With Arnab Goswami launching his Republic TV channel, the war not only for TRPs but over news coverage seems to have intensified.
First, Times group protested against Arnab Goswami and Prema Sridevi walking away with tapes relating to Sunanda Pushkar murder case and launched a police case.
Bennett, Coleman and Company (BCCL) has lodged a police complaint against its former employees Arnab Goswami and Prema Sridevi for “commission of offences of theft, criminal breach of trust, misappropriation of property and infringement of IPR of BCCL” by using tapes allegedly procured when they were with Times Now, on Republic TV on May 6 and 8, 2017.
Goswami called the complainant nervous and unconfident. He said, "Interesting to see them so nervous, if the Times Network has lost viewership, they must evaluate their content and show some grace even in defeat. I am sitting and working in a newsroom and the TOI owners are sitting at the police stations. This shows nervousness and they must show greater poise and realise that new age journalists will not be cowed down by these silly stunts."
Amid allegations of using multiple frequencies, Republic TV has debuted with a record opening on the barometers. As per BARC India’s data for Week 19 (May 6 – 12), sourced from one of the subscribers, the channel has grabbed about half of the relative share in most of the target audience groups.
Among NCCS AB Male 22+, Republic TV has captured the relative share of 49.2 per cent in the all-India market. The channel’s relative share in top six mega cities stood at 52.1 per cent.
All the English news channels barring Republic TV have pulled out of the Broadcast Audience Research Council of India (BARC) and have also removed the watermarking from their feeds.
This is in reaction to BARC releasing the viewership data for the newly launched Republic TV despite NBA urging the council to not to go public with the numbers as the TRAI investigation on the matter was underway. NBA had earlier alleged that Republic TV was trying to garner more viewership through distribution malpractices.
Or how PR by paratroopers proved costly for foreign
news channel!
As Republic news channel is just launched, By S Narendra, Former PIO and
ex-Govt spokesperson takes a look back at the launch of satellite news channels in India, beginning with CNN in 1991
Satellite TV news, very aptly, arrived
in India via CNN. Initially it was an intruder on the zealously guarded Indian
airwaves in 1991.The gulf was or the one between Kuwait and Saddam Hussian’s
Iraq, in which Peter Arnet of CNN telecast from a brief -case was a great
technological Disruptor. The pyrotechnics unleashed against the Iraqi regime by
US fleet spectacle no one wanted to miss
While publicly venting angst and fears
about this assault on Indian sovereignty, every VIP in Delhi wanted to gain
access to the CNN broadcast. Those who could not get permission to acquire a
satellite dish on top of their roof, visited luxury hotel coffee and other bars
fitted with satellite dish enabled TVs offering CNN news. While there was
‘collateral damage’, meaning civilian casualties in Iraq, for India luxury
hotels there was ;collateral gains’.
Intrepid Indian entrepreneurs, masters
of JUGAD, soon came up with a
business model to beat the ancient Indian Telecommunication Act that prohibited
private cables from crossing the public roads. They strung cables on roof tops
and trees and offered satellite TV services broadcast from Singapore and Hong Kong.
An upset government sent in vain one of its senior bureaucrat to Hong Kong in
search of equipment for blocking satellite TV intrusions into Indian sovereignty.
While CNN news broadcasts had arrived,
the broadcaster had not set up a news bureau in Delhi. Those were early days of
India's foray into economic liberalization under Prime Minister P.V.Narasimha
Rao. His government was very anxious to showcase India as a profitable
destination for FDI. And, we in the government were keen to have more and more
international media coverage of Indian economic news. As head of government of
India's media relations outfit-PIB, and government spokesperson, it was my job to facilitate the
entry of foreign correspondents and their news outlets. From about a corps of
40 foreign correspondents, it had grown to over 70.
I extended an invitation to CNN to open
a news bureau. A highly competent and soft spoken Ashis Ray was representing
CNN in India and his earlier attempts to open a news bureau in Delhi had for
some reason not met with the approval of the Ministry of External Affairs. In
the government, there were bureaucrats who were not comfortable with the
coverage of Indian news by BBC, CNN and other foreign news outlets. My own view
was that positive and negative coverage evens out over a period of time. In any
case, Indian news outlets generally provided a lot more negative perception of
India than their foreign counterparts (there
is another story to tell about the problems India media had created for foreign
media representatives during the Surat Plague) After discussing the matter
with PM Narasimha Rao, I had sent the invitation letter to CNN.
