Modi should stop dramatising poverty: Congress
New Delhi, July 31 : The Congress continued to target Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his speeches in Lucknow last week, saying he should "stop dramatising" poverty.
Congress leader Anand Sharma told reporters here that speaking was part of Modi's DNA and if he does not give speeches, "it probably can affect his health".
Noting Modi shapes his address according the composition of audience, he said: "The Prime Minister should stop this drama of poverty. He should not play with sentiments of the poor. He cheated people with these sentiments in 2014 elections. Now it is time to give account of his performance." Sharma said.
He said Indian's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru was from an affluent background but he left everything and adopted khadi, while Modi was the first prime minister who wears "such good clothes" and changes his dress often.
Sharma said former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri was from a humble background but never mentioned about the poverty he faced while occupying the high post, while all the others from Indira Gandhi to Manmohan Singh life with simplicity.
Modi had said in a speech on Saturday in Lucknow that poverty had given him honesty and courage.
Sharma also referred to Modi's remarks in Lucknow that he was not was "not afraid of" publicly standing beside industrialists because his intentions were "noble" and accused him of making baseless allegations against the Congress, which has never insulted the captains of Indian industry nor used abusive words.
"He (Modi) should talk responsibly. Congress Party has always encouraged industrialization, investment, capital formation and redistribution of the capital for the common good. That has been the governing philosophy and the ideology of the Congress and the successive governments and that is why this country had seen unprecedented growth during our time," he said.
He also said Modi should answer how BJP became "the richest political party in the world in four years".
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Union government assumes full control over TV ratings, TRAI role curtailed: Report
New Delhi: The Union government has assumed full control over television audience measurement, removing the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) from oversight of the ratings system that underpins the country’s ₹36,000 crore television advertising market, according to a report published on Wednesday.
The report in Mint said the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) now has exclusive authority over the framework governing how television ratings are measured and regulated. TRAI had been entrusted with oversight of TV ratings in 2012 during the UPA government’s tenure. TRAI is no longer mentioned in the relevant policy document, effectively vesting sole authority in the MIB.
The report said TRAI will continue to regulate other aspects of broadcasting, including channel pricing, advertising caps, interconnection and distribution norms, service quality and compliance standards. Its role in determining how ratings agencies track viewing behaviour has been withdrawn.
Television Rating Points (TRPs), which reflect viewership patterns, guide advertisers in deciding where to allocate spending across channels and time slots.
A government source quoted in the report said the ministry could modify TRAI’s decisions even when the regulator oversaw broadcasting.
A former CEO of Prasar Bharati told the newspaper that the MIB has historically regulated rating agencies through licensing and guidelines, and by holding them accountable under existing norms.
During its tenure overseeing ratings, TRAI had taken decisions affecting the broadcast sector, which included capping advertising time at 12 minutes per hour following complaints about excessive commercial breaks and it now remains unclear how these matters will be addressed under the revised arrangement.
Satya N. Gupta, former principal advisor at TRAI, was quoted as saying that merging regulatory functions with policy oversight and removing an independent regulator from the process was a retrograde step.
TRAI’s involvement in broadcasting had earlier attracted criticism as well. In 2012, its consultation paper on quantitative limits on television advertising was viewed by some as overlapping with the Advertising Standards Council of India’s code. Subsequent recommendations covering television audience measurement, ownership of news channels and issues such as paid news had also raised concerns among sections of the industry.
Television ratings have faced scrutiny in recent years, including during the controversy involving the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), where officials of the ratings body were prosecuted over allegations of manipulation of viewership data.
