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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | NaMo TV is an illustration of how the model code is frozen in time -Arghya Sengupta

NaMo TV is an illustration of how the model code is frozen in time -Arghya Sengupta

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published Published on Apr 24, 2019   modified Modified on Apr 24, 2019
-The Telegraph

The time for informality is over — the Election Commission’s stature requires legal heft

When Winston Churchill stood for re-election as prime minister in 1945 after leading Britain to victory in the Second World War, few could have predicted his resounding defeat at the hustings. Churchill was the same fiery, belligerent and all-powerful leader inspiring awe amongst his countrymen. Yet the country had slowly but surely changed when nobody was watching. Instead of Churchillian bluster, it sought out the calm and stable influence of Clement Attlee for the arduous post-war rebuilding exercise.

Something analogous, albeit less dramatic, appears to have taken place with the Election Commission of India and the conduct of the 2019 general elections. The Commission is largely the same — three retired and respected former bureaucrats going about their jobs in a largely anonymous manner. Yet the nature of the general elections has changed dramatically.

Foremost amongst the changes is the unchecked growth of social media. Minors apart, each social media user today is not only a voter but also a votary, capable of disseminating her views publicly for anyone who cares to listen. Although doing so effectively amounts to campaigning for their candidate of choice, a vast majority of them are not linked formally to their candidate or to a party. This means that existing laws relating to campaign restrictions, as they stand, will not apply. This anomaly means that irrespective of whether the biopic on Narendra Modi or KCR can be released in theatres, it can certainly ‘release’ on the internet and find its way very soon to a mobile phone near you. Instead of proactively looking for solutions to this problem that has remained unresolved since 2014, the Commission merely asked social media companies to come up with a voluntary code of ethics. This mandate to the companies to be good was not only too little, too late, it was altogether too timid.

It is unsurprising that the Commission’s appearance of timidity has been taken advantage of. Take the example of NaMo TV. Irrespective of whether the channel is a regular television channel or a special service channel showing advertisements, its management is mandated by law to either seek prior clearance from the information and broadcasting ministry (if it is a television channel) or from the Election Commission’s media certification and monitoring committee (if it is a political advertisement). The channel appears to have done neither at the outset.

This brazen disregard of the law and sanctity of the election process is not new. Booth capturing and fake voting are old sins of the political class. But the new, high-tech vehicles of brazenness have caught the Commission off guard. Its inability to act expeditiously with regard to NaMo TV means that the channel aired for over 10 days before being asked to certify appropriately. There is little point in closing the stable doors after the horse has bolted.

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The Telegraph, 19 April, 2019, https://www.telegraphindia.com/opinion/namo-tv-shows-how-the-election-commission-and-model-code-of-conduct-are-frozen-in-time/cid/1689000?ref=comment_home-template


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