One of the hurdles for satellite TV
outlets was the government broadcaster
Doordarshan wanting to maintain its monopoly over receiving and distributing
satellite signals. Since the PM was already in the loop, DD could not block
CNN setting up its own satellite linking facility. Atlanta, head office of CNN,
promptly responded to my invitation and
within a couple of weeks opened their bureau. In the normal course, a news
channel setting up a news gathering outfit or reaching audiences is no big
deal. But CNN decided to make a big splash with a big bash. Top level CNN
executives accompanied by a PR team from Atlanta had arrived. When Americans are involved, everything becomes
loud and King size. For the CNN bash, invitations had gone out to cabinet
ministers to almost everyone who claimed
to be a VVIP in the capitals cocktail circuit. The evening party was hosted in
one of the capital’s famous five star hotels on Patel Marg. The hotel
convention canter was fitted with multiple TV screens displaying CNN logo.
As the VVIPs and smaller fries like me arrived,
CNN wanted to show its contribution for taking India story international. On
multiple screens CNN logo splashed followed by a story on India's capital. The
story was pitched to showcase a vibrant market economy spilling over to its
streets. The camera had panned on one of the bustling roads, accompanied by a
reporter’s commentary on the new India and facts about the blooming middle
class. The camera lingered a little longer than necessary on the road crammed
with a diversity of vehicles blocked by stray cattle. The VVIPs got up. There
was a sudden buzz in the semi-dark party hall. Soon the TV screens went blank
and the embarrassed CNN executives, with a crest-fallen Ashis Ray in tow, were whispering tepid apologies to the upset VVIPs. The
flowing alcohol did nothing to mitigate the discomfiture among the hosts and
guests.
As expected, there was no hole in the ground
for me to crawl in, I slipped out of the semi darkness. But before departing I
told Ashis Ray that a candid admission of the mistake by the top brass, an
unconditional apology and announcement of a
mechanism for rigorously checking
what goes into the future India story on
CNN could control the damage.
S Narendra Firmer adviser to PMs
But, then neither me nor Ashis Ray were
aware of the ego of CNN bosses from
Atlanta and their sure-footed US PR advisers. First came a tepid apology, that
blamed the camera-person who was an Indian. Then came
the explanation that the commentary was positive. And, of course, it was put
out as a technical mistake.
My telephone (fortunately, it was a pre-mobile era) buzzed with the
message ‘we told you so’.
Is there a lesson in this? While entering a new media market, a soft
launch could have been tried rather than a big bang one. Brand ego could result
in costly mistakes. Local facilitators’ voice, (in this case Ashis Ray’s),
should get its due respect.
Friends, creativity comes into play right from the beginning when we start making our PR strategies. It all begins with media familiarisation for the spokespersons in accordance with the rapidly changing dynamics. Let us as PR practitioners, first of all understand ‘what makes the news’. It is no more the case of man biting dog; Today’s headline is: Man bites the snake and kills it! (did someone say yuck?!).
Now, let me present a case study scenario. Our spokespersons and we as PR pundits might feel very happy with a Press Release that we write using all the creativity at our command. But it may not find its way into print the next morning. Worse still, the press conference that we hold, using the ‘highly creative’ press release, turns out to be a damp squib. No one accepts any number of excuses.
At the Press Club, where I get to meet many media friends at leisure, I hear complaints after complaints about ‘you PR guys’. As an old friend from Hindu Business Line often complains: ‘Why can’t your guys write simple, straight stories and send is to us instead of using bombastic language and tables and graphs that may impress your bosses or clients?’ Another friend from ToI says: ‘I don’t even open some PR guys’ mails since I don’t want to waste my time’.
For details, please check my column in Reputation Today:
BENGALURU: The Akshaya Patra Foundation and Public Relation Council of India (PRCI) held a panel discussion on ‘You can be the Change’, to discuss how a common man can contribute to bringing about a change in child welfare” on 5th of May, 2017 at Rangasthala, Rangoli - Metro Art Centre.
Vinay Bharadwaj who pioneered a show called 'Let's Talk with Vinay' on YouTube, is spreading awareness among youth on cancer. He said that this Panel Discussion on Child Welfare has made him think bigger and take up much more initiatives in this area.
Amit Amarnath, Founder, Youth for Parivarthan said the initial project was on environmental sector, but now, he says, his organisation has entered into domains of health and education of children and he hopes to do a lot of work through his volunteers in Youth for parivarthan
Mayuraa Raghavendra – Radio Jockey, 92.7 BIG FM, spoke about the awareness spread through the broadcast media for child welfare and the huge responses that he received.
