Saturday, September 29, 2012

Caste divides sharpen in Bihar



Manoj Chaurasia in Patna

Mandalisation is back in Bihar. Unofficially, that is. 

Students seeking rooms on rent to stay here for study are being forced to answer uncomfortable and disconcerting questions by prospective landlords who want them to reveal their caste and family status first. 

A dearth of hostels in Patna colleges makes many students from rural areas opt for private lodgings as the new session has begun.  But, instead of negotiating the rent, these students have to first tell the landlords about their family status and locations of their homes ~ the most popular method, apparently, to ascertain one's caste and family background.  

What’s even worse, agencies that are supposed to help students in getting rooms on rent insist that the students mention in a personal proforma their castes and preferences for landlords of the castes of their choice. 

“It's revolting the way landlords grill us about our caste and family status", said Vikrant Kumar, a student who has come to Patna to prepare for competitive examinations.  

“Even the Thackerays in Mumbai are better than these landlords in Patna! At least the Thackerays want to know only whether one is from Bihar, but not about one's caste or creed," he said. 

Another student, Saurabh Kumar, said the landlord he had gone to had asked him whether he belonged to his caste, whether he was single and of course the area he was from. 

Social scientists condemned the prevailing trend. "It's certainly not a sign of healthy democracy,” remarked Professor Hetukar Jha. 

Prof Nawal Kishore Chaudhary of Patna University said it was all because of vote-bank politics which, according to him, has caused sharp divisions in the society. 

During the 15-year-long RJD regime led by Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi the usual fights were primarily between the "forward" and the "backward" who suddenly became aggressive apparently bolstered by the implementation of the Mandal Commission report.  

During Mr Nitish Kumar's tenure as Bihar chief minister, caste divisions have become much wider with the government dividing communities into classes and castes into sub-castes. 

The whole issue came to the fore after the Nitish Kumar government classified 18 of 22 Dalit castes as Mahadalits. The four castes left out from the Mahadalit category were Paswan, Pasi, Dhobi and Chamar. As the move triggered strong protests, the government subsequently brought three more castes into the category, all except for Paswan.  

The reason for the exclusion of the last caste is apparently the hostile stand taken by the Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan against the NDA government's policies in Bihar. 

There's also a minority twist to the problem.

Minority leaders have criticised the Nitish Kumar government for giving priority to Pasmanda Muslims or Dalit Muslims in the party and government while ignoring the upper castes. The Pasmanda Muslims are led by Rajya Sabha MP Ali Anwar, a Muslim face of the JD-U. 

Opposition exposes Nitish's double standard






Manoj Chaurasia in Patna

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, who is now making a strong pitch for getting special category status for his state, was actually using all  his might to scuttle the efforts of his predecessor, Rabri Devi, to realise the same demand.

The Opposition parties are now digging up old newspaper clippings to expose the "double standard" of Kumar.

When the ruling Janata Dal (United) is taking the campaign for special status for Bihar to a feverish pitch, the RJD and the Congress have decided to hit back.

And it's RJD chief Lalu Prasad who has taken it upon himself to orchestrate the move to "call the chief minister's bluff ".

"We are going to circulate copies of old newspaper clippings wherein then Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee during a rally at Patna’s Gandhi Maidan in February 2002 agreed to seriously consider the special category status demand made by former chief minister Rabri Devi. But, he later rejected it”, Prasad said. The RJD chief alleged that the rejection was the outcome of pressure applied by Kumar who was then railway minister of the Vajpayee government.

The RJD chief said he would go to the masses armed with evidence and make them aware of how the chief minister was "hoodwinking" the people. The Congress, too, has planned to circulate copies of  the speech of the former Prime Minister rejecting the special category status demand and paste copies of the speech at all the block headquarters across the state. The Congress was then a coalition partner in the ruling RJD government in the state headed by Rabri Devi.

 “The only one responsible for Bihar not getting  special status is the NDA government and Nitish Kumar. The former Prime Minister declared in the presence of Kumar and Sushil Kumar Modi during a rally at Gandhi Maidan that Bihar won't be given special status. The news was covered by all the newspapers in Patna the next day. We will now distribute copies of this speech among the masses and expose the hollowness of the state chief minister's campaign,” the state Congress president, Chaudhary Memboob Ali Kaiser, said.

