Cobrapost expose and the issue of media propriety

Aditi Tandon

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Tribune News Service

New Delhi, May 28

Cobrapost’s damning exposé about a section of Indian media allegedly willing to run communal agenda for money has raised issues around press propriety and the power of media to adversely impact democracy by influencing the minds of voters.

While all media houses named in “Operation 136, Part-II”, released by Cobrapost last Friday, have denied involvement in the sting, Opposition parties feel the matter needs a thorough probe before it can be closed or dismissed.

Congress media chairman Randeep Singh Surjewala told The Tribune on Monday that the issue at hand is “far more sinister than the Cambridge Analytica controversy or the NaMo application collating voter data”.

“The Cobrapost revelation is far more sinister than the Cambridge Analytica scam or the use of electors’ data by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s NaMo application. Subject to verification, the Cobrapost exposé is a threat to the very existence of political structures in a democratic polity.

“The manner in which companies like Paytm are alleged to be acting on the diktats of the PM, the BJP and the RSS to release confidential consumer data and the fashion in which big media houses are alleged to be amenable to defaming politicians of a certain hue can invite multiple laws covering newspaper and television industry besides attracting criminal action,” Surjewala said.

The Congress leader asked for an independent probe into the exposé by the media itself. “In the interest of independence of the media and free press, it is important for this exposé to be investigated. The Press Council of India and the National Broadcasters Association should take this probe upon themselves so that everyone named and involved in the sting is probed to satisfaction and the guilty punished,” Surjewala said.

The Congress argued that the allegations of breach of private consumer data by digital wallet company Paytm need an urgent investigation as it was more serious than harvesting of Facebook user data for electoral gains by the UK-based data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica, which has since shut shop.

The Left Front, including the CPI and CPM, favoured a probe into the sting with CPI’s D Raja calling upon the highest judiciary to take suo motu cognizance of the revelations.

“A large section of the media today is prejudiced and biased. Cobrapost sting shows big media houses are ready to peddle Hindutva agenda for money. Fake news has long been a reality in India but this is very serious and impacts electoral mindscape of the people. We all know that the press controls and conditions voter minds and behaviours. To that extent, the press has to be neutral and truly independent. The highest court should take notice of the Cobrapost sting,” Raja said.

CPM’s MB Rajesh said while use of fake news for the purpose of promoting a certain political party had always been known in India, the latest exposé showed media houses were now “amenable to being purchased for unleashing communal agenda”. It was a major threat to democracy and needed to be nipped in the bud, said Rajesh.

The BJP was silent on the matter, which came to light barely few days after Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad slammed the Facebook for attempts to influence electoral behaviours in the wake of the Analytica controversy.

Prasad had then said: “If need be, strong action will be taken (read against Facebook). Let me make it very, very clear, we fully support freedom of press, speech and expression; we fully support free exchange of ideas on social media. But any attempt, covert or overt, by social media, including Facebook, of trying to influence India’s electoral process through undesirable means will neither be appreciated nor be tolerated.”