Mrs Geetha Shankar spoke on the dilemmas being faced by the parent of a child with emotional or behavioural problems and the first question, may be the most troublesome of all: Whether the child’s behaviour is sufficiently different to require a comprehensive evaluation by professionals?
Mrs Meera Bharadwaj moderated the session with ease and with an innate sense of pacing and exhibited a smooth approach to weaving in questions from the audience and the panellists’ response.
A documentary from Akshaya Patra “The Passioneers” - People behind the scenes, that portrayed essence of how the people behind the scenes operate and what motivates them to take up this cause, as also screened.
KOLKATA: Communication students from Birla Global University and Kolkata
University enthusiastically participated in a seminar on Public Relations : New Trends and Challenges, hosted jointly by the
PRCI, Kolkata and Bhubaneswar Chapters in association with the YCC units, in Kolkata, recently.
A student posing questions at the seminar
The Public Relations department of Eastern Railway supported
the event by organizing it at Riveira, Eastern Railway Officers Club (Howrah
Division).
Dr Badri Narayan, Divisional Railway Manager, who was the
chief guest, advised communicators to be innovative even while conveying simple
messages such as Swachh Bharat . For instance, a series of Swachh Bharat messages using Bollywood themes caught
the attention of not the passengers visiting Howrah station, but the entire twitterati. The campaign went
viral in no time, he said.
Kolkata Press Club chairman and Doordarshan senior
correspondent Snehashis Sur said young communicators should be good observers to
succeed in their communication endeavours.
Dr B K Das, director of Birla Global University which
co-hosted the event, said the institution always encouraged interactions among students
to help broaden their knowledge horizon.
B N Kumar, national
president of PRCI, delivered the keynote address and narrated how PR has changed
over the years. Social media now offers ample opportunities, but communicators must use this double-edged
weapon with a sense of responsibility.
A collage of the event: Top: B N Kumar, Ashok Panda, Ravi Mahapatra addressing the seminar. Bottom: selfie to Banta Hai!; B K Sahu felicitating Dr Badri Naraharan
He pointed out to the students community that Indian mother
is a shining example of multi-tasking and communicators and managers have a lot
to learn from her. “She is the first to get up in the morning and last to go to
sleep, working like a perfect machine with a human touch,” he said.
B K Sahu, eastern regional chairman of PRCI, thanked the
Eastern Railway for its support to promote knowledge among students. R N Mahapatra,
CPRO of Eastern Railway and Kolkata chapter chairman of PRCI, and Dr Ashok
Panda, Bhubaneshwar Chapter chairman, played stellar roles in organizing the
event.
The students later visited the Railway Museum to get to know
the history of railways.
Or
how Spicer landed in hot waters over Spicy tweets by his boss Donald Trump
By S Narendra
(Former
adviser to PMs and ex-spokesperson for Govt of India)
Did
the US President Donald Trump on April 12th tell For News that
America ( “we are”) sending an
armada’ to the waters around the Korean Peninsula for countering North Korea test firing missiles capable of carrying nuclear
war heads and holding threats to test every week its
nuclear weapons? In the TV interview the President made it clear that North Koreas
threats would not go without a response from the US. He went on tell that the
armada (did not say ships) being sent includes submarines, ’far more powerful than the aircraft carriers’.
A
few days later , when the looming crisis had not
materialised, the New York Times
reported that the armada was not sailing to deter Korea as suggested by the
President. It was in fact thousands of
miles away sailing in the Indian Ocean for joint exercises with Australian
navy. According to the report, there was a miscommunication between the White
House and the Pentagon. One does not know whether the President unknowingly had
made an ill-timed suggestion or a deliberate bluff for scaring North Korea .But this failure of the armada to
turn up in the area as suggested upset US
allies like South Korea and Japan which rely on US defence support. In
the event of a belligerent and impetuous leader Jong-Un had taken rash action threatened by the news of US armada, the allies would have been exposed to extreme
danger. Commentators point out that due to the ill-timed statement of the US
President, the credibility of US as a reliable ally has suffered.
The
controversy got fresh lease of life when the President’s spokesperson ,Sean
Spicer, in his media briefing (a week later, even though the naval fleet
was still operating near the
Australian coast) attempted to explain
his boss’s statement. He disingenuously asserted that the naval fleet was ‘ultimately’
headed in Korea’s direction and no timeline was specified. This was said despite
the fact that the President’s TV interview was given when, according to Spicer,
‘sending the armada ‘ it did not mean
immediate dispatch, hence there was no ambiguity
in the President’s claim.
