Media, BJP and corporate companies have direct relationship: Magsaysay Awardee P Sainath
Bengaluru, September 2: Magsaysay awardee P Sainath said that as there was a close relationship between the media, BJP and corporation companies, more than 90 per cent of the news appeared in the media were related to BJP.
Speaking at a special lecture on Media and Rural India organized by Suchitra in memory of Dr U.R Ananthamurthy here on Sunday, he said that the BJP has been implementing the laws to support the corporate companies. By privatizing the mining, banking and education, the BJP has encouraged the corporate companies to make huge profits. In gratitude to this, the media houses have been telecasting news in favour of the BJP, he said.
Majority of the media houses were in the hands of corporate companies. So, they telecast the news which suits their interests as the news for the people of the country. So, the farmers suicides, death of hundreds of people and damage due to flood in Kerala would not become the major issues for media, he said.
When there was plague outbreak in the country during 1920s, the media had played a major role in creating awareness among people. But nowadays, the media houses have restricted themselves to the news and stories of industrialists or businessmen, religious institutions and political parties and their leaders. Major leaders and social reformers like Raja Ram Mohan Rai, Gandhi, Dr BR Ambedkar, Bhagat Singh had become the journalists. Besides the social revolution, they had also enhanced the knowledge of people. In view of this, the main characteristic of a journalist was to go hand-in-hand with the social change, he said.
“During 1990, there was no billionaire. But in between 2000, and 2018, hundreds of billionaires were born. Though crores of farmers and labourers worked day and night, they could not live their life and were committing suicide. But what is the reason for increasing the number of billionaires year on year?”
- P Sainath, Senior Journalist
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Eight fruit vendors killed, ten injured as truck falls into 50-metre deep valley in Yellapura
Yellapura (PTI): At least eight persons were killed and 10 others sustained injuries when the truck in which they were travelling fell into a 50-metre-deep valley near here in the wee hours of Wednesday, a police officer said.
The victims, all fruit vendors, started from Savanur and were heading towards the Yellapura fair to sell fruits. They were traveling on the Savanur - Hubballi road when the accident occurred in a forested section, the Uttara Kannada Superintendent of Police M Narayana said.
"Around 5:30 am, the truck driver in a bid to give side to another vehicle went to the extreme left and fell into an about 50 metre deep valley," Narayana told PTI.
He added that there was no protection wall in the road in the valley.
"Eight persons were killed on the spot and two got critical injuries. The injured have been shifted to the KIMS Hospital in Hubballi," the officer said.