Political circles say Kumar’s demand for special category status is nothing more than a “political stunt” as Bihar does not fulfil the criteria required to avail this facility. They say if Bihar is granted the status, then other states too will make the same demand. Eleven states which share international boundaries are inaccessible and backward ~ both socially and economically~ due to their topography and as such they can demand special status for themselves. 

The Bihar chief minister launched the campaign for special status through his month-long “Adhikar yatra” from north Bihar’s West Champaran district to drum up support for the demand. The yatra which is set to cover each of the 38 districts of Bihar will culminate in a massive “Adhikar Rally” in Patna’s Gandhi Maidan.

He is equating the question of special status with Bihar's "pride and is gearing up for mobilising the people to fight for their pride at the rally. “I am fighting to restore the dignity of the people of Bihar by bringing the fruits of developments to your doorstep so that you people do not have to go outside in search of jobs and face insults”, the CM has been telling the masses at his rallies. 

Explaining the rationale behind this demand, he says the special category status would mean tax recessions to industries which will attract huge investments in the state leading to massive development. However, everything does not appear well with the CM as wherever he has gone, he has received huge protests by unpaid teachers and villagers.

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Troubled Nitish buries hatchet with rebel party leader




Manoj Chaurasia in Patna

Amidst the mounting pressure by his rivals to make him an accused in the multi-crore fodder scam, Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar offered to call a truce with his political adversary, Mr Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh, and is holding meetings with the rebel party leader at intervals. Mr Singh, a powerful leader from the upper caste Bhumihar community was among the four JD-U MPs who were suspended from the party for “anti-party activities” in March last year.  

Mr Singh, who represents Munger in Lok Sabha, was one of the petitioners in the fodder-scam cases which eventually led to the unceremonious exit of former chief minister and RJD chief, Mr Lalu Prasad, who also had to go to jail.  

In the past one month, both the leaders have met twice at the chief minister’s official residence in Patna, fuelling various speculations in the political circles. Last Sunday again, the chief minister had invited the rebel party leader to his official residence during which both of them remained closeted in a room for about three hours.  

Although it is still not known about what transpired between the two leaders then, sources said some “vital” issues were discussed. One of the matters was probably Mr Singh’s suspension from the party which could be withdrawn very soon given the prevailing political compulsions.  

Mr Singh, on his part, showed enough warmth for his rival when he supported Mr Kumar’s yatra to seek special a category status for Bihar to be started later this week.  

While Mr Singh, after staying away from the political limelight and marginalised within his own party ~ that too by his once “langotia yaar-turned-bitter enemy ~ want to restore his lost glory and his hold on his constituency with the talks of mid-term polls in the air, the Bihar chief minister has faced some trouble with his political rivals constantly filing petitions at Ranchi High Court.  

On 7 September, a petition was filed by Mr Mithilesh Kumar Singh, a social worker, at the CBI court in Ranchi to make the Bihar chief minister an accused in the fodder scam. In his petition, the petitioner claimed there was enough evidence pointing towards the involvement of the Bihar chief minister in the scam. He had earlier filed a similar plea in the CBI court which was rejected. Subsequently, he moved Jharkhand High Court which asked him to approach the CBI court.  

Media reports said the CBI court has admitted the petition of Mr Singh, seeking to make the Bihar chief minister and another party MP, Mr Shivanand Tiwari, accused in the fodder scam. The court has fixed the next date of hearing for 25 September.

The petitioner’s counsel, Mr Bhola Nath Jha, has told the Press that the petition sought the inclusion of the Bihar chief minister and Mr Tiwary as accused in fodder scam cases. “The petitioner has submitted that there are sufficient evidences which point at both Mr Kumar, who was then a Janata Dal MLA, and Mr Tiwary having received Rs 1 crore and Rs 60 lakh, respectively from the then regional director of the animal husbandry department and kingpin of the scam SB Sinha”. 

