T N Ninan: Don't target the media

Perhaps it’s time the government took a fresh look at its media policy. Its approach so far has been to keep the media at arm’s length, to minimise and tightly control the flow of information, and to by-pass the media by resorting to uni-directional means of communication like Twitter and prime ministerial radio broadcasts. No media accompanies the prime minister on his foreign tours, and Mr Modi has no media advisor, though all the indications are that he and his office track the media very closely. There have been no press conferences by the prime minister, and just a couple of carefully managed interviews (essentially, written responses to questions considered acceptable). Underlying this approach is a thinly disguised unfriendliness that breaks out in the occasional rash.

In recent weeks, the government has taken specific steps to keep the media at arm’s length by tightening the rules for journalists’ entry into government offices, and by limiting the scope for senior officials to brief reporters. There is also the move that, if it succeeds, would probably shut down Sun TV. The latest is the notice that has been sent to three channels for their coverage of the Yakub Memon hanging. In case anyone had not got the message, the national security advisor suggested in the course of a recent lecture in Mumbai that the actions of the media were at odds with the interests of the state.

There have been governments in the past which turned on the media. The most infamous example was of course the press censorship that was imposed during Indira Gandhi’s Emergency rule of 1975-77, but there was also Rajiv Gandhi, who lost his patience in the wake of unrelenting press criticism on the Bofors issue and drafted a defamation law that was dropped only after the entire press rose in united protest. Both instances came after the government concerned ran into political trouble, not before. So the Modi government is unusual in that it has kept the media at arm’s length from the outset. It has now moved against specific media organisations even though it still enjoys broad popular approval and therefore does not need to shoot the messenger out of pique or frustration at any unpalatable turn of events.

The desire to keep the media at bay has co-existed somewhat oddly with a desire by individual ministers to push out into the media positive narratives about their record in office, notably when the first anniversary of the government came round. Quite a few of the claims have subsequently been found to be exaggerated — perhaps the ministers were keen to impress their boss, who has the reputation of being a hard taskmaster. But it is also true that individual ministers (some of whom are quite prickly) are accessible to the media in the way that politicians have always been, and willing to clarify issues even as they protest, with reason, when they think the media has erred (as does happen).

The question is whether this broad approach has served the government well. On the one hand, the media after some initial months of careful pussyfooting is now freer with its criticism. On the other hand, there is reason to believe that some government initiatives have not earned it the media mileage that might ordinarily have come its way. It is not an accident that the prime minister’s multi-country tour of Central Asia got him little media exposure. When the basic approach is to keep the media at a distance, it is to be expected that effective communication will suffer. And if and when things start to go wrong, as they must in any five-year period, the government is hamstrung because of the lack of established channels of communication. What results is the inevitable blaming or targeting of the media — which only compounds other errors.