Seema Nazareth Award: Media should self-regulate, says Delhi LG Anil Baijal

The media fulfils several basic roles in the society, be it entertainment or providing information and education, which makes it difficult to separate entertainment and news, said Lieutenant Governor of Delhi Anil Baijal. As former CEO of Prasar Bharti, Baijal spoke at length about the evolving definition of media and the various platforms that have made it all-pervasive. He was speaking at a function organised to confer the Business Standard-Seema Nazareth Award for Excellence in Print Journalism 2017. Baijal emphasised the importance of social media and its power to be interactive. “Today newspapers, news-oriented television and radio programmes make available stories from across the globe, allowing readers and viewers from anywhere to access voices from any part of the world,” he said. While the print media adapted well to the challenge posed by electronic media, the newer challenge comes from social media.

He cited the instance of US President Donald Trump tweeting about the nuclear “button”, which became a part of the news media sphere. “Social media is a unique space where an individual is both the provider and the distributor of content,” he said. Within this ecosystem, Baijal said it was then important for self-regulation on the part of the media rather than instituting a watchdog authority. “We need to follow a liberal code of ethics,” he said. Earlier in the evening, Baijal presented the Business Standard-Seema Nazareth Award to Senior Feature Writer Dhruv Munjal who joined Business Standard in July 2014. The award, given every year to a journalist under 30 years, carries a prize of Rs 50,000, a silver pen and a citation. Munjal, who is based in New Delhi, is the 19th recipient of the award, instituted by Business Standard and the Nazareth family in memory of Seema Nazareth, a young Business Standard journalist who died in March 1999. This year, a Special Mention award was conferred to Staff Reporter Sree Veena Mani who is also based in New Delhi and joined Business Standard in 2016. The award carries a citation and a prize of Rs 10,000. Delivering the vote of thanks, Nazareth’s sister, Premila Satyanand, read out passages from her late sister’s diary, several of which captured the exuberance of being a young journalist in an exciting newsroom. Satyanand concluded her vote of thanks by thanking Business Standard for offering Nazareth “a home away from home” and becoming her professional family.