The Hindu : Focus on development issues, Jaitley tells media

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jul 07, 2003

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Focus on development issues, Jaitley tells media

By Our Staff Correspondent

BHOPAL JULY 6. The Union Minister for Law, Commerce and Industry, Arun Jaitley, has said that for the sake of all-round progress, media should pay more attention to development issues and avoid trivialising news.

Mr. Jaitley was speaking at a seminar on Vision 2010 (for Madhya Pradesh), hosted here last night by the Madhya Pradesh Gaurav Pratishthan. He said people in this country should give up their pessimism and take a more objective view of India's potential as a nation, which was already on the path of shedding off the "developing nation'' tag. The biggest challenge before the country was to come out of the vicious circle of cynicism.

Mr. Jaitley said India's exports to the U.S. were worth over $ 12 billions whereas the U.S.'s exports to India were only $ 4 billions.

He drew attention to the debate in the U.S. and European countries and said people in those countries were worried as they were losing their manufacturing jobs to China. Also, they were losing the service sector jobs to India.

In the last 10 years, the rate of economic progress in China had been 8 per cent and in India 6 per cent, he said adding that China ranked second in the world in terms of purchasing power while India ranked fourth on this count.

Taking a dig at media, Mr. Jaitley said, "development is no news for media''.

Targeting the television news channels, he said that 24-hour television had its character as it had to shell out news immediately. Citing an example, Mr. Jaitley said the television news channels had nothing to report when, during the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee's just-concluded China visit, it was agreed that China and India would take a joint stand at the WTO. Instead of flashing news of such historic significance, the television news channels in India were busy showing an underwater marriage and its preparations.

`TV trivialises news'

Mr. Jaitley said television news got trivialised as people see only those visuals that could be captured by camera. The tendency to trivialise news left its influence on those who took decisions at the Government level and in the process politicians tended to take popular decisions. The temptation of next morning's headlines was far important for them than decisions that could leave a long-term impact.

Mr. Jaitley gave the Chinese example to convey that investment should seep down in society for the sake of development. It had been easier for China to increase investment because nobody in that country asked questions. Even in the developed countries where people had social security and the quality of life was better the decision process became relatively simple. But the decision process in this country was very difficult due to newspaper editorials, 24-hour television, and the election process.

"The problem at our end is that we are a developing country with a slow delivery system. Those who think social progress can lead to development are wrong. We need electricity, water and roads for generating economic activity. Without these, one cannot hope to attract investment," he said, and praised the efforts of China in building a world-class infrastructure. He said the industrial sector in China had been able to keep the cost of production low because power was subsidised and means of communication were economical.

The Managing Editor of The Pioneer, Chandan Mitra, spoke.

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