Sean
Spicer has adopted a very combative style matching that of his boss. The
President has more than once characterised the media as ‘dishonest’ ,’evil’
‘fake news peddlers’ and the White House
had taken the extreme step of barring media outlets perceived as not
friendly like CNN and Washington Post
from the White House briefings. Watching
the recoding of the Spokesperson’s briefing sessions, one gets the impression
that Spicer is both shifty and often testy. No doubt he has an unenviable job,
since the President is eager to first air his weighty views on policies and
global events on Twitter.
The
President does not hesitate to make controversial unfounded claims nor does he
entertain any qualms about executing 360 degree U-turns on his stand on key issues. As a result, most media have opened a
special section for fact checking on President Trump. It is therefore, an
under- statement to say that this Spokesperson is between the blades of a
scissors.
Here
is another instance where Sean Spicer got into hot waters in trying to parse
another of President Trump’s highly controversial claim. The following Tweets
of President Trump are on record; they
went on to embarrass the American democracy itself.
@real
Trump
“Terrible.Just found that Obama “wire tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing
found. This is McCarthyism” 2.35am-4th Mar 2017.
“Is it legal for a
sitting President to be “wire tapping” a race for president prior to an
election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW” 3,49 am 4 Mar 2017
“I bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the
fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October just prior to
Election!” 3.52 am 4 Mar 2017
“How low has President Obama gone to tap my phones during
the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”
4.02 am 4 Mar 2017
The
US Justice Department and FBI responsible
for carrying out wiretapping in certain cases require Court sanction. The FBI’s
current chief is registered supporter of the Republican party. Both the
agencies could not unearth any evidence in support of this very disturbing
claim by the President.
Now,
you may ask as to how the White House spokesman dealt with this controversy!
Sean
Spicer’s first response was to let the President’s Tweet speak for itself. However
a week later, Spicer told the media that “wiretapping” was an entirely separate
accusation to Trump’s unverified “wire tapping” allegations.” If you look at
the President’s tweet, he said very clearly, quote wire tapping unquote. And Spier added, “there has been
substantial discussion in several reports. There’s been reports in the New York
Times, and the BBC and other outlets about other aspects of surveillance that
have occurred”. (Media fact-check did not show any such reports in the outlets
named). “The President was very clear in his Tweet, you know, that
‘wire tapping’ that spans a whole lot of other options’.
The
hole digging went further when the high profile White House adviser Kellyanne
Convey told a channel that covert surveillance can be conducted through
microwave that can turn on camera etcetera.
The key word used by her was “can”. But did it happen?. Neither she nor Spicer
could offer any proof.
While
explaining the President’s relevant Tweets, both Spicer and Convey ignored a raging controversy about Russian intelligence spying on the election
campaign process and leaking information adverse to Trump’s opponent that
helped the winner. The US legislature was inquiring into this Russian spying. It
was apparent that the President wanted to divert attention away from this
controversy and also from the charge that he and his administration were close
to Moscow. As a result of the Spokesman’s
attempt to parse the Tweets of
the boss, the bad story was gaining more traction and more unfavourable fact
checking on this and other statements of the President.
In
both the incidents cited, the credibility of the administration and that of the
primary official source of news was stretched. The office of the Spokesperson
is a bridge between the media and the government. What sustains and strengthens this bridge is the mutual respect the Spokesperson and the media hold for each other’s roles and responsibilities;
neither crosses the professional lines. The
Spokesperson is invariably is a media professional and the media generally
regard him or her as one among them.
In the
US system, the white House has a less visible director of communication whose
job it is to ensure unity of message emanating from the totality of government,
Again in the US political arrangement, the White House is the focal point of
both politics and the government. As such, its Spokesperson has the opportunity
to lead the headlines. The ordinary people get to see their President and the
government in action through the media - conventional and social. As the
latter borrows and blend stories and
commentaries from each other, the Spokesperson as the primary source of news
and explanations of policy and developments can influence perceptions.
Coming
back to the incidents cited, the first response of Spicer- ‘the President Tweet
says it all’- was a wise one. The later attempts to parse the President’s TV
interview or the Tweet was a case of bad judgment, No doubt the media must have
trapped Spicer for implication.
