India is a unique case of unity in diversity. Challenging common sense of western ideologues, Indian democracy survived and thrived well after seven decades of independence. In this article, I’m going to explain emergence of communal politics and media ethics.
So far, Indian secular credential has been widely acknowledged by the global community. Despite having various faiths and philosophies, the people of India displayed unique example of unity in diversity.
However, emergence of communal politics in the form of mob lynching and citizenships amendment act have somehow damaged its secular character.
Understanding emergence of communal politics
The supremacy of constitution means, the decisions taken by representatives should not be inconsistent to the constitution. Otherwise, the interests of minorities might be compromised.
Moreover, the chances of corruption and nepotism cannot be ruled out in the absence of such measure.In India, the Supreme Court is the guardian, as well as highest interpreting body of constitution.
It has ultimate authority to protect the basic structure of constitution and the rights of minorities. This is the reason why India is one of the most successful democracy despite many religions and faiths in the world.
Rise of right wing political ideology in India
After the 1980s, once the so called guardian of secularism, the grand old party was totally responsible for the emergence of communal forces as the most powerful political force in the last decade.
Hardly two and half decade old party successfully captured political power more than three times with two times absolute majority.
Dynastic politics, weak leadership, rampant corruption, and declining grass-root linkages are some of the responsible reasons which helped BJP to clinch power by defeating powerful organisation.
Communal politics best means to remain in power
It is well known that BJP has been elected by people of India as an alternative for the dynastic grand old party. People thought that the leadership of Narendra Modi will work as per theirs committed manifesto before 2014 General elections.
In contrast, before the 2019s general elections, BJP, after Pulwama attack, fuelled the communal sentiments and clinched clear-cut majority. Since then, Bjp drifted from the development to the divisive politics.
Unemployment and economic development
In the world, there is no other nations have such a huge productive labour force. Millions of working age youths are entering into the labour market every year.On the other hand, continuously declining economic growth is a big challenge when the country is expecting to absorb huge labour force into the productive economic activities.
Communal agenda for power
In spite of all these challenges, party in power is busy in creating another problem by charging communal sentiments a means to remain in power. In this situation, it is better to remain underdeveloped rather than to lead divided.
But, now, one thing is clear that with the emergence of communal politics in India, the age old symbiotic relationship among many faiths might get damaged.
Media ethics in modern democracies
In modern democracies, the fourth pillar, media has been assigned the role of cultivating unbiased public opinion. By doing so, power greedy elements can be punished. But, nowadays, in India, the credibility of media has been eroding so rapidly ever since the NDA government came in power. In this blog, “media ethics in modern democracies” I am going to discuss the media ethics in the light of Indian democracy.
Communal politics and media ethics relationship
Ethics is a certain set of principles or moral rules that determines what is right and wrong conduct or behaviour at work, in case of conflict of interests.
Though these moral principles are normative in nature and hardly legally binding, they have strong bearing on the conduct or working of the individual or institution in the society.
For example, use of technology by media to tell the truth in public and receive monetary benefit is ethically accepted and permitted.
When the political leader is addressing public rally by invoking communal feeling of majority against minorities, media should not indulge in to cover-up. Instead, should uphold the ideals of democracy while forming public opinion.
Role, values in behaviour of people
Values are universally accepted standards of desirability. Simply, values are certain yardsticks to determine the appropriateness of something.
In short, values determine the base level of quality of which something should be done or below which something should be avoided.
For example, in the modern democracies, media is trusted entity for authentic information and news, happening in the any nation. Accordingly, we minimum expect that such institutions should deliver unbiased things without fear and favour in the interest of public.
Role and importance of media ethics in modern democracies
It is a set of moral principles and standards determining the conduct or behaviour of all types of media institutions while delivering services in the society.
For example, telling truth is the fundamental ethical duty of media. But, selling truth in favour of power is the grossly violation of principle of media ethics.
Now, it is gaining momentum due to huge money involved in this activity. And, once called the noble service, now has become lucrative business.
Violation of media ethics in India
Ever since the NDA government came in power, the incidents of violation of media ethics are growing unprecedently all over nation, ranging from electronic to print. Here, I am going to discuss some of the incidents. In last almost a decade, media fraternity in India played three major unassigned role in the Indian democratic system.
Media as a mute spectator
It is widely noticed that media remains as a mute spectator whenever the decisions taken by surprise decision maker becomes suicidal.
For better insight, I would like to recall the decision of demonetisation which forced people to beg for even their hard earned money.
Initially aggressive media suddenly became silent when the grave fallouts started surfacing. During that period, lakhs of jobs were destroyed and liquidity crunch choked the demand in market, paving way for human induced recession. And, even today, Indian economy is struggling to recover from the lethal blow of surprise demonetisation.
We know that it is morally and naturally acceptable the role of media to support the decision of government in the interest of society not against.
Aggressive eugolizer of Prime Minister
Let it be the divisive politics, lynching incidents, and chaos of CAA and NRC, the Indian media aggressively propagated the single brand Prime Minister, citing the issue of national security.
These media institutions didn’t think over the genuine problems the citizens of nation facing during crisis. Instead, they are aggressively presenting the image of PM as messiah of nation, without any effective result.
In the period of coronavirus pandemic, whole media lobby was intensively highlighting the instructions given by Prime Minister through media. But, they suddenly became mute when the voices raised against the ill-timed decision of lockdowns.
Media as the manipulator
What we naturally expect is the bare truth about the activities happening in the nation through the fourth pillar of democracy. But, unfortunately, recently, the entire media coverage has been totally shifted from national issues to personal, or individual incidents of Bollywood.
Isn’t it a deliberate drama to shift the public attention from the burning genuine issues of nation? Or, is it totally inability of leaders in power to deal with such issues effectively?
This is nothing but the innovative role of Indian media as a master manipulator to rotten the weakened root of democracy under the Bjp rule.
Last words on communal politics and media ethics
Media, the fourth pillar of democracy, is the natural interface between government and public to share problems and policies. It works properly as long as the medium remains unbiased and impartial.
Otherwise, any partiality may prove detrimental for both. There is an organic relationship between media and modern democratic system. Recent emergence of communal politics is the product of grossly negligence of the fourth pillar of democracy.
Freedom of speech and expression
Social institutions in modern societies
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