Reports further said the RJD chief, too, is preparing to submit a petition from his side in this regard. All these developments have virtually robbed off the sleep of the Bihar chief minister who now looks to be trying hard to get the support of all those, even his rivals, who were even remotely connected with the fodder scam. The JD-U sources, though, denied Mr Kumar’s bonhomie with the rebel party leader had anything to so with Mr Kumar’s impending problems.

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Seamier side





The Nitish Kumar government may insist that law and order problems are a thing of the past in Bihar but its curious reluctance to deliver justice to a teenage gang-rape victim undermines the claim, writes Manoj Chaurasia ...  

Bihar under chief minister Mr Nitish Kumar is repeatedly projected as a land where crime is history. The administrators claim that the jails of the state are choc-a-bloc with notorious criminals whose trials have been fast tracked, that no massacre has taken place in the state since 2005 and that people are leading a much more harmonious life. Bihar’s ‘transformation’ has not only captivated national dailies but also international publications such as The Economist, The New York Times and Time that believe the state has become a model of governance worth emulating across the country.

However, while the Assam government lost no time in putting the alleged perpetrators behind bars following the very public molestation of a young girl on a Guwahati street after TV channels ran the news, Bihar continues to investigate and re-investigate the gang-rape of a teenage girl nearly two months after the crime was committed in the high-security zone of Patna. While the crime is believed to have been committed last June, the principal culprits ~ who reportedly come from influential families ~ remain untraceable. The Opposition is accusing the powers-that-be of pressuring the administration to shield the perpetrators.

Apparently, police initially took no notice despite a copy of the CD containing footage of the gang-rape being made available to them on 12 July, 2012. It is believed that the perpetrators ~ some eight of them ~ had uploaded the footage onto the Internet once the victim refused to submit to them any more.

The victim was apparently duped by her boyfriend Prashant Jha into entering Flat No 301 of Rambha Apartment located off Patna’s upscale Bailey Road where seven other young men were waiting for them. While each of them took turns to rape the teenager, one managed to capture the gang-rape on his cellphone. CDs were eventually burnt to blackmail the teenager into repeated submission. This went on for a month. When the victim started resisting them, the perpetrators started circulating the CDs and also ensured that the footage found its way into the Internet. Even Patna police received a copy but took no action saying the victim needed to lodge a complaint first.

“If news channels had been reporting a gang-rape for one week, why did not police at least get in touch with reporters?” wondered noted social activist Ms Kanchan Bala. It was only after local TV news channels kept following up the news, telecast bits of the footage and flashed pictures of the perpetrators on 12 July, 2012 that the administration found itself under pressure. Women’s rights groups took to the streets of the state capital and even organised a candlelight procession. Bihar women’s commission finally sat up and Commission member Chandramukhi Devi visited the victim at her home, recorded her statement and forwarded her complaint to police. It was then that police registered a first information report (FIR).

But the Opposition alleges that the FIR had been deliberately diluted to protect the perpetrators. In an open letter dated 6 August, 2012 to the state’s director-general of police, Opposition lawmakers raised 17 points. “Even after the women’s commission had obtained a signed statement from the victim on 18 July, why did not police include in the FIR the names of Saurabh and Sushant who figure in her (victim’s) statement recorded by a court under Section 164 of the CrPC?” is one point raised by the Opposition. The open letter also suggests that police arrested only six perpetrators while the victim had mentioned eight in her statement to the court.

Police swung into action when Patna’s chief judicial magistrate issued a warrant of arrest against the culprits after taking suo motu cognisance of the gang-rape that was reported by a newspaper on its front page on 25 July, 2012. But, Saurabh, said to be the son of a JD-S lawmaker in the Nitish Kumar government, is still evading arrest. The conspiracy to protect Saurabh became apparent when police picked up Dinesh Paswan, a domestic help with the alleged perpetrator’s family, and produced him in the court of the CJM, Patna asserting that he was the missing Saurabh. According to the Opposition’s open letter to the top cop, Paswan spilled the beans in court and described Saurabh as a “fair complexioned, handsome boy who resides in a government flat near the Hanuman Mandir in Ranvanshi Nagar”. A JD-U lawmaker has already lodged a complaint against a local Hindi news portal for suggesting that Saurabh was his son.