Professionalism prepares the Spokesperson not to be trapped by media. Professional
training helps the Spokesperson to allow a bad story to exhaust itself look for
opportunities to change the headline.
sunarendra@gmail.com
While
working as the government and PM spokesman, I adopted the policy of letting the
statement of the boss remain, even when it was most untenable. Or advice the
chief to issue a wholesome retraction, if the statement was indefensible or
very controversial. Media expects and accepts a politician to equivocate and tell half truths.
But it would not trust a fellow professional who happens to be speaking up for
the government, when he equivocates or offers disingenuous explanations.
Once
the spokesperson’s credibility is lost, his (her) value to both the media and
the organisation he speaks up for diminishes.
Disclaimer: The views expressed by the author are purely
his personal. PRapport does not take any responsibility for any of it, except respecting
Narendra for his candid views as a veteran communication professional - Editor
Months after Arnab Goswami proclaimed independence for
news, the nation still wants to know as to when his new channel Republic will be
launched. While the billboards are all across the country say 'With You Soon', let’s us hear from the
man himself, Arnab, about his plans, his views. Excerpts from a chat Pradyuman
Maheshwari, Editor-in-Chief and CEO of MXM India, has with Arnab:
So the question which, let me ask with a non-trademarked
statement: India wants to know when is the launch?
Very soon, it’s a matter of days now. You’ve seen my newsroom,
it’s buzzing with energy, I’m trying to get the product as close to being
perfect as possible. There’s nothing like an absolutely perfect launch though.
But having said that, we’re trying to sort of stitch things together… bring all
parts of the piece together, get the team to integrate, believe in themselves,
believe in the product, believe in the news they putout… get very, very
familiar with the technology they are using because some of the technology
you’re using here is…
Different?
Completely, completely new age. And so I want that
familiarisation process to carry on so I’m not setting a hard date for launch
yet, though if you ask me can I launch? I can launch right now.
So no Akshay Trittiya
launch, April 28th?
No, no-no.
May 1, Maharashtra Day,
Gujarat Day…
No, I don’t believe in these any commemorative events or dates.
I believe every day is good for news… we should just have a good run, go with
the flow.
But surely you need to
inform the distribution folks?
The distribution guys are more or less informed. I think most of
the people are aware of our channel being launched. In fact, we’re getting a
push from the distribution guys to launch early. Some places have already
started putting up promos on air in anticipation of our launch; our media
campaign should be starting soon. So we are almost there.
The question is that, the last mile, 4-5 days here or there
should be a discretion of the producers of the channel. So whenever the
producer of the channel says we’re okay to go, I’ll go.
So, plus or minus the
4-5 days, May 10, May 1?
Yes. I would say, yes, pretty much around that.
For the full version of the free-wheeling chat, please check:
http://www.mxmindia.com/2017/04/up-close-with-arnab-goswami/
(Former adviser to PMs and ex Spokesperson, Govt of India)
A paid passenger of United Airlines
was dragged out of his seat to make room for the airline crew. Videos showed
the passenger forcibly dragged out of his seat and later running back to his seat with blood on his face. Videos
of the incident went viral.
United Airlines shares soon declined
by 7%.And, UA has become the butt of jokes and UA competitors came out with
their own take such as this one from South West airlines: ‘We Beat Competition,
Not You’.
UA CEO’s first reaction was to defend the staff action.
He went on to describe the passenger, an American citizen and a doctor of Vietnamese origin as ‘ disruptive’.
A statement from UA tried to defend its action as routine with legal sanction.
It was claimed that when an airline over-books, it can off load passengers. In
US airlines routinely overbook and when required to off load passengers, they ‘incentivise
volunteers' by offering sweet deals,
In the present case, UA allowed passengers
to board the aircraft and then decided to off load. Force was used to yank out
passengers selected at random for off loading. Normally, off loading takes
place at boarding gate before allowing passengers into the aircraft. In this
case there was the possibility of inviting racial bias.
UA CEO did not factor this in while
issuing his first statement.
After the video went viral, damaging
the reputation of UA and inviting share holders’ ire, the airline came with another statement regretting the
incident, but not a full apology. No action was proposed against the concerned
staff.
When things went out of control with
criticism mounting, the CEO came out with apology (media reported that he
refused to resign taking responsibility for the unseemly incident). By then a
petition with 150,000 signatures demanding CEO’s resignation had become public.
In a damage control effort, UA
announced full refund of the fares to
all passengers on the flight.
