Orientation Program at IIMC-Delhi
Orientation Day-I
IIMC-Delhi:To the gathering of new-comers on the 1st day of Orientation Program at IIMC-Delhi, Mr. Vinod Sharma, the Editor of The Hindustan Times, Spoke about the ' Political Change & Media Hyperbole'.He began his discussion with the contradictions that exist today in India. " India, today, comprises of two faces of people- one, smiling face and the other, non-smiling face", he said.Further, he dealt at lenght on the evolution of the essence of Journalism in India. According to him, the tenets of Journalism constitute reaching out to the masses, creating awareness and consequently, empowerment of the society. He regretted tha Journalism is marching towards economics. " It is progressively degenerating and moving away from the enshrined principles of Accountability, Responsibility, Honesty or Justice to the cause of social education and empowerment", he argued. He opined that Media, now-a-days, have seemingly mortgaged their journalistic business to big ad-providers and big corporate houses. Also, journalism is driven by TRPs, circulation figures, constituencies, advertisements, etc. In the process, he distinguished between Big newspapers and Great newspapers.Again, he highlighted both positive and negative elements viz-a-viz, Media hyperbole. Citing examples of Blue-line buses, state of roads, schools, etc, he said that Media hyperbole has been able to drw the attention of both the govt. and the general public alike for the good. However, he emphasized, " Dealing with real-time information is like handling RDX. So, media hyperbole should be handled with caution and under-estimation in matters of real-time information.
Orientation Day-I (Contd)
Prof. Anand Kumar from Sociology Department of JNU also addressed the students in the afternoon session. His topic was_________________________________________________. During the 1 hr or so, he threw light on various facets of globalization, its agents, its issues, its impacts on society, particularly, Indian Society.Opening his lecture, he defined, “ Globalization is a process which inter-connects things and people beyond nations. It is not localization; it is antithesis to the nationalism.” He then talked about five aspects of globalization, notably: finance capital, commodity, technology, information and labour, in order to ascertain the level and extent of globalization of a country or a place.Talking about mediators of globalization, he mentioned about 8Ms. He opined that these 8Ms such as market, money, modernity, middle class, MNCs, Media, Migration and Multi-culturalism were intrinsically associated with the process of globalization. Thereafter, he touched upon its impacts. He said that it led to hegemonization, homogenization, hybridization, in addition to, marginalization, ethnicization and regionalization. In Indian context, he recalled, “ The process of globalization started in 1992 when the country was not ready as such; it was, in fact, forced on us.” He stressed that it was circumstantial and inevitable, and therefore, not very favourable for us at the outset. He further argued that the globalization, which was accepted by Indians with mixed-reactions initially, had, of late, proved to be disastrous for the economic life of majority of the citizens. Accordingly, there has been either Americanization or Africanization of the society across the globe. While Americanization represented upward moving, tech-savvy, demonstrative middle classes, which comprised of nearly 40 million, Africanization meant more than 400 million poor farmers, unemployed youth, workers in unorganized sectors and so on. So, in his views, it has created more of losers than winners.
Orientatioin-Day II
Prof. V. V. Bhattacharya, the VC of the JNU, while addressing the new IIMCians, sough to put across his views about the socio-economic changes afflicting the society at large and the position of the media in it. He said that media were becoming more and more commercial, and their public service component was subsiding. The media invariably carried 3 kinds of news- truths, half-truths and lies. While sports news were fairly true, news on economy and crimes constituted half-truths and half-lies, and the views of politicians were complete lies.Nevertheless, he considered that media were vibrant and sufficiently independent in India. Earlier, news items comprised mostly of politics, social issues and govt. press releases on govt. policies and economy. Post liberalization, media were increasingly carrying news items pertaining to stock markets and other sectors like IT, entertainment, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, etc.These sectors were growing fast, accordingly pushing the Indian economy to the forefront. “The growth of media and entertainment is fastest, and in next few years, they might become the 1st in the world. Television is a great medium. Soviet Russia collapsed, not because of CIA, but because the televisions brought the superior life-style and higher standard of living of Americans to the bedrooms of Russians”, he stressed. He regretted, “Even after 60 yrs of Independence, still 30% of the population aren’t able to meet two-square meals a day. While we have billionaires and many millionaires, we have vast majority still languishing in poverty, particularly in rural areas.” He added that despite 40% p.a. growth in new economy, agricultural growth remained abysmally low at 2% p.a. Therefore, he concluded with the need for balanced Indian Economy.
