Why is the British government so keen on looking a gift horse in the mouth?
Last week John Whittingdale, UK's secretary of state for culture, media and sport, released a green paper inviting consultations on everything to do with the BBC - its mission, purpose, scale, scope, content, funding and so on. The current royal charter, the constitutional basis for the BBC, is due to expire in 2016. The review process will lead to a new charter that will come into force in 2017.
While much of this is 'due process', there has been much angst about the kind of people the committee in charge of this process has. And on the quibbles the government seems to have about BBC's content, whether it is distinctive enough and so on. (In 2013, 76 per cent of Britons thought BBC makes high-quality content, online and otherwise.) British newspapers routinely carry articles that question everything the BBC does - from its funding and governance to its processes. Some of it happened as a result of the misdeeds of former hosts such as Jimmy Savile coming out. But the anti-BBC feeling within the current administration goes beyond the tabloid, say analysts.
For the better part of this year, there has been a campaign of sorts building up on somehow curtailing the BBC. Many liberals in the UK are now calling it a witch-hunt by a conservative government. Could the review, which usually helps to make the BBC a better firm, end up hampering it? And if it does, should it matter to us in India?
If you know how critical a good, autonomous, independently-funded public broadcaster is to the quality of discourse in a country, any democracy should worry about what happens to the £4.81 billion (Rs 47,700 crore) BBC Group. It runs BBC News, one of the world's most trusted (and digitally savvy) news brands. BBC Worldwide, its commercial arm is the largest distributor of television programming outside of the US studios with Sherlock, Wolf Hall and natural history shows. Its news and non-news programming are huge (positive) influencers on how the UK is perceived by the rest of the world. They are also lucrative exports going by every study done so far.
Across the world, in Germany, the Netherlands or France, public service broadcasters are urged to be a bit more like the BBC. In countries like the US, with very little support for public service broadcasting, the right-wing voice dominates. That explains why BBC News became so popular after the Iraq war - people wanted another point of view. Now Al Jazeera too is being looked up as a source of independent, neutral news.
India, with its chaotic, broken news industry, has a lot to learn from the BBC - not just on news gathering and journalism, but also on the role an autonomous public service broadcaster can play in keeping the market on its toes. The £3.7 billion (about Rs 37,000 crore) that British taxpayers give as the licence fee that funds the BBC, is money well-spent. The presence of the BBC has ensured the quality of news and public debate is so high that private news outlets struggle to keep pace. It rankles many who would like to see the BBC's funding cut.
In 2013-14 Indian taxpayers spent Rs 2,140 crore to partially fund Prasar Bharati Corporation, which runs Doordarshan and All India Radio. But Prasar Bharati Corporation, one of the biggest items on the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting's portfolio, remains a disappointment. It doesn't manage to hold Indians, let alone be a global force in the news business. Four different committees over 10 years have said the same thing - the corporation needs to be freed from government control. It doesn't lack funding or assets, it only lacks freedom. No government - irrespective of ideology -has listened.
While the public broadcaster has not been allowed to function, the private news market has done so, rather inefficiently. (And writing on that would take a full page.) The result is that in spite of being a liberal news market, the world's largest democracy doesn't have a world-class news industry.
The positive intervention that a well-funded public broadcaster can make is evident in the UK market. Sitting here in India and watching the hawks circle over the BBC makes you wonder if the idea of an independent public service broadcaster can survive.
Twitter: @vanitakohlik
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