About Nepali Media

Status of media freedom in Nepal

Dharmendra Jha

Nepal is world’s youngest democratic republic. Political parties remain committed to democracy and pledge to support and promote press and media freedom, but there is a huge gap between the action and the intention. Even today journalists across Nepal face threats and security problems from different armed groups active in different pockets of the country. Attacks on journalists and threats of violence and intimidation have particularly affected colleagues based in the districts, particularly central Tarai and the eastern hills. But this should not at all mean that working conditions are highly favorable in the rest of Nepal, including Kathmandu.

The interim constitution of Nepal guarantees press and media freedom, but what lacks is an enabling atmosphere for the industry to flourish. The relationship between employers and the employees is not very smooth across the board. The state makes pledges to promote press and media freedom on all occasions but it does every bit to control the information. Just a couple of months ago the Ministry of Communication issued a circular to a privately-run television channel. This was clearly an attempt to control press and media freedom through direct intimidation. And, the prime minister himself has gone public venting ire against Facebook. Of course, both received public rebuttal.

It should be noted here that political leaders who have been schooled in anti-democracy philosophy are at the command and control of the state affairs. Although the current administration speaks publicly in support of press and media freedom, it actually intends to gag the press. That’s why journalists in Nepal also need to turn their attention to foster democratic system for some more time to come.

It is a matter of grave concern that the government, or the state, does not take decisive steps to end impunity. As a result, repeated calls and organized efforts by press and media associations always end up with lip service. Another increasing trend in Nepal's journalism arena is self-censorship. This trend owes a lot to the prevailing state of impunity and lack of security. This is a very dangerous situation, but in the current circumstances not unnatural. There is no debate that the prevailing environment is not at all conducive for free and professional journalism. Nepali journalists have a fear psychosis. It is not possible to report factually in such a mental state. The situation is especially grave in middle terai and eastern hilly areas. With journalists out in the districts, practicing self–censorship, capital centric media houses have been directly affected. Nepali journalism is thus facing behind in factual reporting.

There were many attempts to psychologically terrorize the press. The journalists and the media institutions became the victims of various attacks. Attacking media houses, vandalizing vehicles, torching newspapers, smashing media equipments and stopping newspaper publications were some of the incidents that took place during this period.

The international fraternity’s role is critical to change the scenario back home. We take this opportunity to thank you for the kind of support that our international friends are lending and also requests for continued support to us in the days ahead. Our goals are simple: We want  press and media freedom. We want an enabling environment; we want conditions where fellow journalist can work freely, without having to worry about the consequences, or threats, intimidation and violence. Impunity has been on the rise in the recent past and the situation appears to get worse by the day. The situation has only aggravated because the state protects those involved in attacking the media.

Few cases to consider:

The murderers of journalist Dekendra Thapa and journalist Birendra Shah are still not punished. The government commission formed to probe JP Joshi's killings did not submit its report and the case filed against the abduction of Prakash Singh Thakuri was withdrawn. Uma Singh's murder case was not properly investigated. After mounting pressure from media associations' nationwide protests and international circle, the government filed the case in the court in hurry. No proper investigation has been carried out.

The government paid no heed to demands from Journalists associations to form an investigation commission to probe the killing of journalists during the conflict. The state has not taken any initiative to compensate the families of killed journalists and to educate their children. And, the government has failed to implement any of its past agreements and commitments. Those linked with and accused of killing and torturing journalists need not fear in Nepal – they enjoy political protection. This has directly affected the journalists and the media, which suffers from self-censorship.

Journalists in Nepal suffer in more than one ways. Because the industry itself is weak financially and institutionally, journalists have to make do with little or no regular pay for months and work for long even without appointment letters. Assurances and commitments by the state are hardly implemented. Our study shows 70 per cent of journalists have not even been given appointment letters. Journalists working in the state controlled media (Radio Nepal, Nepal Television, Rastriya Samachar Samiti which is  a national news agency and Gorkhaptra Corporation which publishes an English and a vernacular daily and three vernacular monthlies) are also among those who have had to suffer because the Act has not been implemented fully. No wonder, the state does not care if the private sector media implement the Working Journalists’ Act or not. The state simply doesn’t care and such a situation often puts journalists in difficulties. And, in some cases journalists have become vulnerable to compromises at different levels.

The press right is not possible unless the citizen's rights are first secured. That is why the press has always supported civil movements. Press movement, which was directly associated with the civil movement, is now focused on ensuring professionalism and commercial security. Media is still struggling to ensure professional rights, security and freedom of press. A professional attitude is today's necessity for the development of journalism. But for this, Nepali press needs security and professional expertise. We are demanding that the government guarantee both. No civil right will be guaranteed in the absence of press and freedom of expression and Journalists movements revolves around this as well.

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Market Driven/Commercialized/Corporatized Media: Huge Compromise on Media Ethics?

At the outset, I would say that media ethics have been compromised due to market driven and commercialized media. From the experience of Nepal, what I can say is that as the country is developing economically, the value, integrity and ethics of media has gone down significantly. In the name of surviving in the open and liberal market, the media organizations have been compromising without honoring any boundary.

I would like to recount an account of compromise on ethics in Nepal by giving an example. One of the young researchers did a survey on how some media organizations behaved during an event involving a business institution. It was about an Indian multinational Dabur. This foreign direct investment company in Nepal produces all kinds of juices and exports. It is one of the highest tax paying manufacturing industry in Nepal. Dabur got involved in a row with Nepal's biggest media house. This event took place around 2010. At the period many Indian multinationals had stopped providing advertisement to that particular business house, Kantipur Publications. In order to take revenge on the Indian multinationals, the publication started highlighting news about how unhealthy and adulterated the Dabur's Real Juice was. The researcher found out that within the period of about a month there were about 45 news stories and editorials on the issue defaming the Dabur's products.

Interestingly, at the same time the other two major media houses (we can say second and third biggest) were not uttering a word about the quality of Real Juice. It is because the advertisement  that  were curtailed in Kantipur Publications were going to those media houses. The researcher counted the stories on those newspapers for the same period, and as you know, none was negative against Real Juice.

This is only an example of how corporatized media compromise on media ethics. We have been seeing such kind of stories going around on the Television, radio and news papers in Nepal.  There are some stories raising the concerns about certain issue of a big corporate house. If the media relation officers of that particular business house are efficient and are aware of tricks to stop the news, the story dies down soon. However, if the business house shows some kind of adamancy and denies greasing the palms of the journalists, the news gets nastier.

What I'm very much surprised is that the media houses are not surviving on what they are offering to the public, but how do they acquire certain news and manage to trade it off with the concerned corporate, bureaucrat or individual. So, the media freedom we are talking about is not the right of the people to know, but the right of the media houses to decide how much they wish to let people know.

When we are talking about corporatized media houses, we tend to vilify big organizations. But in Nepal, I have experienced smaller media houses compromising on media ethics just for their personal and petty interests. These smaller houses are owned by the journalists, yet they are not behaving responsibly, they are not living up to the expectations of the people. I believe, in Nepal, the bigger media houses have tried to maintain integrity more than the smaller media houses owned by journalists.

I am hopeful to know more about this issue in this gathering of eminent journalists from the South Asia.

Thank you very much for allowing me to speak on this occasion.

Presented in the seminar on Curbing Media by Government ? Organised by FES India, MICCI and ICG, 14^th-16^th October 2012, Goa International centre Goa India.