[This piece is based on this journalist's speech at the human rights workshop he attended at Dehra Dun.]

It was heartening to see mediapersons being the panelists at a forum on the role of the media. In a random survey of various seminars held on the issue in New Delhi in recent times, one found that among the speakers jurists accounted for 35 per cent, bureaucrats accounted for 35 per cent, politicians were 20 per cent, and mediapersons only 10 per cent. The mediapersons who usually speak at such fora usually belong to the management cadre in media establishments.

The hackneyed "role of the media" subject is an explosive one. On the face of it, the media should not have a role to play by itself. The media is seen by many as something which is meant to inform, instruct and educate. The soap-culture newspapers have only in recent times added the entertain angle as well. The inform part is fine, but the instruct and educate component is fraught with dangerous consequences.

Who are media people to be so self-righteous and sacrosanct so as to tell the people what they should do and what they should not? In such cases, the media does not remain objective; once subjective and opinionated, the media becomes a tool in the hands of the establishment. One must remember, the term "fourth estate" was meant to denote the media as the "fourth estate of the establishment". In most cases, it still is. In an ideal situation, the media should act as a mirror, and not as a catalyst.

It is equally important to remind people that the media in India does not have any exclusive right called the "freedom of the press". The media has as much right to be free as is any Indian citizen granted the right to freedom of expression by the Indian constitution. The myth that there is something called the "freedom of the press" must go. Yes, the press must be free; but then so must be the citizenry. The term is also used, more often than not, to denote absence of state control over the media. What is hardly talked about is how market forces and economic compulsions (apart from personal biases) dictate the media as well.

Before commenting on the role of the media, it is imperative to know how the media functions.

To confine the discussion to only one aspect of the media - the print; laypersons must understand that newspapers, by and large, carry three types of content: reports, features and articles. The first can be broadly said to denote the right to information, the last the right to freedom of expression. The second can be construed as a mix of the other two. The third only provides an avenue for people to express their ideas and opinions in the columns of the newspaper.

Journalists are primarily concerned with the first - news, and, therefore, in a position to ensure the right to information to the people. It is the same media-as-a-mirror aspect that has been mentioned earlier. Here, yet again, the intrinsic dichotomy in the media must be explained for those not abreast with how it functions: it is a classic business vs profession instance. For media owners a newspaper is a business, for journalists it is a profession. For the sake of convenience, let us leave out the complex overlapping aspects.

As far as journalists are concerned, human rights cases in India have been largely reported quite faithfully. It is only because of media reports that the predicaments of exploited/persecuted communities have been brought to light and jurists and others have been taking interest in such issues. Since journalists have been doing their job, there is little point telling them either what their job is or how they should do their job.

What merits mention and, hence, a debate are situations where both journalists and human rights activists face a constant threat to life in the course of discharging their duties. This writer's knowledge and understanding on the situation in Kashmir being limited, talking about the Northeast would be pertinent.

Most newspapers and journalists in the Northeast can be broadly classified into two categories: those who are anti-security forces and those who are anti-militants. On the other hand, in the case of newspapers and journalists from mainland India; firstly, they are dead against insurgents (without much basis in most cases), and secondly, they do not give adequate coverage to atrocities perpetrated on innocent people by security forces, particularly Army and Assam Rifles. The heinousness of the militants is faithfully reported and equally faithfully accorded due prominence.

It is here that the role of media owners, more than journalists, come into play. Most newspapers have an unofficial/unwritten writ running large in their offices that one cannot report atrocities committed by security forces beyond a point. There are two factors that come into play here: for one, the Army especially must not be projected as a villain; and secondly, the militants must be projected as rogues.

Take the example of The Times of India. It remains the only newspaper in the country to have a human rights cell. Yet, it is yet to highlight human rights abuses that are rampant in the Northeast. The newspaper seems to have been more preoccupied with the alleged violation of the economic rights of Ashok Jain.

[After this point had been made at the workshop session, Man Mohan, the TOI human rights cell coordinator, regretted that the Northeast had indeed not been granted due coverage; but explained his limitations being the only person in the cell. He expressed the hope that he would be able to carry reports of human rights violations from the Northeast in the future.]

Calcutta-based newspapers do carry small reports of human rights violations, not because they are very concerned about the people of the Northeast; but because they have a substantial circulation in the region. In spite of that, the reportage on human rights violations by security forces remains pathetic. For correspondents of many non-Calcutta, non-Northeast newspapers Guwahati is either a punishment or a plum posting. The less said the better about either lot and how and why they act as they do.

The problem is particularly acute with journalists from outside newspapers who paradrop with pre-conceived notions, ideas and convictions about the Northeast, particularly insurgency, and go about writing lopsided, motivated reports. The Luingam Luithui (a founder member of the Naga People's Movement for Human Rights) case provides a stark example of a human rights activist being hounded by the Indian establishment as a direct result of some irresponsible reporting by an irresponsible journalist.

No, not all journalists out there are bad. It is also important to understand what problems journalists face in reporting human rights violations. Apart from treading a tightrope between the security forces and rule of the Indian law on one hand and the insurgents on the other, journalists have a difficulty in accessing information. Official versions, one knows, is not the hard truth/reality. The second is a situation where journalists are not allowed to report on abuses by security forces. Such instances are hardly worth any mention as far as newspapers of the Northeast are concerned, while one has talked about the outside newspa