In the meanwhile, the passenger who
was dragged out of aircraft was in a
hospital and his lawyers had approached a court with a plea to ensure that all evidence of the incident be preserved.
Sadly, UA did not come out with a
statement how it was compensating the victim for the ill -treatment meted out
to him. Nor did the the CEO or some senior UA official go to meet the victim
and his family with a wholesome apology and settle the matter privately,
The author
The image and reputation of UA has
suffered an irreparable damage. Clearly shows the CEO was not up to the job.
His first intervention was a classic case of mismanagement as he did not show
concern for cash customers, an airline’s biggest asset. The video showed a
bloodied passenger that should have alerted CEO that something more than
ordinary , routine off loading' had taken place.
The wholesale refund offer to all
passengers showed that UA had messed up but this gesture was a classic case of
too-little-too-late.
A bad situation had turned into a
first class crisis and reputation mismanagement as the CEO did not steer UA out
of the mess but brought upon it a crisis with his unwise first reaction.
The big question that arises now is
what were the PR experts engaged by UA doing other than building up a crisis
step by step?
The
stunning victory of Mr Narendra Modi with over 320 seats in the state Assembly
of 403 seats, is indeed a Tsunami that no one predicted as the party vote share
jumped from just 15% in 2012 to 39.6% in 2017. “This will usher in a big change
in the Indian Politics” said Amit Shah.
Three Pronged Strategy
What
could be the reason for such a massive mandate? An objective analysis of
results and media reports reveal that Mr. Narendra Modi as an icon of the party
with Amit Shah Party President as a strategic tactician (action man) evolved a
three pronged strategy to win the war of UP elections. It includes: Modi's
ideology and his development schemes; propaganda and communication strategy and
the third most important one is grassroots communication through booth level samithies.
Sab Ka Saath, Sab Ka Vikas - an idea that clicked
Ideology and Performance Indicators
First,
the BJP has evolved a content strategy based on its ideology and high performance
indicators of welfare schemes. They include:
•Creation of a sectarian division between Hindus and Muslims by not
having fielded a single Muslim on the 403 Assembly seats. A sense of loyalty
developed by Hindus towards BJP
•BJP’s viewpoint against triple talaq to woo muslim women.
•It is not caste that matters but development said Modi Ji which has
broken the caste ridden society of Uttar Pradesh, by highlighting that one
needed development, innovation, a new sense of spirit to eradicate poverty and
not the old lethargic caste based reservations.
•The Prime Minister address to the nation on demonetisation watched
and heard by millions of people created a war resonated so strongly with the
poor for establishing an equitable society, who became his captive vote bank.
As a result Mr. Modi not only became pro-poor but also anti-corruption crusader.
In the process, a type of social coalition has been created comprising the
poor, the new middle class, marginalised sections of other backward classes and
dalits. This has been a strong point in favour of BJP.
•The B.S.P's strategy Dalit - Muslim vote bank has been shattered by
social coalition.
Along
side ideological connotations, the BJP's election strategy included the
achievements of NDA Government’s welfare schemes during the last two years. Among
others, the credits of the Government comprise make in India, the concept of
'Roti Kapda and Makan’ (Food, Clothing and Shelter) for the poor, national
policy for farmers, “Phade Bharat Badhe Bharat”, “Aam Aadmi Bhima Yojna”, Prime
Minister’s foreign travels that brought 'Samman' to India, Skill India, Digital
India, Swachh Bharat, Jan Dhan etc. Other welfare schemes that were included in
the strategy cover: the initiation of 52 lakh gas connections to women in UP as
well as disbursal of Rs. 20,000 crore loans through the Mudra Bank and opening
of three crore Jan Dhan accounts.
If
the recent notebandi topped the list of achievements, sending of 104 satellites
to space by ISRO in one go became an added value to boost the image of Modi
Government.
Amit Shah - Big Change in Political Communication
Multi-media Propaganda Campaign
All
these ideological and performance indicators were sold to the electorate more
forcefully and effectively through a strong multi-media propaganda campaign. Second
part of the election strategy was, therefore, a multi-media communication and
propaganda campaign to reach out to the electorate. Media included:
interpersonal media, folk arts, mass media – newspapers, radio, TV and social
media – facebook, twitter, youtube, etc. The Prime Minister’s speeches in the
course of his Man Ki Baath, radio broadcasts, TV news and speeches delivered in
India and abroad, election rallies, and his views expressed on the stump made
more impact on the voters mind, particularly, those who are exposed to mass
media.
