Prasar Bharti CEO Jawhar Sircar has reportedly complained about the government's influence in the running of the company, in a series of letters to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Prasar Bharti runs Doordarshan and All Indian Radio.
According to reports, Sircar warns that without complete autonomy, Prasar Bharti runs the risk of repeating malpractices like "the heavily-edited interview" of Narendra Modi in the run up to the 2014 Lok Sabha election. On April 27 this year, Doordarshan had carried an interview with Narendra Modi. However, controversy erupted when the UPA government was alleged to have censored parts of the interview. Portions of the interview, particularly Modi's remarks on Priyanka Gandhi, Ahmed Patel were allegedly edited out owing to the government's interference. Read more
Later, Sircar had acknowledged that certain portions of the interview broadcasted on Doordarshan "were apparently edited" and pointed a finger at the then Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari for failing to grant "operational autonomy" to the public broadcaster that it has been seeking for years. Read more
In the letters, Sircar reportedly cautions about a repeat of these kinds of incidents. "We do not want to land up in issues, such as the deliberately-edited interview of Shri Modi on the 27th of April, which created such controversy," a recent letter dated August 8, 2014 reads.
In the series of letters to the government, Sircar also brings up the lack of transparency in the government's appointment and transfer of Prasar Bharti officials. He mentions that important officials were transferred without informing top Prasar Bharti executives in the letter.
Journalist Ashok Shrivastav, who had conducted the Modi interview, tweeted on Saturday that he was humiliated and shunted after the interview, but was now back to work.
Sircar, has taken on the ministry over these issues in the past as well. One of the last letters by Sircar was reportedly on the same day when SM Khan — the top news executive when the Modi interview took place — was removed.
According to reports, Minster of Information and Broadcasting, Prakash Javadekar has reacted to Sircar's warnings saying that he would look into the matter, whereas the former minister Manish Tewari demanded that the new government show how they would deal with these demands.
Also Read: Government should not control the media: Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar
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