Bihar’s women’s commission too has accused police of shielding the main culprits. “The scene of crime described by the culprit does not match what police insist is,” Chandramukhi Devi said, it alleging that Patna police were trying to cover up for powerful people. She said: “Police are definitely under huge pressure to make the victim recant. The scene of crime that police are scouring bears little resemblance to what is on the rape footage.”

Local media claims that it had received the CD about a month ago and promptly handed a copy to the then Patna city superintendent of police Ms Kim Sharma for action. It is believed that Ms Sharma had been secretly gathering evidence when she was transferred to the distant eastern Bihar town of Katihar. The administration remains tight-lipped. The matter rocked the current monsoon session of the state Assembly but the only thing the government has done so far is to make a routine promise to deliver justice to the victim.

The teenage victim, who is from a family of modest means, has described the gang-rape as a nightmare. With both the chief minister and the director-general of police remaining mysteriously mum, it seems her ordeal is far from over.

The writer is The Statesman’s Patna-based Special Representative 

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Bihar: Katju stirs a storm, media remains gagged



Local media houses nothing more than road-side 'kirana' shops? 

By Manoj Chaurasia

Justice Markandey Katju, a former
judge of the Supreme Court of
India, and the chairperson of Press
Council of India is otherwise known
for courting controversies. But when
he reached Patna for a two-day visit to
Bihar in February to attend a function
organized by the Patna University, he
just dropped a bombshell.

His blunt remarks at the packed Patna
University auditorium that the press in
Bihar is not independent under chief
minister Nitish Kumar’s rule created
a furore in political circles. The wily
judge did not stop at that. He mocked
Bihar’s “turnaround” saga being widely
publicized in the media, and also
constituted a three-member committee
to investigate the “gagging of Press”
charges in the state. He took the
government head-on, and warned that
he would not allow the Nitish Kumar
government to run if does if it does not
allow the constitution to function.

Everything at the PU auditorium
being attended by dignitaries such as
Governor of Bihar Debanand Konwar
was going on in the customary cool
and calm manner until Katju spoke
his mind: “During Lalu Prasad’s
government, law and order of the
state had deteriorated but the press
was free to criticize the government’s
wrong moves. The present regime
has improved the law and order but,
from what I have come to know, it
does not allow the media to function
independently…anyone who has
dared to write against the government
has been either sacked or victimized
by the media houses under pressures
from the government”.

He began his visit to Patna with these
words sparking off protests from some
certain quarters. But the government
remained calm. It perhaps had a
hope that the judge would perhaps
retract his words. Although Katju’s
statement had indirectly questioned
the role of the government in public,
chief minister Kumar maintained a
mysterious silence and refused to be
drawn into the controversies.

Just when the people in the government
were awaiting a “correction” to PCI
chief’s statement, Katju lobbed another
bomb. Without being browbeaten
by the open criticism from the ruling
party that sought his ouster as the
PCI chief for his “gagging the Press”
remarks, Katju fired another salvo
on the Nitish Kumar government,
the very next day. Virtually tearing
apart the “good governance” claim
of the ruling NDA regime, he asked
it to mend its ways or he would not
allow it to function. “The constitution
provides for freedom of expression and
freedom of the Press. No government
is above the constitution and any
government or institution trying to
violate the Constitution cannot be
tolerated”. “Agar sarkar samvidhan ko
nahin chalane degi to main sarkar ko
nahin chalane dunga”, he thundered.
The issue rocked the ongoing budget
session of the state assembly with the
opposition members cutting across
party lines raising ruckus in the House.

The agitated opposition members
shouted slogans like “Press ki aazadi
par ankush lagana band karo” (stop
curbing the freedom of the Press),
“Vigyapan ka dahshat dikhana band
karo” (stop using advertisement as
a tool to pressure the media houses)
and “Aghoshit censorship band karo”
(withdraw undeclared censorship of
Press), eliciting stinging reactions from
the government. Stung by protests,
the ruling party leaders accused the
PCI chief of being under the influence
of the Opposition. Bihar’s deputy chief
minister Sushil Kumar Modi of the
BJP even alleged that Katju was in the
habit of making baseless allegations
to hog headlines and even suggested
that he should join active politics,
instead of behaving like an activist of
a political party.

