[cr-india] Fwd: Re: On DU CR's move to allow student election related broadcast

[Vickram Crishna]

Dear Ram, Richie, others


Let us not be blinkered, the danger of station capture is real. 


However, in terms of genuine community stations being compromised, there isn't such a big danger per se. Why should politicians bother, when the potential nexus of a 'most-favored' station and the religious or 'social work' group is so juicy? And the number of such stations is far in excess.


For genuine stations, getting this kind of content is potentially one to build subscriber confidence. But it won't be that easy to get the competing candidates. 


Vickram

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From:"N.Ramakrishnan" <nram at ideosyncmedia.org>
Date:Sun, 30 Aug, 2015 at 11:42 pm
Subject:[cr-india] Fwd: Re: On DU CR's move to allow student election related broadcast

Dear members:
Inadvertently, this ongoing discussion on the list moved to a private thread. Reforwarding the missing mails to the list. Please see chain of mails below.
Regards,
Ramakrishnan 


N.Ramakrishnan Executive Director Ideosync Media Combine H.No.1381, Sector 37 Faridabad - 121 003 Haryana - India Tel: +91-0129-4131883/4064883/4065883/6510156 Mobile: +91-9810273883 Web: www.ideosyncmedia.org Twitter: @ideosyncmedia Facebook: facebook.com/ideosyncmedia Visit the Ideosync Blog at: www.ideosyncmedia.org/blog 

-------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: Re: [cr-india] On DU CR's move to allow student election related broadcastDate: Sat, 29 Aug 2015 17:06:44 -0700From: Richie Rego <richiersj at yahoo.com>To: N. Ramakrishnan CR-Tech <nram at ideosyncmedia.org> 


Hi Ram, I agree with you on the maturity of the communities and their rights to discuss and receive information.  


My reservation is that often our radio managers represent communities' voice without consulting them! 


Personally,  I would very much like CRs to be active politically and economically without which alround development cannot take place. But I am wary of radio stations and political leaders making this a tool in their hands. And the community merely becomes the targets!  


By the way,  I realised that in my small little phone, I failed to reply to all, and consequently, my response was restricted only to you. Surely you could share it with the group. 

Richie 

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From:"N.Ramakrishnan" <nram at ideosyncmedia.org>
Date:Sat, 29 Aug, 2015 at 8:04 pm
Subject:Re: [cr-india] On DU CR's move to allow student election related broadcast

Dear Richie:
My point, in fact, was that stations should be free to cover parliamentary and assembly elections in their areas if they so choose! I myself would not mind at all if any of those events were covered on CR; because I see it as part of my right to free speech. What purpose community radio if communities cannot hear about who they themselves are selecting to represent themselves within national and local legislative and administrative bodies and processes?
While I agree with your distinction between campaigning and covering elections - an important distinction there - I am also wary of saying communities should do x and not do y: I cannot arrogate myself to a position where I decide that the station or community is mature enough to cover elections, but not mature enough to allow candidates to speak for themselves on air - or doubt their ability to control these processes. (Incidentally, this also begs the question of how one would decide the maturity level of a station - and who would do the judging.)
My personal approach would be to consult the community on whether they feel issues around elections, candidates, polls etc are important issues to discuss - and if yes, get the community's inputs on what would be allowed on the station, and what would not. The community would decide what standards of impartiality are to be maintained, and how to be able to judge this in a transparent way. This is where the common understanding of the principles of the stations and its code of ethics comes in.
This way, your question of where one would draw the line also gets answered by itself. Assuming the community and CRS have been able to achieve a common understanding of a code of ethics, if the community feels their station would like to immerse itself in the politics of the region, I would see it as their right to do so. Conversely, if they feel they would not like to engage with the hurly-burly of participatory democracy and elections, and would like to speak only about governance from a purely developmental point of view, that is their right too, and for them to decide.
I look forward to a continued discussion on this. With your permission, I would like to carry this conversation on on that forum, and post your response and my current mail on the list, as I believe it is important for everyone to engage with these issues.
Warm regards,
Ramakrishnan

N.Ramakrishnan Executive Director Ideosync Media Combine H.No.1381, Sector 37 Faridabad - 121 003 Haryana - India Tel: +91-0129-4131883/4064883/4065883/6510156 Mobile: +91-9810273883 Web: www.ideosyncmedia.org Twitter: @ideosyncmedia Facebook: facebook.com/ideosyncmedia Visit the Ideosync Blog at: www.ideosyncmedia.org/blog 

On 29/08/15 5:14 PM, Richie Rego wrote:


If student election campaign is permitted on CR, how will that be different from parliamentary and assembly election campaign.  


Covering elections is different from campaigning, though broadcasters can cross boundaries easily. Keeping the spirit of CR in mind,  one can get the communities to discuss politics, make it a community issue for development and empowerment. In this,  politicians need to kept of CR,  at least from propagation and libby.

But campaign as such DU permits party politics explicitly. Today's college / university elections are loaded with party political agenda.


With the present ruling class,  CR has already become a tool in the ruling party's hand. Where do we draw the line?  Election campaign, political ads, and political alignment - seems to be natural progression 

RR

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From:"N.Ramakrishnan" <nram at ideosyncmedia.org>
Date:Sat, 29 Aug, 2015 at 11:46 am
Subject:[cr-india] On DU CR's move to allow student election related broadcast

DU-CR's decision to allow campaigning on its station for the student election in Delhi University this year opens some interesting doors in terms of precedents. Other stations - which I shall not name here - have covered local municipal and Panchayat elections before, so this is not a new process by any means; but it is probably the most overt one till date. Read Radio Survivor's coverage of the news here. The Statesman also has an article about this. 
I suspect if it is done in a transparently fair and impartial manner, and if the station moderates the discussions in terms of time allowed to the various candidates and to the kind of content that is actually aired, this serves to underline the fact that local news belongs on CR - as do information about political representation and critiques of governance at the local level.
There are those of us who think that a step like this opens a Pandora's Box of political patronage and CR-capturing; and while I personally tend to see more positives than negatives, I agree that those are thoughts that must be respected. Perhaps a revised framework for what constitutes acceptable coverage and what does not would help? I think DU CR's experience would establish some processes that could be collated in terms of how this could be done - especially if other stations that have done this type of coverage before are willing to chip in with their own experiences. Perhaps looking at these experiences and operational practice notes while going back to the CR ethical practice document that was developed a couple of years ago might help?
Thoughts?

Ramakrishnan 
N.Ramakrishnan Executive Director Ideosync Media Combine H.No.1381, Sector 37 Faridabad - 121 003 Haryana - India Tel: +91-0129-4131883/4064883/4065883/6510156 Mobile: +91-9810273883 Web: www.ideosyncmedia.org Twitter: @ideosyncmedia Facebook: facebook.com/ideosyncmedia Visit the Ideosync Blog at: www.ideosyncmedia.org/blog 

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