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Presidential ordinance enhances Prasar Bharati autonomy

The Prasar Bharati Act, 1990, for giving autonomy to the electronic media, has been amended through a presidential notification issued last week.

The changes include the abolition of the 22-member Parliamentary Committee, which was to oversee the working of the autonomous Broadcasting Corporation of India (Prasar Bharati).

Another significant change is the scrapping of the Broadcasting Council, which was to hear complaints relating to the Prasar Bharati. A body on similar lines is envisaged in the broadcasting bill which has already been introduced in Parliament.

Minister for Information and Broadcasting S Jaipal Reddy said the changes have been made to enhance the autonomy and efficiency of the corporation. He said the government was considering creating an ombudsman to deal with complaints on unfair treatment of individuals or issues. Another alternative was to enlarge the Press Council into a Media Council which will then act as a redressal forum across media.

In a communique in July this year, it was announced that the act would stand notified from September 15, 1997.

The legislation to give autonomy to the electronic media was introduced on December 29, 1989, by the then information and broadcasting minister P Upendra, and passed after a nationwide debate in July 1990. The act received presidential assent on September 12, 1990.

The provision relating to the 22-member committee was not in the original bill and was brought in through an official amendment under pressure from opposition parties, including the Congress.

However, since then, the act has not been notified on the ground that with the advent of satellite TV channels and other changes in the media, certain amendments were needed. The change of government with the Congress coming to power in 1991 also resulted in some rethinking on the legislation.

The successive governments had also been saying that the act had to be amended in the light of the comprehensive legislation on broadcasting , which is now pending before a joint parliamentary committee.

Early last year, I K Gujral and S Jaipal Reddy, who were then in the opposition, had urged the President to notify the legislation and had asked all the political parties to include this in their election manifestoes at the time of the last general election.

By the presidential ordinance, the assets of Doordarshan and All India Radio, estimated to be worth Rs 550 billion, are being transferred to the Prasar Bharati on a perpetual lease at a token fee of Re 1 per annum, instead of treating the assets as capital provided by the government to Prasar Bharati. Reddy said this was being done because of criticism that capital can be converted into equity by a future government, thus retaining control of Prasar Bharati.

The Prasar Bharati has been given the option of deciding which government personnel it would like to retain on deputation. The earlier 1990 bill had said this would be decided by the government.

The Prasar Bharati will also be free to take decisions relating to the shape of advertisement and commercial time in its programmes. Sections 12(5) and 12(2) have been amended accordingly.

It had been decided that all members will have six-year terms instead of one-third of them retiring every two years. But no member will be eligible for a second term. An amendment has also been introduced to remove the possibility of any foreign national becoming a member of the board.

Asked how the department-related standing committees could do the work of overseeing an autonomous body, Reddy said that the Prasar Bharati was a statutory body, and not a constitutional one like the Election Commission or the Supreme Court.

He made it clear that although the government had certain powers under Section 21 of the act, it could only issue transparent policy guidelines and interefere in the programming.

Amendments have also bee made to give flexibility to the Prasar Bharati board to constitute recruitment boards or ask the Union Public Service Commission to perform the recruitment functions.

The power to supersede the board of the Prasar Bharati on charges defined under the act has been vested with Parliament and not with the President, as provided in the principal act.

Some sections have been amended in the light of the proposed broadcasting bill to clearly assign the role of public service broadcasting to the Prasar Bharati and to leave the regulatory role to the proposed Broadcasting Authority of India.