The moot question now is that is
the media in Bihar really facing an
undeclared government censorship? Is
there any truth in Katju’s statements
or are they just the result of, what the
ruling NDA leaders describe as, his
penchant for being in media limelight?
It’s hard to say anything until the
three-member PCI team comprising
Rajeeiv Ranjan Nag, Arun Kumar and
Kalyan Baruah formed to look into
the complaints of violation of freedom
of Press in Bihar submits its report.
Yet going by the contents in the local
media and its over willingness to
routinely highlight the positive side
of the government, it becomes clear
that Katju’s remarks have a solid
basis. His words appeared closer to
truth when most of the local media
censored the story of the brutal killing
of four persons from the minority
community in an incident of police
firing at Forbesganj in eastern Bihar’s
Araria district in June last year. The
deceased were protesting against the
blocking of their decades-old rights of
passage by an upcoming maize starch
and liquid glucose factory owned by
a ruling party lawmaker when the
police resorted to indiscriminate firing
on the protesting mob. TV footage
telecast on local TV news channels
repeatedly showed a police jawan
jumping over the face of a seriouslyinjured
firing victim lying senseless
on the ground in sheer madness and
ruthlessly trampling him with his
boots until he died. The heart-rending
scene shook the heart of every sensible
citizen but the local media which
has the responsibility to report the
truth without bias remained totally
unmoved as the very picture did not
appear in any of the local newspapers.
Even the news stories appeared in a
partial manner.

The tale did not end here. The local
media did not even care to report
the stories of the fact-finding teams
of various political parties, rights
groups and also the visit of National
Commission of Minorities (NCM)
chairman with regard to this firing
incident. The sensational disclosures
came to light when the Bihar Media
Watch (BMW), an NGO which keeps
a watch on the activities of the local
media, conveyed the whole matter to
the Press Council of India chairman
through its formal two-page complaint
petition. “It’s painful to submit that
no newspaper published from Patna
carried the heart-rending picture of the
incident showing a policemen jumping
over the body of a seriously injured
victim who immediately died”, the
BMW said in its complaint to the PCI.
Accusing the media of violating the
“basic moral ethics” and “minimum
code of conduct of journalism”,
it alleged the local media also
shamelessly censored the stories about
the visit of the NCM chairman who
had come to meet the families of the
victims and ascertain the truth of the
matter. “This news (the visit by the
NCM chairman) was not published in
the largest-selling Hindi newspaper,
Hindustan, while Prabhat Khabar
made a mockery of it by publishing
the news on Page 16 in the classified
column consisting of 20 words. In so
far (as) Dainik Jagran is concerned, it
did not even consider this news worth
publishing”, said the BMW complaint
petition signed by Pushpraj, convener
and Dr Meera Dutta, member.Almost 
similar things happened when
another minority class member was
dragged on the uneven city roads
after being tied to a police jeep on the
suspicion of being a chain snatcher.
This incident took place in eastern
Bihar’s Bhagalpur district in 2007.

The local media is also full of stories
about how a Patna-based journalist from
a prominent vernacular daily claiming
itself to be the largest-circulated daily in
the world transferred one of its reporters
to the jungles of Maoist-dominated east
Singhbhum district in Jharkhand. He
was allegedly punished for his exclusive
front-page piece on the liquor scam in
the Nitish Kumar government that cost
the media houses crores of rupees in
advertisement revenue an an infuriated
government immediately stopped its
advertisements to teach the journalist
a lesson for its “over smartness”. After
living in the Jharkhand territory for some
months, the said journalist somehow
managed his transfer to Delhi but not
before he had regretted filing such copies
and the government restored the ads.

The same treatment was meted out to
another leading Hindi newspaper when
it dared to write against the government.
The ads were restored a month later but
not before its editor-in-chief had met
the government officials and reportedly
assured that such a mistake would not
be committed in future. It appears that
the same assurance is being honoured
till now.