Modi’s Dress
GandhiJi's
dress made all the more difference for the people to identify him as a man of the
people in the freedom struggle. Similarly, Modi's dress, overt change in style
and his energetic personality – all created an effective veneer around his
political style which has added to his vote catching power among all sections
of the people including the Dalits.
Among
all, Mr. Modi is an excellent orator whose oration with parables not only
attracted the attention of the public but also influenced their mindset towards
his ideology. One of the strategies has been his punch dialogues such as SP
Leader Akhilesh Yadav and Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi were described
as “old furniture”, while BSP leader Mayavathi as “Yesterday's newspaper”. Amit
Shah treated all opponents as “Kasabs” who was executed in terrorists attacks
case. Mr. Modi's speech modulation and body language also projected his
personality and influenced the voters. Prime Minister even participated in
street shows to reach out to the people at the booth level. Above all, people
say that Modi had a better hearing aid to listen to what we call grassroots
voice that helped him to evolve his communication strategy.
As
a result of his style of speaking and achievements, people praised Mr. Modi
calling him honest, clean and “Garibon Ka Messiah”, a symbol of India and
immediate cause of the elections that helped his party to win the elections.
Booth Level Samithies
Third,
an effective grassroots communication strategy was designed almost in 2014 to
reach out to the village voters through booth level samithies. These samithies
were constituted at 1.4 Lakh election booths with BJP party workers and RSS
pracharaks. In fact, RSS paid a pivotal role at the grass roots. This aspect of
strategy was more forceful than the other two strategies. If the second
strategy of propaganda was through mass media, public meetings and rallies, the
third strategy was based on two step - flow of communication – Modi's message
first reached booth level samithi members through mass media in the first step
and in turn these members of booth level samithies reached every household in the
village, town or city to carry the messages of Mr. Modi. House hold
communication was yet another feature of the election campaign in which
messages of MR Modi were humanized and personalised to influence the mindset of
the voters.
Whither India
Dr C V Narsimha Reddi
India
was ruled by foreigners for about 1000 years of which Muslims ruled for 600
years including the Mughals. A dichotomy surfaces in the recent election
campaign of BJP that if “Sabka Saath – Sabka Vikas”, was the BJP's election
campaign in 2014 while the winning BJP consciously excluded Muslims in the 2017
election fray. What message does that send? People ask what will be the future
of our secular country? An issue to ponder over. (The author is Editor of Public
Relations Voice; Former Director
Information and Public Relations Department, Govt of Andhra Pradesh. Email ID – drcvn@hotmail.com
The recent Legislative Assembly
election campaigns have seen a dramatic change in the communication,
particularly political communication, is conducted. While PR Narendra Modi is
credited for dramatically transforming or even disrupting the political
communication, the opposition too had its own share of initiatives. PRapport
initiates a debate among communication professionals to analyse and
understand lessons from the new communication regime - what was right and
what we wrong.
We at PRCI did make a beginning
during our 11th Global Communication Conclave with a discussion on Disruption
– Political Communication with a Fireside Chat with BJP political strategist
Ashwani Singla. Nowwe take this
forward.
By S.Narendra*
India has
successfully completed another cycle
of free and fair elections. The latest
poll cycle witnessed several new features
in poll campaign communication.
According to a BJP leader in UP, the battle strategy aimed at winning ‘booth by booth’ (there were 150000 poll
booths).For this purpose the party deployed lakhs of foot-soldiers for personally connecting with
the voters. The foot-soldiers efforts
in the field were coordinated
through mobile phones and social media.
In a first of
its kind, BJP gathered inputs from
thousands of voters for preparing its
manifesto. Such crowd sourcing and deployment of foot-soldiers seems to have
created a groundswell. The 3-D communication-that is, multi-screen projection
of election BJP rallies, especially that of PM rallies, (first unveiled in 2012
Gujarat poll), was very much in play. At each such venue, a bank of plug-and -play
facility was created for news channels to take their feed which went a long way
in getting free airtime. Perhaps , relative absence of broadband connectivity limited the scope for streaming PM’s rallies
from one centre to others.
A notable aspect
was the seamless mixing of traditional campaign mode with the state-of-the art
technology by the two main contenders-BJP and SP. The latter, as the ruling party spent hundreds of crore of rupees from
government funds for showcasing its performance (Kaam Bolta hai) and its
young chief minister. SP’s incumbency handicap
was also palpable. The Incumbency
burden in this case meant that the voters had taken for granted any
development initiatives of the outgoing
government. And, rerunning
its such achievements in TV
spots and other media without
unveiling SP’s future agenda failed to rally the voters. The government communication usually tends to throw information at people without packaging
such ‘achievement information’
into a political message .
