-The Hindu   “The intent is clear. Keep the people drugged so they do not revolt against poverty” Press Council of India (PCI) Chairman Justice Markandey Katju on Sunday called upon journalists to play a seminal role in promoting scientific and rational ideas in society and raise the intellectual level of the masses by extricating them from the morass of superstition, casteism, bigotry, communalism and feudal tendencies. Delivering the Jhabarmal Sharma memorial lecture here,...

-PTI Press Council of India Chairman Justice Markandey Katju has sought “more teeth” for the regulatory body and expansion of its ambit over the electronic media and the Internet for which, he suggested, a legislation should be introduced in Parliament. In a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, now made public under the RTI Act, Justice Katju said the only power conferred on the Press Council under Section 14(1) of the Act...

Markandey Katju's forthright comments on the state of the Indian news media and the intellectual competence of many journalists have certainly raised many hackles. One does not have to agree with everything the chairman of the Press Council of India diagnoses or prescribes to see that his observations have hit home. Nor are his concerns confined to how and in what respects journalism and many journalists go astray and let...

The newly appointed Chairman of the Press Council of India (PCI) and an eminent former judge of the Supreme Court Justice Markandey Katju now faces a somewhat Hamletian dilemma — how best to suit his actions to his words. And, in the process, how best to also diffuse the heated debate and controversy that has followed some of his recent remarks on the state and the functioning of Indian media. Interestingly,...

-The Hindustan Times   Press Council of India (PCI) chairman justice Markandey Katju has agreed to withhold the letter he had written to PM Manmohan Singh seeking punitive powers for the Council in a stormy session that witnessed four walkouts. “Declaring he is no dictator but a democrat, he agreed to go with the members when they did not agree to many of his 22 suggestions," a member told HT on condition of...