Stories doing the rounds in the
local media are that the journalists
have been asked to highlight only
the positive side or write mainly
the promotional stories about the
government, and totally dilute
the negative stories. “We have
standing instructions from our boss
to highlight only the positive side
of the government and polish more
the already promotional stories. The
situation is worse than the emergency
period but what can we do? We have
no option other than succumbing
to the pressures of the government
and our media establishment or else
we will be on the streets”, confided a
senior journalist working with a local
English daily published from Patna.
For obvious reasons, he prefers to
remain unidentified.

Yet not everyone agrees with Katju’s
“gagging the Press” statement. There
is also a section of people which has
solely blamed the greed of the local
media to mint money at the cost of
credibility and journalistic ethics. “It
was the same media which constantly
criticized the previous RJD government
for its failures and highlighted the
scams during the Lalu Prasad regime
without ever looking succumbing to
the government’s pressures. But the
same media is signing paeans to the
chief minister and his government
although there are many issues, such
as sky-rocketing corruption, utter
lawlessness and poor delivery system,
which need to be exposed. This means
that the local media houses have
now compromised with journalistic
ethics and reduced themselves to
nothing more than road-side “kirana”
shops in a bid to earn more profits”,
explained a media person. Credibility
of the media persons, if not the media
houses, is indeed the loser in Bihar!

(The writer is the State Bureau Chief of The
Statesman based in Patna)

