This article is written by Mushtaq Ahmad Dar. In this article, the author has explained the Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India) Act, 1990 in a detailed manner.

Introduction

Media is a mediator of information between the citizens and the State. It is the fourth pillar of our democracy which has a responsibility in shaping the public opinion. A vibrant and a free media is to be necessary for a healthy democracy. As media has the nature of questioning and criticism, so it has a vital role in the whole countries. This means that, for any country which has aspired to democratic norms of governance, should have a free and fair press.

The Act grants autonomy to All India Radio and to Doordarshan, both of which were previously under government control. The Act received the assent of the President of India on 12 September 1990 after being unanimously passed by Parliament. It was finally implemented in November 1997.

Prasar Bharati is India’s largest public broadcasting agency. It is a statutory autonomous body set up by an Act of Parliament and comprises the Doordarshan Television Network and All India Radio, which were earlier media units of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. 

During the emergency time as well as other times, Doordarshan was used for government propaganda. Thus, the Prasar Bharati Act, 1990 was established. The main motive of the Act is to provide freedom to electronic media i.e. the All India Radio and Doordarshan.

Act, What is it?

The Prasar Bharati Act provides for the establishment of a Broadcasting Corporation, to be known as Prasar Bharati, and define its composition, functions, and powers. The Act grants autonomy to All India Radio and to Doordarshan, both of which were previously under government control. The Act received the assent of the President of India on 12 September 1990 after being unanimously passed by Parliament. It was finally implemented in November 1997. By the Prasar Bharati Act, all property, assets, debts, liabilities, payments of money due, as well as all suits and legal proceedings involving Akashvani (All India Radio) and Doordarshan were transferred to Prasar Bharati

Objective 

The twin objectives of the Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India) Act of 1990 are crystallised in Section 12 of the law. Section 12(3)(a) mandates that Prasar Bharati ensure that “broadcasting is conducted as a public service.” Again, Section 12(3)(b) reinforces that the purpose of establishing the corporation is to gather news, not propaganda. The Act came into existence after decades of post-independence struggle to free broadcasting from the stranglehold of the government. The legislative intent of the Act finds an echo in the Supreme Court’s 1995 judgment in The Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting versus the Cricket Association of Bengal, which said the “first facet of the broadcasting freedom is freedom from state or governmental control, in particular from the censorship by the government… Public broadcasting is not to be equated with state broadcasting. Both are distinct.” The Prasar Bharati Corporation’s main objective is to provide autonomy to Doordarshan and Akashvani in order to “educate and entertain the public.”

Brief History, How did it come about?

The efforts for an autonomous broadcasting corporation can be traced to the post-Emergency B.G. Verghese Committee, which recommended the formation of Akash Bharati or the National Broadcast Trust for All India Radio and Doordarshan. The panel, in its February 1978 report, highlighted the need for a fiercely unbiased and independent corporation as “the executive, abetted by a captive Parliament, shamelessly misused the Broadcasting during Emergency.” The next year, Information and Broadcasting Minister L.K. Advani proposed a Bill for an autonomous corporation called Prasar Bharati for AIR and Doordarshan. But the Bill lapsed. Once the Janata Party imploded and Indira Gandhi came back in power, the Congress government appointed the P.C. Joshi Committee in 1982, with a narrow mandate of evaluating the programming of Doordarshan. The committee emphasised the lack of functional freedom in Doordarshan and said the “Ministry of Information and Broadcasting should be reorganised and a separate board, on the lines of the Railway Board, should be created, in which only people with professional experience should get entry.” In 1989, Prasar Bharati Bill was introduced by the National Front Government. Bill borrowed some contents from the previous bill and also added some new changes. V.P. Singh Government moved this bill and was passed in Lok Sabha in August 1990. Finally, Prasar Bharati came into force in 1997 which is established under the “Prasar Bharati Act” and came into existence on 23rd November 1997.

Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India) Act, 1990

This Act extends to the whole of India. The Act provides for the establishment of a Broadcasting Corporation. The Act defines composition, powers and functions of the corporation. It grants autonomy to the All India Radio and Doordarshan which were previously under the control of the government. Section 3 of the Act deals with the establishment and composition of the corporation. The corporation is a body corporate having perpetual succession and a common seal with the headquarters in New Delhi.

