Panel to review Prasar Bharati

NEW DELHI, Nov 22 (UNI) — The government tonight set up a three-member committee to review the Prasar Bharati, its structure and recommend changes to make the functioning of Doordarshan and All-India Radio more professional.

Mr Kiran Karnik, the Chief Executive Officer of Discovery Channel, marketing expert Sunu Sen and Chairman and CEO of Info-Sys Narayanamurthy are members of the committee.

Mr R.C. Mishra, who is Joint Secretary in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry will be Member Secretary and Prasar Bharati CEO R.R. Shah is an invitee.

The committee will give it recommendations within three months. It will also study appropriate ways to improve the quality and creativity of the public broadcaster.

The setting up of the committee to review the whole structure of Prasar Bharati is in keeping with the promise made by the BJP in its election manifesto.

While the present Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley has not gone as far as his predecessor Pramod Mahajan to recommend the winding up of Prasar Bharati, he has said that public assets worth Rs 55,000 crore cannot be left in the hands of a few people with no accountability to the government or Parliament.

"Autonomy with accountability and credibility’’ is the ‘mantra’ enunciated by Mr Jaitley for Prasar Bharati. He has also envisioned the role of public service broadcasters, free from government control and run by media-savvy professionals, for AIR and DD.

While the government gropes for a new shape and role for Prasar Bharati, the corporation is in a limbo right now. It has been functioning under an Acting Chief Executive Officer for several months. The positions of the Chairman, Member (Executive), Member (Finance) and Member (Personnel) are vacant besides three other vacancies in the board.

The confusion on various issues has led to Prasar Bharati — despite its large reach in the country — to lose out on several fronts. Doordarshan’s revenues have been falling over the past two years, from a peak of Rs 572.73 crore in 1996-97 to Rs 490.15 crore in 1997-98 and Rs 399.32 crore in 1998-99.

All this has also led to a lack of initiative and programme quality has suffered.

Cable operators still do not telecast Doordarshan’s main channels despite a government notification.

In 1977, the idea of autonomy for DD and AIR was first mooted in the aftermath of the Emergency. In 1990, the present Prasar Bharati Act was passed and given Presidential assent. In 1997, the Act was finally notified. And now in 1999, the issue seems to have come back a full circle with the role of the state-owned electronic media being debated anew.

The Congress charged the Centre with handling Prasar Bharati as its "private agency". The government is handling Prasar Bharati in the most unprofessional manner and is treating it as a private agency", party spokesman Anil Shastri told reporters when asked to comment on retiring two members of the Prasar Bharati Board by the government.