The age of saturation coverage

DID the media let itself be used? Is 24-hour television coverage the enemy of ‘cold consideration’ as veteran journalist Inder Malhotra claims? Is it impossible to conduct a summit under the ‘bright lights’ of the media as former Indian ambassador S.K. Singh maintains? Did the Indian media hype expectations to unrealistic levels? In the aftermath of the recently concluded Indo-Pakistan summit the domestic media has attracted a considerable amount of censure for its performance both before and during the proceedings.

Not everybody agrees with this view of course. International relations analyst Kanti Bajpai refuting the allegation of hype welcomed the ‘scrutiny’ that freed diplomacy from being the preserve of a few while others have argued that the TV glare is an inevitable circumstance of our times. One could also argue, with equal vehemence, that these are the consequences of an open media. While it is not my intention to abuse our hard-won autonomy for the audio-visual media, something that appeared to impress even the most cynical Pakistani visitor during the summit it seems to me was that some discussion on the media’s choice of formats, priorities and the dangers of liberalisation is not out of place.

It needs to be remembered, for instance, that the round-the-clock cricket match-like coverage of major events such as a hijacking or an election adopted by many news channels is not an inevitable outcome of openness but a specifically selected format from many options available. While one advantage of this live-come-what-may approach has been to provide a range of expert opinion there is also, as we have seen, the enormous pressure to speculate, to force premature judgments and leave the viewer with the feeling of living from one thrilling crisis to another. This sort of saturation-coverage approach has also had an impact on the print media which, instead of striving to provide what television cannot, appears to be duplicating its focus on the Big Story of the moment leading to a surge of trivia (what Clinton ate; what Begum Musharraf wore) in what could be perceived by some as a fairly injudicious use of precious media space. The other noticeable tendency in our new information age is the over reliance on political issues. The Indian press has always been accused of an obsession with politics. The magazine revolution of the eighties and the emergence of new issues such as women’s rights and the environment brought about a change. But now with television we seem to have returned to the fact of politics not only dominating but overwhelming the media. One finds less and less serious discussion in the print media and very little on television news channels on subjects such as education, technology, social mores, health, urban culture, the arts, the media and so on. The enormous changes taking place in the way we eat, study, marry, communicate, procreate, pray, earn, age and so on — all aspects that closely concern the average consumer of media products seem to find little space on debates and discussions on current affairs. But perhaps the most dangerous trend to emerge in recent times is the disappearance of issues. This is a difficult point to illustrate in the shadow of a truly Big Story like the recent summit. The best way I can think of doing it is by linking it to the notion that has gained prominence in recent times of journalism being a business like any other. A subtle result of that line of thought has been a change in perception: one that sees the news media less as an institution and more as a loose conglomerate of fragmented and highly adversarial units.

By adversarial I am not talking about professional competition but the sort of rivalry that appears to mandate that apart from the big and obvious news event one publication or channel will not freely build on a story broken by another; that competing publications will avoid quoting or naming each other; that one could in all likelihood see a significant story on the news on one channel one evening and find it nowhere else thereafter. The Tehelka arms deal expose, one of the rare recent instances of a story broken by a media house to get extensive coverage did not for instance spark off, as it could have, a spate of stories, independently investigated by other news agencies, on the subject of defence deals.

In the absence of investigative follow-ups; of opinions being comprehensively analysed from a cross section of the media, there is no thickening of debate, no momentum gained by issues that can aid reflection or provide a larger picture of the truth. There is a danger of subjectivity ruling as we saw in Chennai with the Karunanidhi arrest being covered in contrasting ways by rival networks. Our free media is a matter of extreme pride but perhaps we could do with some introspection on certain aspects.

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