Guiding Light

Role of Media in Building A Better Society

In the age of globalization, media no doubt needs to give due attention to the commercial aspects of the industry but there is no reason for it to move away from social concerns. Today if we take any morning news-paper in hand and have a look at its columns, we would see that most of the news covered are about events of perverse human dealings, bride burning, oppression of lower caste people by higher cast, railway accidents, floods and fires, scandals, political defections, dacoities, hostility between religious communities and warfare between countries. As result of this, when there is no news of a big scandal, a horrible murder, a terrific railway accident or a major racket or a calamity in a paper, readers say: "There is no news today; today's paper is tasteless.' This usual trend has come to stay so much so that, in the field of journalism, it has become a common saying that bad news is good news. In journalism today, it is declared with great pride that the press is 'the watch-dog of democracy'. Thus, strict and fearless criticism is considered to be one of the main duties of the Press. The idea behind it is that the public may be awake to the misdeeds of the leaders and that anyone who is planning to indulge in crime or in disruptive activities, should bear in mind that he will be exposed as others have been and will be hauled up because of his illegal acts. But what is the net visible result of such exposures and such kind of news? We all must first realise that the root cause of all kinds of misery and crime lies mainly in unethical thoughts, words and acts of man. Incidents like robberies, dacoities, embezzlement, adulteration or manufacture of new destructive weapons by some countries — all these spring from what may well be called ‘impurity of thought’ or, in other words, from violence, hate, greed, etc. in the minds of men. These evils can be reduced or, even up-rooted, by tackling the rootcause itself, viz., pollution of thought, or in other words, by inculcating in people what goes today by the name of moral values, humanism or purity in the mind of man. It should, therefore, be realized by every media person that if a world full of peace and happiness is to arrive, then it would not be possible without a positive & constructive role of Media.