Orientation-Day II (Contd)
Later in the afternoon, Mr. D. Raghunanthan from Delhi Science Forum, spoke to the audience on ‘Making Sense of 123: Indo-US Nuclear Deal’. He highlighted the core of the deal, and also the objections raised from various quarters, including the BJP.He said, “ The deal is a part of the July 2005 Indo-Us Joint Statement during PM Manmohan Singh’s US visit”. Touching upon the details of the deal, he said that India agreed to separate self-designated military (8) and civilian facilities (14) in a phased manner, with civilian facilities under full scope of India –specific safeguards including ‘Additional Protocol’, if only uninterrupted N-fuel supplies were assured and with strategic fuel reserves to guard against.He continued that the US, on the other hand, agreed to provide India nuclear fuel and N-energy technology; persuade US congress to lift sanctions and allow exports of civilian nuclear and dual use technologies; persuade IAEA, NSG also towards above; press for Indian membership of ITER, Gen-IV Forum, etc. and recognize India as a “responsible state with advanced nuclear technology (not NWS)”.He also pointed out the objections raised by the BJP and hawks. “The BJP considered that India has surrendered its nuclear sovereignity. And the deal will “cap” India’s nuclear arsenal and increase its cost”, he said. Talking about others worry, he said the separation was not easy; nuclear research would suffer, among others.While concluding, he maintained that the deal hasn’t crossed the clear-red lines drawn by the Prime Minister in the Parliament. He opined that the deal has meant increased Indo-Us strategic partnership from long term security perspective. He, however, felt that India still needed extra vigilance henceforth.
Orientation Day-III
Speaking on the day-3 of orientation program, Mr. Navtej Sarna, Spokesperson, Ministry of External Affairs, Govt. of India, gave a broad over-view of India’s Foreign Policy. He said that any foreign policy essentially incorporated the domestic realities of the country. Historical evolution of India’s foreign policy could be traced back to 19th century (200yrs down the line) when new wave of pride in civilizational pride dominated the newly western-educated nationalists like Ram Mohan Roy. He also said that Indian National Congress, the leading group in the struggle for Independence, had framed foreign policy years before Independence. It had views on several issues surrounding the world then from Nazim to Russian Revolution, among other things. So, the foreign policy framework had already been designed. He said that India’s Broad Framework of foreign policy represented the challenges posed to the newly Independent India. They included territorial integrity & unity of several Princely States; altering and improving the erstwhile colonial economy of the country by alleviation of economic hardships of the people; espousing the cause of freedom of other colonial countries in rest of the world; non-aligning with either of the Blocks: Warsaw Pact or NATO etc. They formed the skeleton of the future foreign policy. In addition, various changes have also had taken place in last 60 years. Vietnam crisis, Arab-Israel war, Gulf-wars, Terrorism, and so on have worldwide effects. Therefore, India needed to orient its foreign policy in tune with the country’s best interest with respect to these developments. In the context of Immediate Circles: Neighbours, he said that “Peaceful periphery” as pre-requisite for progressive socio-economic cooperation is India’s ever stand. He also said, “Stable, strong, peaceful & prosperous Pakistan is in our interest”. He maintained that ‘democratic, stable and prosperous state’ would benefit the whole of the region, talking about other SAARC member counties. “By and large, we are moving in good direction", he concluded.
Orientation Day III (Contd.)
