These newspapers have been accused of being non objective in reporting of an incident of Police firing on poor people of Forbesganj in Araria district in the state.
Sources in the Council said that it has received several complaints from Bihar regarding ‘anti-people and pro -state attitude of several newspapers published from the state.
PCI is an effective statutory, quasi judicial body which acts as a watchdog of the press. It adjudicates the complaints against and by the press for violation of ethics and for violation of the freedom of the press respectively.
“We will surely issue a show cause notice to the concerned newspapers if the complaints are found to be genuine” said a senior member of the PCI adding that the complaints are being studied by all members of the council including chairman regarding role of media in Bihar.
An NGO, Bihar Media Watch in its complaint to the PCI has alleged that the roles of all the Hindi and English Newspapers with regard to the police firing of 3rd June 2011 have been pro-state.
“It is painful to submit that no newspapers published from Patna published the heart rendering picture of the incident in which one of the police was literally jumping on the body of seriously injured victim who immediately died”, the complaint said that adding that this picture was repeatedly telecasted by TV channels throughout the nation.
“The correspondent who made available this visual of the incident to the channels himself is a correspondent of one of the reputed Hindi daily of Patna but his employer Newspaper did not consider it worth publication”, it alleged.
The memorandum said that after the death of four poor people belonging to minority community in the police firing in Bhajanpur village of Forbesganj on 3rd June, 2011 the local newspapers violated the basic moral ethics and minimum code of conduct of journalism.
“The way the most prestigious newspaper, Hindi Hindustan acted the progressive readers of majority
section and of minority were compelled to see this newspaper as a ‘Hindu Akhbar’. Other newspapers followed the same path. The newspapers attitude became more obvious after the visit of chairperson of National Commission of Minority (NCM)”
“Wajahat Habibullah, the chairman of NCM along with one of the member Saieda Belgrami Imam visited the site of police firing in Forbeseganj block on 21st June, 2011. But this news was not published in the largest selling Hindi newspaper, Hindustan in Patna edition”.
Whereas, English newspapers gave proper coverage to the NCM visit to Forbesganj.
“Newspaper, Prabhat Khabar made mockery of it by publishing this news on page 16, in classified column in two and half lines consisting of twenty five words. So far Dainik Jagran is concerned it did not even consider this news worth publishing on 22nd June, 2011” said the application adding that the NCM Chairman met Governor of Bihar, Chief Secretary and Home Secretary of Bihar on 23rd June, 2011 in connection with the Police Firing at Forbesganj.
However, this news was also not considered worth publishing by Prabhat Khabar and Hindustan, but Dainik Jagran published this news on page number six, of course, in big space.
“Initially the visit by NCM did not find coverage in Hindustan , but on the return of NMC back to Delhi the newspaper Hindustan daily made comments in its editorial ‘ Do Tuk’ on 24th June , 2011 giving it communal colour which shows newspapers pro-state and biased attitude” the complaint by Bihar media Watch said.
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It was clear that NCM was against the state sponsored police firing in Forbesganj and NCM had given serious opinion on police firing hence, Hindi Hindustan deprived its readership of this news.
Complaint also alleged that the English- Hindi dailies published from Patna did not write editorial nor any comment against SP Araria, who ordered firing on the crowd of poor –downtrodden innocent minority. Also no newspaper in order to bring justice to the innocent victims even did news analysis for the whole month.
The convener of the Bihar media Watch Pushpraj asks as how media can maintain silence in case of such an important and barbaric incident.
Complaints against some Urdu dailies including Qaumi Tanzeem and Farooqi Tanzeem have also been received. They also have been accused of being ‘anti-people and pro-state’.