The BJP on the
other hand, enjoyed the advantage of
presenting the Union Government’s several
on-going pro-people
programmes which were not
being effectively implemented by SP state government . The Centre’s dominant presence on social media
like mygov.com site, apps and
social media and on TV and radio could not be matched by other parties., And, PM himself adroitly put
himself as the champion of the
poor against the rich and took almost personal responsibility for lifting UP
out of its under-development.
The opposition
attack on demonitization seems to have backfired as the people perceived the
step as a blow against the rich and the
corrupt. As the theatre of Ram Janmabhoomi movement and demolition of the Babri
Masjid in 1992, one expected BJP to revive the emotional Ram temple issue. Surprisingly,
the issue did not dominate the political discourse.
A sub-text to
the political communication was the BJP’s clever weaving of the social divide represented by Dalits,
OBCs and Upper castes into its seat
distribution arrangement. Although BJP totally ignored giving any
representation to Muslims (16% of the state population), and its opponents attempted to paint BJP as anti-minorities,
such factors did not significantly swing voters away from BJP. This is one
mystery of this election campaign communication
that needs to be carefully studied.
An important
point to note is that both conventional media and social media, howsoever
intensively they are deployed, have their limitations. Such limitations can be
overcome only when they are enjoined with IPC
or inter-personal communication for micro-messaging. In this case, the
BJP’s massive numbers of foot-soldiers were empowered with messages using
social media.
And, more
importantly, they became the listening posts,
sending feed- back to central
strategists. At the helm was an untiring, towering foot-soldier in the form of Narendra Modi.
He was both the media and the message phenomenon. Opposition withered away.
PS: One of the first Communication needs assessment,
CNA, studies commissioned by the Election Commission (designed and supervised
by me), established that Voters were influenced more by IPC that is, when they discussed issues with friends and other known
people. The latter tended to be information consumers of media and eager to be
Jaankars. My recommendation to ECI was to reach out to such Jaankars who could
relay messages to actual voters who may or may not access media. In traditional
societies, IPC tends to be more effective. (*The
author is a former Information adviser to PM and government spokesperson. He can
be reached at sunarendra@gmail.com)
The
11th PRCI/YCC Global
Conclave on March 5th 2017 organised an exclusive one-day programme for
the youth at NMKRV College Mangala Mantap, Bengaluru, with the theme :Are u
ready for the future?
Nearly
300 students from different Media colleges in Bangalore, Mysore, Kerala,
Kolkota, Pune participated. National
Award winning film director of Lucia and U turn fame Mr Pawan Kumar in his
inaugural and key note speech urged the students to move away from routine
activities and become creative.
Mr
Vinod Menon, International Trainer and speaker spoke about the preparedness
expected from the students, Mr Mathew Hibberd, Professor of Media Management
from Switzerland spoke aboutthe oppurtunities available to
students abroad and also cautioned them to be aware of the challenges.
Mr
Kaushik Ghosh, Group CEO, Asianet News Network, spoke about the skill sets
needed for students to take up careers in communication.
The
Panel discussion had a mix of Industry leaders and academicians, who discussed
in depth on bridging the gap between Industry and academics. Ms Lavanya, RJ,
Radio Mirchi, Prof Madhavan, HOD – Media Studies, Jain University, Mr Yogesh
Joshi, Chairman, World Communication Forum, Switzerland,Mr Ravi Shankar from Aim High Consultancy, Mr
Jayaprakash Rao, Youth activist. Mr
Ratul Ganguly a PR Professional from
Kolkota, and Ms Shivani Mody, Editor-in – Chief,Chemical Today Magazine
participated in the Panel discussion and drove home a lot of points which added
value to the students. The programme also saw a creative story telling workshop
delivered by Kathalaya.
The
programme was organized by YCC Karnatak Head- Ms Maya Chandra and overseen by
Ms Geetha Shankar, National Chairperson, YCC.
YCC
acknowledges the immense efforts and support given by Mr Lokesh, Ms Divya Kumari-
Bangalore Chapter Head, Mr Prashanth- Secretary, Bangalore Chapter, Ms
Manasi, and the scores of student
volunteers who toiled thanklessly for days to make the Conclave a big success.