Prof. O. P. Kejriwal, Commissioner of Right to Information, spoke about the tenets of Right to Information. He said, “It is one legislation which has become so popular among citizens like no other acts in recent times”. Right to information basically provides right to any citizen to access to any piece of information from any govt. dept, including any other organizations, which receives substantial aid or investment from the govt. Prof. Kejriwal further said, “It is directly hitting at the insensitivity of the government”. Rightly so, it seeks to introduce transparency, accountability, sensitivity and corruption-free system. Basically, it aims at empowering citizens. It is a tool in the hands of citizens to seek redressal of their grievances.He talked about media as well. He felt that media could play tremendous role bringing about awareness among masses about RTI. Therfore, media should take the lead in delivering the fruits of RTI to every corner of the country and unearth any amount of injustice and wrong-doings into the knowledge of people so as to ensure redressal of the grievance through RTI.He, hoever, was at unease with media today. He said, “The Media haven’t used even 5% of the power or opportunity that RTI has given them. Neither they lighten the burden, nor enlighten the path”.
Orientation Day-IV
The Public Relations is one of the promising career options these days. This field has a tremendous scope in terms of job-opportunities and growth prospects in various areas, including corporate as well as public sectors. Speaking on the subject at IIMC on Day-IV of the Orientation Program, Mr. Ajit Pathak, Chief of the Indian Oil Public Relations, discussed the essentials of the Public Relations. He defined Public Relations as 'sustained, planned and deliberate communication, based on truth to project right image of the organization'.For any organization, it is of utmost significance to create, maintain and preserve good image in people's psyche. Public Relations practitioners exactly endeavour towards this end. They represent the organization's state of technology, track-record in corporate sector responsibilities, status of share-holders and the like in positive light to influence people's mind and understanding.Talking about what PR aspired to accomplished, he enumerated thus: goodwill of the dealers and organization/product visibility; fostering the goodwill of the public around; determining the organization's posture in dealing with its public; positive impact on performance, quality & productivity; high employee morale; better employee relations; commitment of the stake-holders; overcoming misconceptions & prejudices; minimizing situation of attack on the organization, and positive attraction to professional personnel.Furthermore, "Competitive business environment; customer's paradise; attraction for global brands; demand for quality; cost considerations and environmental pressures are major business challenges today", he observed.He reiterated that complex business environment; desperate management; IT developments; enlightened media; over-ambitious stake-holders; speed & accuracy; balancing print/electronic media and issues of ethics were challenges of PR.
IIMC-Delhi:To the gathering of new-comers on the 1st day of Orientation Program at IIMC-Delhi, Mr. Vinod Sharma, the Editor of The Hindustan Times, Spoke about the ' Political Change & Media Hyperbole'.He began his discussion with the contradictions that exist today in India. " India, today, comprises of two faces of people- one, smiling face and the other, non-smiling face", he said.Further, he dealt at lenght on the evolution of the essence of Journalism in India. According to him, the tenets of Journalism constitute reaching out to the masses, creating awareness and consequently, empowerment of the society. He regretted tha Journalism is marching towards economics. " It is progressively degenerating and moving away from the enshrined principles of Accountability, Responsibility, Honesty or Justice to the cause of social education and empowerment", he argued. He opined that Media, now-a-days, have seemingly mortgaged their journalistic business to big ad-providers and big corporate houses. Also, journalism is driven by TRPs, circulation figures, constituencies, advertisements, etc. In the process, he distinguished between Big newspapers and Great newspapers.Again, he highlighted both positive and negative elements viz-a-viz, Media hyperbole. Citing examples of Blue-line buses, state of roads, schools, etc, he said that Media hyperbole has been able to drw the attention of both the govt. and the general public alike for the good. However, he emphasized, " Dealing with real-time information is like handling RDX. So, media hyperbole should be handled with caution and under-estimation in matters of real-time information.
