EC’s ‘name and shame’ policy to battle paid news

The Election Commission has cracked the whip on media houses and candidates indulging in paid news during elections by adopting a “name and shame” policy. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Jun 13, 2013, 02:02:00 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Election Commission has cracked the whip on media houses and candidates indulging in paid news during elections by adopting a “name and shame” policy.

The Commission in the last few years has increased its vigil against paid news, considered an election malpractice, across the country.

As many as 42 cases of paid news were reported in Karnataka during the assembly elections in May, whereas over 80 cases of paid news were reported from Tamil Nadu during last year’s assembly elections. There were 276 cases of paid news in Gujarat, 104 in Himachal Pradesh and 250 in Bihar during the assembly polls.

According to the EC, paid news is an advertisement under the grab of news promoting a particular candidate. The district media certification and monitoring committee headed by the district electoral officer is responsible for spotting instances of paid news.

As per the commission’s latest directive to all Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs), the decision of the committee on paid news would be posted on their respective websites as part of its “name” and “shame” policy.

“The name of the media house and the candidate would be posted on the website of the CEOs and the EC once a paid news is confirmed,” said Akshay Rout, director general (media and communication).

However, lack of proper investigation has been a major issue in identifying paid news items. Commission officials said CEOs have to ensure that a final decision on paid news is taken only after hearing to all sides of the story.

“We would like them to consult the Press Council of India in case of print media and News Broadcaster Association in case of electronic media,” a senior commission official said.

Once a news item is declared paid news, the Commission adds up its cost as election expenditure of the candidate sponsoring the news item. However, it cannot take any action against the candidate or the media house.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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