'Give Press Council Ministry status'
"PCI chief" or his lookalike believes censorship is essential in"national interest" although it is bound to hurt some.
AJITH PILLAI conjures up “Justice Katju’s†interview with himself.
Dipped in Witriol
AJITH PILLAI
The “unanimous” August 27 Press Council of India (PCI) resolution (though one member has denied it having been passed) to approach the Central Government seeking the mandate to regulate electronic and social media has given a new spring in the steps of PCI Chairman Markandey Katju. And aiding him in his gravity-defying gait and bounce, it is alleged, is a spiral mechanical compression device attached to the bottom of his custom-built shoes which momentarily raises his soles a few extra inches from the ground whenever he walks.
Incidentally, the contraption (christened Springing Mobiles) was specially designed by three ex-IITians who developed an inexplicable interest in innovative footwear and steel springs after watching Aamir Khan’s Three Idiots. Asked by colleagues as to what connection the movie had to shoes, one of them simply explained that people respond in unique ways to cinema. “Perhaps it may have been Aamir’s sole-stirring performance,” he added jocularly.
Anyway, it was the day after the PCI “passed” the resolution that Justice Katju (or was it his lookalike?) strode into the Council office in Delhi in the Springing Mobiles. Here indeed was a man all charged up, more buoyant and with the singular purpose of cleaning the Aegean stables of the electronic and social media. Everyone watched with awe. One member of the PCI, an editor, who believes that the world will be a better place if it rewinds to the glory days when there were a handful of TV news channels and no social media, had this to say: “It’s a small spring (not of any Arab make) in our chairman’s shoes but a giant leap backwards for the media.”
But getting down to business, how does Justice Katju--remember he was a Supreme Court judge--hope to play the veritable role of a super censor? Thankfully, the PCI chairman has saved us the trouble of interviewing him. In what must be a first of its kind a spy-cam recording is doing the rounds in which a person who clearly looks like the former judge has interviewed himself. To achieve this unique feat a series of questions were apparently first fed into a Dictaphone.
Armed with this recording, Katju or his lookalike drove to a slushy, rain-drenched stretch of green in Delhi’s diplomatic enclave, Chanakyapuri. Once out of his car, the “ex-judge” pressed “play” on his recorder and started walking and answered each of the questions. While conducting this one-man “Walk The Talk” exercise the “PCI chief” did not realise that a secret camera placed on his person was playing eyes and ears to certain Israeli companies interested in setting up internet monitoring systems in India.
But to get to the Q&A session, over to “Justice Katju”:
Q: Why do you think that monitoring the electronic and social media is the need of the hour?
A: My dear, it’s not just the need of the hour, it’s the need of this minute, this very second. The more we delay things the worse (or is it verse?) they get. Today they will see poetic justice in maligning a politician or a community, tomorrow someone might attack the Press Council or lampoon me as someone with scissor hands who goes around sniping news content and blocking Facebook accounts when not trimming hedges. Anyway, that aside, let me assure you, we will be fair and will have nothing but national interest (that curious chameleon-like creature which changes colour with each government) in mind. Our actions might hurt some. But as the great Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping once famously said, “If you open the window for fresh air, you have to expect some flies to blow in.” It’s these flies we want to catch.
Remember censorship is a ship that we will have to sail in through the foggy ocean of information. It will be an epic journey, and I am proud to be the skipper of that vessel whose tonnage and horsing-around power is yet to be determined by the ship builders, Mazagon Dock Ltd, in consultation with the I&.B ministry.
Q: But Judge saab how do you hope to monitor lakhs and lakhs of websites, Facebook, Twitter… And then you want to look closely at hundreds of TV channels and the print media?
A: Ah! It is a herculean task. Which is why I believe that the PCI must be accorded the status of a ministry. It should be allowed to employ thousands--today’s hacks will be tomorrow’s hackers, those who while away time watching TV will be gainfully employed spotting TV content of suspicious nature. The entire nation will be involved in the process. Anyone reporting misuse of media will be rewarded with a certificate of merit and a leather-bound copy of the PCI’s guidelines. And the Council will be a law unto itself with sweeping powers that goes beyond brooms and vacuum cleaners. It will have a tribunal that can punish and impose penalties such as barring offenders from using indefinite articles and forcing them to substitute verbs with adjectives in their copy. We certainly are in for exciting times.
Also news on TV has to be regulated. By our projections in the years to come, the small screen will eventually replace Parliament in that all debates will be conducted in studios. So, to accommodate Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members (six to each channel) you will have to have a humungous number of new telecasters. And the anchors will have to play the crucial role of the Speaker. In fact, after a general election, parties will soon be deciding on allocation of seats on TV channels. Parliament will merely open on every working day for the ritualistic Disruption Hour when MPs can shout, scream and stage walkouts.
Q: All that’s very well. But one of the council’s members has issued a statement that the August 27 resolution was never passed…
A: Slipping into denial mode is not unusual. However, let me reiterate that as far as the resolution is concerned, it was passed. I couldn’t have dreamt it all up. Although, I must admit that there are times when one dreams one is awake and when you get up the dream continues.
Q: Getting back to the PCI, wouldn’t it become a sort of Thought Police that George Orwell wrote about in his novel 1984?
A: Baba, not Thought Police but Thinking Police of the information age. Till now, everybody has been saying that the PCI has no teeth. All we are asking for are a few incisors, canines, premolars, and molars. We are not demanding fangs. Of course, to keep the nation’s sanity intact and weed out those peddling dangerous information one has to be tough and resort to some unusual tactics. To quote Deng Xiaoping again: “It doesn’t matter if a cat is black or white, so long as it catches mice.”
Q: Finally, when and how do you start?
A: Once the government gives its okay we will set the ball rolling. For now we will study the Chinese model of media and internet watch. If India wants to be China then we have to learn a few tricks from that country.
Recorded voice: Well, it was indeed a great pleasure talking to you Justice Katju. Many thanks for your valuable time.
“PCI Chairman”: The pleasure was all mine Justice Katju…