PCI for efforts to check fake newspapers

NEW DELHI, JULY 22. The Press Council of India has proposed coordinated efforts by the Central and State agencies to contain the growing menace of fake newspapers.

``The Registrar of Newspapers of India (RNI), the Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity (DAVP) and all State Governments and Union Territories should coordinate their efforts to identify such papers and initiate action against them'', the PCI's latest report, `Future of Print Media', has suggested.

The statutory watch-dog body has observed that ``the proposal, if implemented properly, will not only save public money going to fraudulent hands, but will also divert it to genuine papers which are in need of encouragement''.

The 163-page report, to be published shortly, has observed that commercial interests and other benefits that accrue from the journalistic profession have gained an upper hand, motivating more and more people to venture into the field and unfortunately also brought in the menace of fake newspapers.

A 21-member committee headed by the PCI chairman, Justice P.B. Sawant, also dwelt at length on the controversy relating to the relative importance of big, small and medium newspapers in national life, while calling for devising appropriate measures to provide patronage and care for the small and medium newspapers.

The big newspapers, with better financial, technical and human resources, can afford to bring out a more attractive product and often with wider national and international coverage, primarily for the urban readers, the report said.

With more and more satellite editions involving less proportionate production cost, they are spreading into the readership domain of the small and medium newspapers with local editions and supplements.

With larger circulation, they attract the bulk of the advertisement revenue, including that from multi- national corporations.

They can, therefore, afford several times more pages and sell at a lower price than the small and medium newspapers.

The plight of the small newspapers is worsened by the price wars and the competing offers of incentives by the big newspapers.

The small and medium newspapers, mostly owned by individuals and commanding about 64.19 per cent of the total circulation, are mostly local papers.

With limited resources, their news coverage and production quality are not up to the mark, the report said. The main charge against them is that they often give inflated circulation figures to get a larger share of Government advertisements.

``A good number of them are also `hand maidens', particularly to local politicians, or they work for the prosperity of individuals or to increase the areas of their local influence,'' the report said.

- UNI

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