Quality of journalism and factors influencing it( against the motion)

Journalism , certainly a very important profession of providing insightful and true information to the people about the matters of politics, economics, impacts of international happenings and a lot more.

But at present ,being a journalist is more about being a disseminator of knowledge gaining information or just being a good actor will do?

With this good evening to one and all present here, today, I Diksha Rajoria stand before you to express my views against the motion which is “Quality of journalism and factors influencing it”. Taking the mentioned notion further I would like to state that unfortunately this vital profession is becoming dirty and unfaithful with each passing day where only such news items are stressed upon which would fetch TRP and make them nation’s no. 1 news channel and the irony is that such television platforms really gain mob vogue and get further encouraged to continue with their years long tested and proven golden method.

But as many of my worthy opponents must be waiting for instances, so here they are. Year 2017 proved really helpful to me. Let’s begin with our favorite and no.1 news channel Aaj Tak( Sabse tez) , Aaj Tak deserves full marks for falling for a story that is so screamingly fake. The “story” carried by India Today’s Hindi channel had its origins in a satirical column by a Moroccan blogger and was quashed in 2015 by Daily O, a website owned by none other than India Today itself. So it aired a news stating that a fatwa has been approved in Saudi Arabia as per which men can eat there wives if they feel hungry . Gross! and disgusting !, I know but it did happen.

How can I not mention “ THE CONNOISEUR , THE HOTSHOT” of this golden method , one and only the republic tv. There is a list of examples but I would like to state a very critical news which was aired back in 2017.They aired a complete story rather a prime time debate on a statement by Arundhati Roy that“70 lakh Indian soldiers cannot defeat Azadi gang in Kashmir” , now in reality this statement was never really said and was an entirely made up content which they quoted from one such interviews which again , never happened. This created a spur on social media, simply because it attacked the patriotic sentiments of people round the nation and people were highly angry and furious on Arundhati Roy and later when the truth was reported they took down the story and buried it under the sand. In my opinion such sensitive content should not be circulated with such negligence on verification as these things can turn into riots , personal attacks on the host and even an ugly political blame game.

This fairly results in time wastage as if we would have discussed so passionately about our economic problems then the state would have been different .

Next on the list is zee news which made a story on Dawood Abraham as they knew that nothing excited corporates and politicians more that a news on there A grade confidant. They aired a story which claimed that worth $15000cr assets of Dawood have been seized by UAE authorities. But unfortunately all the thrill vanished when the UAE government confirmed of no such seize.

On a very serious note I would like to state that these are just the few examples from many such blunders which had happened and might even continue. It is important for everyone to understand that news channels is a platform on which people believe and hence it is there moral duty to present true information after enough verification. One of the best examples is Sushant Singh Rajput’s death which other than providing justice satisfied every single want of these so called news channels from viewership to advertisement revenue .

As a conclusion I would like to implore to all the media houses to not use scandals , deaths , rapes as a source of TRP , don't popularize them rather use your power to fight for them. I believe that the context above clearly prove that how low the quality of journalism has fallen and majorly the factors affecting it are : popularity( TRP) , revenue and political support . With this I rest my case