, you might have heard these comments:

“You are a journalist, can’t you get passes arranged for that concert?”, “Can I get a similar Press Card like yours?”, “It is easy to show your Press Card and tell the police you are a journalist when you are charged for a minor offence”, “Don’t you know I am from the media?”, “A PRESS sticker on the car can do wonders”.
The common man sees journalists as powerful people. But the Zee News episode, in which two senior journalists were sent to prison after being accused of extortion, has prompted another wave of outrage over the misuse of this so-called power of the media, though on a much bigger scale.
Rajdeep Sardesai, the editor-in-chief of CNN-IBN television, tweeted after a televised debate on the subject, “I guess journalists are more feared today, but sadly less respected. We are more arrogant, less ethical”.
Questions that remain unanswered in the Zee case are best left to the courts, given that the journalists are in Tihar jail, serving their 14-day judicial custody but have not yet been found guilty of any crime.
This case is not isolated, however. Three media people, including two employees of the India TV news channel, were accused of trying to extort money from a traditional Unani healer, after apparently filming him prescribing Western medicine to patients. In another case, correspondents from India TV and ABP News were suspended after they were accused of being involved in an extortion case.
Such instances, and a bigger case like Zee News that involves politician and wealthy industrialist Naveen Jindal, have reignited the debate on media regulation in India. It seems the self-regulation model has failed in India and it is time for a body that has the authority to issue and cancel a journalist’s permit to work, something that is not required in India today.
Critics argue that a regulatory body on the lines of the Medical Council of India is not going to yield the desired results. After all, such a regulatory framework has failed to deter doctors from doing what they shouldn’t. But I don’t see a possible failure as reason enough for not having stringent rules in place.
The Print and Electronic Media Standards and Regulation Bill 2012include a provision to cancel a media organization’slicense and impose heavy fines for offences. But other provisions which give the authority powers to suspend or ban coverage of an event in national interest have drawn criticism as it is seen as a suppression of the media’s freedom to report in India, something enshrined in the constitution’s law guaranteeing freedom of speech.
The industry doesn’t need a regulator to seek reporting approvals, or to get story ideas vetted or sources verified. In a democracy, the freedom of press is and should be paramount. What we need is a body which can come down heavily on those who misuse their position for unethical practices such as extortion.
For instance, if a journalist is found guilty in extortion case and serves the jail-term, can he be trusted to report objectively once he’s back on the job? What we need are rules with provisions to ban journalists or news organizations found guilty in such cases.
As more and more young people continue to enter the profession, strict provisions could act as a deterrent. Only then will there be the possibility of journalists being feared less and respected more.