Orientation Day-I (Contd)
Prof. Anand Kumar from Sociology Department of JNU also addressed the students in the afternoon session. His topic was_________________________________________________. During the 1 hr or so, he threw light on various facets of globalization, its agents, its issues, its impacts on society, particularly, Indian Society.Opening his lecture, he defined, “ Globalization is a process which inter-connects things and people beyond nations. It is not localization; it is antithesis to the nationalism.” He then talked about five aspects of globalization, notably: finance capital, commodity, technology, information and labour, in order to ascertain the level and extent of globalization of a country or a place.Talking about mediators of globalization, he mentioned about 8Ms. He opined that these 8Ms such as market, money, modernity, middle class, MNCs, Media, Migration and Multi-culturalism were intrinsically associated with the process of globalization. Thereafter, he touched upon its impacts. He said that it led to hegemonization, homogenization, hybridization, in addition to, marginalization, ethnicization and regionalization. In Indian context, he recalled, “ The process of globalization started in 1992 when the country was not ready as such; it was, in fact, forced on us.” He stressed that it was circumstantial and inevitable, and therefore, not very favourable for us at the outset. He further argued that the globalization, which was accepted by Indians with mixed-reactions initially, had, of late, proved to be disastrous for the economic life of majority of the citizens. Accordingly, there has been either Americanization or Africanization of the society across the globe. While Americanization represented upward moving, tech-savvy, demonstrative middle classes, which comprised of nearly 40 million, Africanization meant more than 400 million poor farmers, unemployed youth, workers in unorganized sectors and so on. So, in his views, it has created more of losers than winners.
Orientatioin-Day II
Prof. V. V. Bhattacharya, the VC of the JNU, while addressing the new IIMCians, sough to put across his views about the socio-economic changes afflicting the society at large and the position of the media in it. He said that media were becoming more and more commercial, and their public service component was subsiding. The media invariably carried 3 kinds of news- truths, half-truths and lies. While sports news were fairly true, news on economy and crimes constituted half-truths and half-lies, and the views of politicians were complete lies.Nevertheless, he considered that media were vibrant and sufficiently independent in India. Earlier, news items comprised mostly of politics, social issues and govt. press releases on govt. policies and economy. Post liberalization, media were increasingly carrying news items pertaining to stock markets and other sectors like IT, entertainment, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, etc.These sectors were growing fast, accordingly pushing the Indian economy to the forefront. “The growth of media and entertainment is fastest, and in next few years, they might become the 1st in the world. Television is a great medium. Soviet Russia collapsed, not because of CIA, but because the televisions brought the superior life-style and higher standard of living of Americans to the bedrooms of Russians”, he stressed. He regretted, “Even after 60 yrs of Independence, still 30% of the population aren’t able to meet two-square meals a day. While we have billionaires and many millionaires, we have vast majority still languishing in poverty, particularly in rural areas.” He added that despite 40% p.a. growth in new economy, agricultural growth remained abysmally low at 2% p.a. Therefore, he concluded with the need for balanced Indian Economy.
Orientation-Day II (Contd)
Later in the afternoon, Mr. D. Raghunanthan from Delhi Science Forum, spoke to the audience on ‘Making Sense of 123: Indo-US Nuclear Deal’. He highlighted the core of the deal, and also the objections raised from various quarters, including the BJP.He said, “ The deal is a part of the July 2005 Indo-Us Joint Statement during PM Manmohan Singh’s US visit”. Touching upon the details of the deal, he said that India agreed to separate self-designated military (8) and civilian facilities (14) in a phased manner, with civilian facilities under full scope of India –specific safeguards including ‘Additional Protocol’, if only uninterrupted N-fuel supplies were assured and with strategic fuel reserves to guard against.He continued that the US, on the other hand, agreed to provide India nuclear fuel and N-energy technology; persuade US congress to lift sanctions and allow exports of civilian nuclear and dual use technologies; persuade IAEA, NSG also towards above; press for Indian membership of ITER, Gen-IV Forum, etc. and recognize India as a “responsible state with advanced nuclear technology (not NWS)”.He also pointed out the objections raised by the BJP and hawks. “The BJP considered that India has surrendered its nuclear sovereignity. And the deal will “cap” India’s nuclear arsenal and increase its cost”, he said. Talking about others worry, he said the separation was not easy; nuclear research would suffer, among others.While concluding, he maintained that the deal hasn’t crossed the clear-red lines drawn by the Prime Minister in the Parliament. He opined that the deal has meant increased Indo-Us strategic partnership from long term security perspective. He, however, felt that India still needed extra vigilance henceforth.