Amendments and recent draft bills regarding the Act

The Prasar Bharati Amendment Act of 2011, amended provisions to ensure that all posts in Akashvani and Doordarshan, barring few exceptions, shall be deemed to have been transferred to the Prasar Bharati from April 1, 2000. The amendment act had defined the service conditions of several of the employees in some of the key areas.

The Information & Broadcasting ministry recently took a major step by drafting the Prasar Bharati Establishment of Recruitment Board Rules, 2020, Prasar Bharati is supposed to be an autonomous body, yet it does not have a mechanism to hire its employees. Consequently, government officers belonging to other services generally come to work in Prasar Bharati on deputation. Over decades, the Prasar Bharati Recruitment Board could never be set up because the I&B ministry and the public broadcaster often had differences over its structure.

Section 3: Establishment and composition of Corporation

Structure of the Prasar Bharati Board

The Act specifies General Superintendence, direction and management of affairs of the corporation. Prasar Bharati Board does all such acts and exercises all those powers which may be done by the corporation.

The Board shall consist:

• Chairman;
• One Executive member;
• One member (Finance);
• One member (Personnel);
• Six Part-time members;
• Director-General (Akashvani), ex Officio;
• Director-General (Doordarshan), ex officio;
• One representative of the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (India), to be nominated by that ministry and;
• Two representatives of the employees of the corporation.

Section 4: Appointment of chairman and other Members

The President of India appoints Chairman and other member except for ex-officio members, a nominated member and the elected members. There shall be not less than six meetings every year but three months shall not intervene between one meeting and the next meeting.

Section 12: Functions and powers of Corporation

Functions and Objectives of Corporation

The main motive of the corporation is to educate, inform and entertain the public. By conducting and organizing public broadcasting services to people, it has become easy to provide the information to the people in an easy manner. It also ensures the balanced development of broadcasting on radio and television.

Following are the objects, namely;

• To provide the autonomy to Akashvani and Doordarshan, so that to ensure the function in a fair, objective and creative manner.
• To uphold the unity and integrity of the country.
• To maintain the democratic and social values which are enshrined in the constitution.
• To look after the safeguarding of the citizen’s right to be informed freely, truthfully and objectively.
• To spread literacy, agriculture, rural development, health, family welfare, environment, science and technology.
• To encourage healthy competition and spirit of sportsmanship by providing adequate coverage to sports and games.
• To promote cultures and languages of the various regions by broadcasting many programmes.
• To provide special needs of the youth always organize special programmes.
• To remove the problems of women, pay special attention to the upliftment of the women.
• To take special steps for the protection of the children, the aged, the blind, the handicapped and other vulnerable section.
• To protect the rights of working classes and advancing their welfare.
• To provide the suitable programmes for the needs of the minorities and tribal communities.
• To promote national integration that will maintain the community language of the nation.
• To promote research and development activities of radio broadcast and television broadcast technology.

Parliamentary Committee

According to section 13, it shall consist of twenty-two members of Parliament, out of which fifteen from the House of the People shall be elected by the members and seven from the Council of States shall be elected by the members. The committee shall function according to the rules made by the speaker of the House of the People.

Powers of Central Government Section 23 

According to the Act, the government has the following powers are:

• From time to time when the government may think fit may issue the directions to the corporation for the unity, sovereignty and integrity of India.
• The Central Government require the corporation to furnish the information which government may consider.
• At the time of any difficulty arises, the central government may by order publish in the official gazette and make the procedure to remove the difficulties.
• The Central Government has also the power to make the rules. The rules may be considered in relation to:
• The salaries and allowances and condition of service in respect of leave and pension.
• Allowances payable to the chairman and part-time members.
• Control, restrictions and conditions for which corporation may appoint officers and other employees.
• Conditions and restrictions which a Recruitment Board may establish.
• Qualifications, other conditions and period of the office of the members of the Recruitment Board.
• Terms and condition of the service of the officers.
• Form and manner in which the annual statement of record shall be prepared.

Section 23: Power of Central Government to give directions 

The Centre still holds the reins of Prasar Bharati as it has the power to make rules for the corporation, issue grants or allowances and control the salaries of employees.