Monday, September 3, 2012

Newspapers' credibility falls in Bihar, readers sulk



Special Story 

Critique, June 2012

By Manoj Chaurasia

The size of the media is alarmingly
getting smaller in Bihar. The
state that was once home
to many reputed newspapers, such as
The Indian Nation (which virtually
held a monopoly over English language
newspapers published from Bihar till
mid-80’s)and The Searchlight, now
appears to be turning into “graveyard”
of newspapers. The general feeling
among the common readers is that
this is the outcome of a change in
attitude of the media houses. Their
mission once was “journalism”. Now
it is “professionalism”. The general
frustration among the common
readers these days is that there has
been a very sharp erosion in the
credibility of majority of the media
houses. These media houses are busy
pleasing the ruling party in a bid
lay their hands on more and more
government advertisements and mint
money. For them any other collateral
cost is immaterial.
Sadly, the media houses have not
taken any lesson from the past and
aspire to join the ranks of the run
of the mill business houses that are
driven by the profit maximization
motive. They seem to be missing the
point that that the media industry
is completely different from the rest.
In this business, the main thing is
not profits alone. But it is profits
without compromising credibility.
The credibility of a media house is its
only stock in trade.
There have been instances in the
past about how the common readers
blindly relied on the news reported by
a certain media outlet. But today the
basic thinking about journalism has
undergone a complete change. Today,
majority of the local editors seem to
be acting as “liaison officers” between
the government and the media
houses. This has dealt a body blow to
the credibility, sanctity and purity of
the media. They must know that it’s
the credibility that sells in the markets
and, if this is gone, everything is gone,
including their business.
This, perhaps, was one of the
reasons behind the closure of several
newspapers published from Patna in
the last over two decades. Ironically
many newspapers had to cease
their publications when they at the
height of their popularity and had
very good circulation in the areas.
They included- The Indian Nation,
Aryavarta, The Searchlight, Pradeep,
Patliputra Times, Janshakti and
Navbharat Times. The last to be closed
down was Navbharat Times which
ceased its publication in 1995. This
was shortly after the state assembly
polls in which RJD chief Lalu Prasad
returned to power with absolute
majority. This had happened after
most of the media houses had written
him off and predicted a spectacular
victory of Nitish Kumar’s Samata
Party. He had floated this party after
revolting against his mentor.
In later years, the newspapers made
it a habit to criticize the governments
led by Lalu Prasad and then his wife
Rabri Devi. More so Prasad was
named as an accused in the fodder
scam. He then had to virtually face a
“ trial by the media”. The cases have
not yet come to a logical conclusion.
However, in one of the cases, he was
even acquitted by the designated
CBI court. The same media has now
ironically gone silent on reporting
the “failures” of the ruling National
Democratic Alliance government
headed by chief minister Nitish Kumar.
None of them, it is alleged, has the
guts to “annoy” the chief minister
and lose government advertisements
worth crores being issued every month
by the same government. It is the
same state government that keeps on
demanding a special financial package
form the Centre on the ground of being
economically backwards.
“I’m closing the Dainik Jagran from
tomorrow since it has become more
of a mouthpiece of Nitish Kumar
government. What’s the purpose of
reading a newspaper when it looks like
blindly supporting every policy of the
government?”said RB Sharan, a retired
engineer from the Bihar State Electricity
Board. “It’s very painful to disown
a paper which has been your pal in
loneliness but I don’t have any option
now”. Same is the situation with the
another Hindi newspaper which claims
itself to be the largest-selling newspaper
in Bihar. Its editors have been only too
eager to cover the very small story of a
CM’s yatras in villages.
Another Hindi newspaper which
has its headquarters in Ranchi,
Prabhat Khabar has even changed its
decades-old slogan that was printed
over the masthead from “Akhbar
nahin aandolan” (this is not just
a newspaper but a movement) to
“Bihar jage…desh aage ( If Bihar goes
ahead, the nation goes ahead) to suit
the tastes of the ruling party. This has
been done apparently in a bid to be a
very strong claimant for government
advertisements.
Sounds nauseating but the fact is
that there is virtual rat-race among
the local newspapers published
from Bihar about how to please the
party in power. The newspapers’
credibility and journalistic ethics,
thus, obviously are the victims here as
every journalist is being viewed with
suspicion by the common readers.
In this situation, there appears to
be a problem of survival for those
media houses which refuse to take
the government’s side or toe its line.
Sadly, most of the media houses have
 “adapted” themselves to the changed
situation in Patna and are expanding
their business fast.
The situation was not so alarming
until few years year ago. It took
a turn for worse especially in the
aftermath of 2008 global recession
when the corporate houses slashed
advertisements to newspapers citing
the meltdown. Till then corporate ads
were the main attractions for the media
houses but once they saw a huge cut
in them, they subsequently turned to
the government to keep them floating.
It is alleged the local NDA government
turned this adversity into opportunity
and reportedly agreed to increase the
ads frequency provided the newspapers
highlighted only positive aspects of the
government. Thus followed a bizarre
competition in the local media to
throw out their so-called journalistic
ethics and please the masters to get
the government ads. Not only Hindi
newspapers, even the Urdu newspapers
too changed their “style” considerably
to make hay while the sun shines
in Patna. Such was the change in
the attitude of newspapers that the
Nitish Kumar government doled out
government ads very liberally to most
of the newspapers. Even newspapers
and periodicals whose circulation
was just a few thousands walked
with ads worth lakhs. Strangely,
many of the newspapers in alleged
league with the officials of the Public
Relation Department reportedly faked
their circulation figures to get more
government advertisements. This
saw several regional newspapers and
periodicals even far ahead of English
dailies published from Patna such as
the Hindustan Times and The Times
of India.
Apart from government advertisements,
these newspapers have also been luring
away the common readers in various
ways, such as by promising assured
gifts to them if they subscribe to them
and also give ads in the newspapers.
Till recently, the advertisement officials
had been primarily approaching the
local businessmen, industrialists or
the people in the business of running
schools to get ads but now the common
men are being briefed about the
importance of their birthday, marriage
anniversaries or Valentine days. If that
is not enough, the local newspapers
have also come up with schemes, such
as promising to offer them papers at
the rate of only Re One if they buy a
one year subscription.
Among the prominent newspapers
being published from Patna, Prabhat
Khabar has emerged as the fast-growing
newspapers. Such has been
the support from the ruling regime that
the newspaper whose circulation was
primarily limited to the state capital
until few years back is now being
published from various cities of Bihar
today. Its circulation too has increased
considerably in the last few years as
compared to rival Hindi newspapers
and now it is said to be offering good
package to the journalists.

(The writer is the State Bureau Chief of The
Statesman based in Patna)