Orientation Day-III
Speaking on the day-3 of orientation program, Mr. Navtej Sarna, Spokesperson, Ministry of External Affairs, Govt. of India, gave a broad over-view of India’s Foreign Policy. He said that any foreign policy essentially incorporated the domestic realities of the country. Historical evolution of India’s foreign policy could be traced back to 19th century (200yrs down the line) when new wave of pride in civilizational pride dominated the newly western-educated nationalists like Ram Mohan Roy. He also said that Indian National Congress, the leading group in the struggle for Independence, had framed foreign policy years before Independence. It had views on several issues surrounding the world then from Nazim to Russian Revolution, among other things. So, the foreign policy framework had already been designed. He said that India’s Broad Framework of foreign policy represented the challenges posed to the newly Independent India. They included territorial integrity & unity of several Princely States; altering and improving the erstwhile colonial economy of the country by alleviation of economic hardships of the people; espousing the cause of freedom of other colonial countries in rest of the world; non-aligning with either of the Blocks: Warsaw Pact or NATO etc. They formed the skeleton of the future foreign policy. In addition, various changes have also had taken place in last 60 years. Vietnam crisis, Arab-Israel war, Gulf-wars, Terrorism, and so on have worldwide effects. Therefore, India needed to orient its foreign policy in tune with the country’s best interest with respect to these developments. In the context of Immediate Circles: Neighbours, he said that “Peaceful periphery” as pre-requisite for progressive socio-economic cooperation is India’s ever stand. He also said, “Stable, strong, peaceful & prosperous Pakistan is in our interest”. He maintained that ‘democratic, stable and prosperous state’ would benefit the whole of the region, talking about other SAARC member counties. “By and large, we are moving in good direction", he concluded.
Orientation Day III (Contd.)
Prof. O. P. Kejriwal, Commissioner of Right to Information, spoke about the tenets of Right to Information. He said, “It is one legislation which has become so popular among citizens like no other acts in recent times”. Right to information basically provides right to any citizen to access to any piece of information from any govt. dept, including any other organizations, which receives substantial aid or investment from the govt. Prof. Kejriwal further said, “It is directly hitting at the insensitivity of the government”. Rightly so, it seeks to introduce transparency, accountability, sensitivity and corruption-free system. Basically, it aims at empowering citizens. It is a tool in the hands of citizens to seek redressal of their grievances.He talked about media as well. He felt that media could play tremendous role bringing about awareness among masses about RTI. Therfore, media should take the lead in delivering the fruits of RTI to every corner of the country and unearth any amount of injustice and wrong-doings into the knowledge of people so as to ensure redressal of the grievance through RTI.He, hoever, was at unease with media today. He said, “The Media haven’t used even 5% of the power or opportunity that RTI has given them. Neither they lighten the burden, nor enlighten the path”.
Orientation Day-IV
The Public Relations is one of the promising career options these days. This field has a tremendous scope in terms of job-opportunities and growth prospects in various areas, including corporate as well as public sectors. Speaking on the subject at IIMC on Day-IV of the Orientation Program, Mr. Ajit Pathak, Chief of the Indian Oil Public Relations, discussed the essentials of the Public Relations. He defined Public Relations as 'sustained, planned and deliberate communication, based on truth to project right image of the organization'.For any organization, it is of utmost significance to create, maintain and preserve good image in people's psyche. Public Relations practitioners exactly endeavour towards this end. They represent the organization's state of technology, track-record in corporate sector responsibilities, status of share-holders and the like in positive light to influence people's mind and understanding.Talking about what PR aspired to accomplished, he enumerated thus: goodwill of the dealers and organization/product visibility; fostering the goodwill of the public around; determining the organization's posture in dealing with its public; positive impact on performance, quality & productivity; high employee morale; better employee relations; commitment of the stake-holders; overcoming misconceptions & prejudices; minimizing situation of attack on the organization, and positive attraction to professional personnel.Furthermore, "Competitive business environment; customer's paradise; attraction for global brands; demand for quality; cost considerations and environmental pressures are major business challenges today", he observed.He reiterated that complex business environment; desperate management; IT developments; enlightened media; over-ambitious stake-holders; speed & accuracy; balancing print/electronic media and issues of ethics were challenges of PR.
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