Section 23 gives the Centre powers to issue directions which it “may think necessary in the interests of the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India or the security of the State or preservation of public order” to not broadcast “any matter of public importance”.

On the context of what true autonomy means for a broadcasting corporation, the Supreme Court has referred to a ruling by the German Constitutional Court, which said that “freedom from State control requires the legislature to frame some basic rules to ensure that government is unable to exercise any influence over the selection, content or scheduling of programmes”.

Autonomy for Prasar Bharati: Sam Pitroda Committee recommendations

Sam Pitroda Committee has taken minimal action to strengthen the Prasar Bharati in February 2014. Certain recommendations have been made by Sam Pitroda Committee for the autonomy of Prasar Bharati:

• To give the effective freedom to the Prasar Bharati, amend the Prasar Bharati Act, 1990.
• In order to frame rules and regulations and to hire manpower without the approval of the Government, Prasar Bharati should be given the power.
• Prasar Bharati should become a “Genuine Public Broadcaster” as against a “Government Broadcaster”.
• To make the Direct-To-Home (DTH) signals in a primary mode.
• To increase the allocation of funds in order to content generation to 50% of the total expenditure within a period of 5-7 years.
• To meet the obligations of the public service broadcasting, satellite and digital cables TV operations should be expanded.
• To define the social media strategy of Prasar Bahrain.
• To review all the channels, Doordarshan and All India Radio and their sub-optimal utilization of the resources should be phased out.
• To set up PBC as the third arm of the public service broadcaster, Doordarshan and All India Radio.
• It should be best broadcasting service in the world using next-generation opportunities, strategies, technologies and etc.

Some Important Case Laws 

Union of India v. Cricket Association of Bengal AIR 1995

Supreme Court held that broadcasting should be under the control of public and should be operated by the public statutory corporation.This implicit in Article 19(1)(a) where the corporations, whose constitution and composition must be in such order to ensure their impartiality in political, economic and social matters and other public issues.

The right of free and expression includes the right to receive the information. It is necessary that citizens have the benefit of the plurality of views and must have opinions on the all public issues. There must be a diversity of opinions, views, ideas and ideology among the citizens. Private Broadcasting is more prejudicial to the right of free speech of the citizens than the government controlled media.

BCCI-Nimbus Prasar Bharati Case 

According to the Court, the objects and purpose of the Sports Act are to provide access to the largest number of the viewer through sports broadcasting channels with Prasar Bharati. Court also said that it should be essentially directed towards those citizens who do not have access to cable television and only access to terrestrial and DTH networks of Prasar Bharati. Court also pointed out the virtue of Section 12(3)(c) of the Prasar Bharati Act.

Union of India v. Board of Control for Cricket in India and Ors

The Supreme Court held that Prasar Bharati cannot engage in free transmission of the signals of live sporting or cricketing events, received from content right holders/owners, to cable operators.

Conclusion 

Prasar Bharati is significant because:

Public and Private Service Broadcaster

Private Broadcasters cannot fulfill the objectives of Public Service Broadcasting. The main motive of Private Broadcaster is to sell products of their advertisers. They depend upon the revenue from their advertisers. Commercial broadcasting will not meet the needs of public service broadcasting because commercial broadcasting assumes the audience as consumers and not as citizens.

National Broadcaster

National Broadcaster Prasar Bharati is the largest technical coverage. The Prasar Bharati services are available in all the corner of the country. In remote and border areas it reaches 99.3% and 91.42% in geographical areas. A strong National Broadcaster is a symbol of national pride for the entire nation. A National Broadcaster is the one which has a great strategic significance in emergency situations like natural calamities, war etc.

Freedom of expression is guaranteed as a fundamental right of the citizen in our constitution. And we all know that Prasar Bharati is a means of expression and a most important part of our democratic set-up. All media’s are enjoying full freedom of expressions like Print media and electronic media too. As it is well known that, Print media and electronic media are owned by big corporate sectors and now these companies are enjoying the freedom of expression. So we can’t imagine that public broadcaster suffers from every kind of restrictions that put it under the effective control of the government.

However, Prasar Bharati has not been able to function as the medium of the people. It has practically no freedom except to sing the praise of the government of the day. It is not surprising that it has not risen in public esteem.

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