Observing Television – A Blog on Broadcast Media

Print journalists generally scoff at the writing skills of a television journalist. There is some merit in what the people from print believe, a television journalist writes for the ears whereas the print journalist writes for the eyes. There is no necessity (as far as the voice over script is concerned) to ensure that punctuations are carefully put down. Hence, not surprisingly many TV reporters start making many punctuation errors. They may not differentiate between “its” and “it’s”. Many do not believe in putting capitals even in case of a noun. With the coming in of the SMS age some may use “how r u?” style of writing. Sometimes an ungrammatical sentence looks good when delivered in the right voice over style. And at times a TV script ends up having many full stops which may not make sense in print (Eg: The Indian team was unhappy….. they believed they have been unfairly targeted). Once a television journalist is used to this style of writing, he may find this method an easy way to express his thoughts. In the last few years however, a significant change has come in this direction. The television screen for a news channel today is filled with lots of written material. Breaking news, Flash News, News tickers, advertisements, graphic plate for unwritten quotes, everything requires material to be written on the screen. Obviously, one cannot afford to make any grammatical errors or spelling mistakes here. Suddenly, the television journalist today has to think like a print journalist. So multi-skilling is probably the answer for future. Look out for the next blog on multi-skilling.

In a television world which aims to get as many viewers as possible, crossing the ethical line becomes a necessity many times for television channels. For the teacher however, the dilemma becomes all the more complicated as students want to know what is wrong in crossing the ethical line when professional channels are doing that. The questions may range from asking about a specific instance to checking the veracity of what is being taught. One student for instance asked a very blunt question to me: “I am told all students have to unlearn what is being taught in a Mass communication institute as they join a news channel”. Well! even though one cannot take the responsibility of the entire fraternity of journalism teachers, however to answer the above question, there are many aspects. One there is a style book which every channel follows this may be different for different channels. The cliche “one man’s meat is another man’s poison”, may also work here. On the other hand there is also the problem of the ideal situation. If you see a person dying after riots will you help him or shoot him dying. Though 9 out of 10 people may agree that the man has to be saved…a channel boss may wonder why were you helping the person while the others were shooting the story. In short, teaching ethics even as many channels turn a blind

Every year Doordarshan the Indian National Broadcaster covers the Republic Day Function. A national event held at the capital of the country New Delhi. Any television professional watching this coverage often is very critical of the coverage, ranging from the poor quality of coverage to bad live vision mixing. The regularity with which crucial moments get missed has often been highlighted. This year however, the coverage has been comparatively better. Not only have such misses been less, it seems the crew knew what to expect. There were better angles in which the cameras were placed and the shot sizes were better too. From the technical point of view one felt good about the coverage. Despite rising security concerns the cameras were able to get in the right position to capture the shots. The weather gods were equally good and the fog and mist which generally covers India Gate and Rajpat (The road in which the main march happens) were absent. As usual Doordarshan had cameras on top of India Gate to cover an aerial view of the event. The entire Rajpat could be seen clearly. The disappointment however was the commentary. The retired defence personnel used for the live commentary were not able to keep pace with the changing visuals. In fact there did not seem to be much coordination between the two groups. Of course it wasn’t that the commentary was always going wrong… the professionals used for the purpose however did a better job. So in all it was a better coverage in comparison to the previous years. Even as we love to criticize the govt. channel year after year, it was one of those performances which was worth praising.

The definition of what is news seems to be changing thanks to television in India. In Media Schools one teaches that news is about facts, opinions are not to be given to your audience or readers. The reader should rather figure out his own opinion on the subject based on the facts given. However, with a need to get more viewers channels have been trying many new methods. One of them has been editorialising i.e. giving your own opinion on a subject. Obviously, opinions have their own bias. Even newspapers have started giving their opinion on a subject. Ten years back when I had undergone training in Broadcast Journalism from UK, the teachers there had warned us of times when everybody would be aware of their legal rights. Defamation and libelous cases, we were told would be the order of the day. No doubt all of us today are aware of our legal rights. We know what is defamatory or libelous. But given that we need to somehow get the audience to see our own news channels… many of us cross the legal and at times the ethical line to ensure that the audience sees the programmes. Many times the channels are successful, but other times they leave their audience with a bad taste in their mouth.

The current economic growth in India is fuelled by the country’s advancement in the area of Information Technology fields. There is still a huge demand for skilled personnel in the area of IT. Not surprisingly even freshers get a good pay package. Further the BPO sector (commonly known as call centres) are giving many opportunities to those looking for jobs. The skills required in this sector are basic but once again the returns are decent. Not surprisingly, in states like Andhra Pradesh (A southern Indian state) lesser number of people are opting for television as a career.

Television Journalism offers fame, an opportunity to meet whos who in the world, a promise to be able to make a difference and a satisfying job. However, it offers good money only to those who are very good in their work and are ready to put in hardwork. Thanks to the fact that there are over 300 television channels and the other media sectors are also opening up in this country job opportunities are many in the media field as well. Even the govt. has recognised the worth of professionals in this field. Well known television personalities such as Rajdeep Sardesai and Barkha Dutt have been awarded Padma Shri (a very respected national award given to individuals who have done well in their respective fields.)

So which is the job field a fresher should choose. The answer may not be easy, however, for the person who not only wants to make a career but also a good name through his efforts, journalism is the way out.