Brainstorming conclave on ‘Is Indian media completely polarised?’
Media Coverage | 03-04-2023
Union minister for information and broadcasting, sports and youth affairs Anurag Singh Thakur delivering his speech during the Lokmat National Media Conclave on the topic ‘Is Indian media completely polarised?’ which was organised on the occasion of the birth centenary of veteran freedom fighter and founder editor of Lokmat Media Group Jawaharlal Darda alias ‘Babuji’ and the golden jubilee of Lokmat Nagpur edition at Hotel Centre Point in Ramdaspeth, Nagpur, on Sunday. Present on the occasion were (From L) director operations of Lokmat Media Group Ashok Jain, editor of Lokmat Digital News Ashish Jadhao, deputy executive editor of ABP Majha Sarita Kaushik, editor of News18 Lokmat Ashutosh Patil, State Information Commissioner (Nagpur & Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar) Rahul Pande, executive editor of Punjab Kesari and Navodaya Times Aaku Srivastava, editor (national affairs) of ABP Vikas Bhadauria, chairman of the editorial board of Lokmat Media Group and former member of Rajya Sabha Dr Vijay Darda, managing editor of News18 India (Hindi) Amish Devgan, editor (news) of Asian News International (ANI) Smita Prakash, senior journalist and former editor of Lokmat Samachar S N Vinod, group editor of Lokmat Media Vijay Baviskar, associate editor of Hindustan Times Pradip Kumar Maitra and associate editor of Lokmat Samachar (New Delhi) Sanjay Sharma.
Rajesh Tickley
‘Pt Nehru apologised to get released from jail’
Anurag Thakur mocks Rahul over Savarkar remarks at Lokmat National Media Conclave
Lokmat News Network
Nagpur
The politics over Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s criticism of freedom fighter Veer Savarkar heated up with Union information and broadcasting minister Anurag Singh Thakur on Sunday charging that Rahul’s great grandfather Pt Jawaharlal Nehru had apologised to a princely state government for securing release from Nabha jail.
He was delivering the concluding address at Lokmat National Media Conclave held in Hotel Centre Point, Ramdaspeth. State forest minister Sudhir Mungantiwar and chairman of editorial board of Lokmat Media Group and former member of Rajya Sabha Vijay Darda were prominently present.
Nehru had illegally entered Nabha princely state along with Akal Takht activists after Jallianwalla Bagh massacre. He was awarded a prison sentence of two years. He was imprisoned in a kuccha cell where he had to sweep the floor and eat simple food. This became unbearable for him. His father Motilal Nehru approached the viceroy for securing his release. Within two weeks Jawaharlal tendered a written apology to Nabha government and got out of jail. On the other hand, Acharya Kripalani and Akal Takht activists remained behind bars. Nehru has expressed remorse about this apology in his autobiography,” Thakur said.
Further slamming Rahul, the minister said Rahul could never become Savarkar as the latter’s life was full of patriotism and sacrifice. “Rahul says he would never apologize in life. But this is a lie as he had tendered an apology in 2018 to the Supreme Court,” he added.
The minister alleged that a section of the media was biased against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and supporting foreign media in defaming India. He said India was among the top five economies of the world. It had successfully developed two Covid vaccines, vaccinated its entire population, fed it during Covid and achieved many things in many fields. This had made many people uncomfortable and they were trying to defame India by spreading false news.
>State minister Mungantiwar emphatically said that the Indian media was not polarized. “India is a tolerant country. It can’t be polarized under any conditions. Hence our media also cannot be polarized,” he added.
Mungantiwar further said the question of polarization can arise only in coverage of politics. “What kind of polarization is possible when you try to conserve the environment or empower women,” he added.
ANI editor Smita Prakash also said Indian media was not polarized. “Till 1980s you had only one TV channel, which was run by the government. It only telecast government news. All the newspapers were socialist. However, now there is a lot of variety and media organizations with different ideologies are competing with each other. Indians should be thankful for having this choice,” she added.
Prakash slammed foreign media for distorting the truth about India. “Time Magazine had carried a piece claiming government was doing a repeat of 1984 genocide by searching for Amritpal Singh. Switching off the internet in some districts of Punjab was a violation of human rights for this journalist. In the end she admits she doesn’t know much about Amritpal. And we hold such magazines in high esteem,” she said.
ANI editor Prakash, group editor of Times Network Navika Kumar, group editor of Lokmat Media Vijay Baviskar, managing editor of News18 (Hindi) Amish Devgan, editor (national affairs) of ABP Vikas Bhadauria, editor of News18 Lokmat Ashutosh Patil, executive editor of Punjab Kesari and Navodaya Times Aaku Srivastava, state information commissioner of Nagpur and Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Rahul Pande, senior journalist and former editor of Lokmat Samachar S N Vinod, associate editor of Hindustan Times Pradip Kumar Maitra and deputy executive editor of ABP Majha Sarita Kaushik were the panellists. The moderators were editor of Lokmat Digital News Ashish Jadhao and associate editor of Lokmat Samachar (New Delhi) Sanjay Sharma. Director (Operations) of Lokmat Media Group Ashok Jain was also present on the occasion.
Why not return awards over Bihar, WB riots?
“Riots broke out during Ram Navami in West Bengal and Bihar. Had this happened in a BJP-ruled state many so called intellectuals would have returned the awards conferred by the government. But no such thing happened in the two states. This raises a question mark over the awards received by such persons,” Thakur said.
The minister further said WB chief minister Mamata Bannerjee had asked Hindus not to venture into Muslim localities. “This clearly shows the law and order situation in Bengal has gone to dogs. However, some journalists are not writing a word on this,” he added.
Rahul says he would never apologize in life. But this is a lie as he had tendered an apology in 2018 to the Supreme Court.
Anurag Thakur, Union I&B minister
‘Foreign media anti-Hindu’
Thakur came down heavily on foreign media in the light of BBC’s documentary on PM Narendra Modi. He charged it was anti-India and especially anti-Hindu. “Unfortunately, a section of Indian media gives too much importance to foreign media. It doesn’t bother to check facts and just reproduces them as published in foreign media. Indian journalists must realize the viewership of our channels and the circulation of our newspapers are far higher than foreign ones. Indian media should set the agenda for global developments rather than the other way round,” he said. “There are school shootings in the US every three months. Why doesn’t the Indian media tell the US government to make stricter gun control laws? No matter how hard foreign media and their supporters in India try, the Indian public won’t be fooled,” Thakur added.
India is a tolerant country. It can’t be polarised under any conditions. Hence our media also cannot be polarised.
Sudhir Mungantiwar, State forest minister
Question mark over impartiality of electronic media: Vijay Darda
Chairman of editorial board of Lokmat Media and former member of Rajya Sabha Vijay Darda said questions were being raised whether media was able to fulfill its responsibility as the watchdog of the society. “The electronic media is in the dock especially due to allegations regarding biased political coverage,” he added. Elaborating on electronic media, Darda said, “Earlier, experts were invited for TV debates so they could enlighten the viewers. However, today the same set of people with similar ideologies are invited every day for debates. This has raised serious question marks about the impartiality of channels.” Darda further said while every media house has its own viewpoint there should be a difference between this and bias. “When the government does something praiseworthy, praise it and vice versa. But today media organizations are either for the government or against it. Very few are neutral,” he added. He concluded by saying, “Mostly media houses are fair but a few are creating a bad name for the entire industry.”
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