Symposium on media and impressions held at GU

Symposium on media and impressions held at GU
 HERALD NEWS DESK
PANJIM, APRIL 2
A symposium on “Impressions of Goa: Mainstream, Margins and media” was jointly organised by Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive policy, Goa University in collaboration with Goa Union of Journalists(GUJ) on Wednesday.
The event was held at the university conference hall. The symposium aimed at providing an interface between media, academics and civil society on questions related to social exclusion, democracy and the role of media.
The speakers participating in the symposium included Shambhu Bhau Bandekar, writer and former deputy speaker,; Dadu Mandrekar, writer, Dalit activist and editor, Prajasattak; Prakash W Kamat, Special correspondent, The Hindu and president, GUJ; and Frederick Noronha, senior journalist, writer and co-founder, Bytes for All. The session was chaired by Prof AV Afonso, coordinator, CSSEIP and dean, faculty of social sciences, GU.
Bandekar said that the word NEWS contains the universality of all the directions of North, East, South and West and thereby should be inclusive in nature. However, today, the vision of media is getting narrower as well as shallow under the influence of pro-rich political economy. Quoting Bernard Shaw he posed the question: Can newspapers act as ‘University of the Poor’?
 He said that many forms of discriminations related to caste, class and gender inequalities prevail today even after years of constitutional rights and these have to be identified, located and brought to the fore for corrective actions.
Mandrekar bemoaned the marginal position of the Dalits in the society as well as in the institution of the media, even in a progressive State like Goa.
He said that whatever democratic rights and empowerment, the weaker sections of the society including women have gained is the fruit of the painstakingly drafted constitution of India by Dr B R Ambedkar.
He exhorted that the same spirit of the constitution should be kept alive in all sphere of the society including media.
Frederick Noronha pointed out that appealing to good intentions of individuals does not suffice as deep embedded structural logics and mechanics of different institutions like media and university have more powers and may lead to very different outcomes. He lamented the fact that much time and energy of media person goes in pursuing instant stories and protocol reporting, whereas the life and issues of marginal sections, which require a long-term observation, are underrepresented or at best given token representation.
He said that language is one of the important markers of deprivation and marginalization, but this question is not addressed in its entirety and complexity. For example, the students with primary education in Konkani and Marathi face many barriers at the advanced level of education.
Prakash Kamat pointed out at the divide between English and regional vernacular press and pressed for the need to forge this divide. He said that though vernacular newspapers provide more space to the stories and concerns of the rural and marginalised sections of Goan society, but have failed to generate sustained debates over the issues of marginalised people.
He pointed our that various factors such as the ownership patterns, labour relations, consciousness and responsibility among media-person as well as the level of awareness of the masses govern the content of the media.
He welcomed the growing competition between different newspapers but cautioned that if the readers are not forthcoming in what they want from the media, then sheer economic interests and compulsions of ad revenue would continue to determine the content and style of the newspapers.
After the deliberations, Prof Afonso chairing the session opened it for questions. A spirited and intense discussion followed.
Earlier, Ishwar Singh introduced the theme of the symposium and its importance in today’s context.