On October 24, 2020 a webinar on Media, Ethics and Professionalism organised by the Media Studies Association for the final year Journalism Honors students, was facilitated by Mr.Jayanth Kodkani, a former Associate Resident Editor of Times of India, Bangalore, in an insightful “Academia-Industry Interface” session highlighted the role and significance of several laws and acts concerning the Media Industry in contemporary times.
Mr. Kodkani spoke extensively about the emergence of a Post-truth world; conditions in which objective evidence are less powerful than appeals to sentiment and personal belief in shaping public opinion; further throwing light on the relevance of pursuing ethical journalistic practices and upholding the media laws and acts laid down to facilitate credible and reliable journalism in the society today, while sharing personal narratives from his career as a journalist.
In a country like ours, knowing the true role and nature of journalism is important as the media is known as the fourth pillar of democracy. Maintaining a degree of neutrality and not being biased when they affect the masses highly is a must. However, the media organisations have not achieved this goal in recent times. The profession of journalism is in danger in the world’s largest democracy owing to several social and political factors. It is therefore important to analyse the functionality and relevance of several media laws and acts and act upon them to uphold the same, as this is the only viable way for the media to move forward and help rebuild an informed and responsible society.
The guest speaker spoke about how the media that propagated democracy once is now undoing it through its actions. Mr. Kodkani provided some enriching learning takeaways from the session. The discussions focussed on the mainstream media, it’s superficiality and it’s inefficiency. He further explained the misinformation is a product of the society’s prejudice than our ignorance.
The session facilitated the understanding of critical thinking and it’s importance when consuming information in both online and offline spheres, at the hands of an expert, Mr. Kodkani, who has adequate knowledge and experience in the field. The session largely revolved amplifying voices by understanding media makers and democracy. He provided some enriching learning takeaways from the session. The discussions focused on the mainstream media, it’s superficiality and it’s inefficiency to provide adequate representations to different sections of the society that we live in.
A question-answer session was held after an informative and insightful power-point presentation presented by the speaker about the nature and essence of media laws in the country. Students asked questions about the role of credibility and honesty and the role of mainstream media in influencing the mindsets of people. The speaker further discussed the gap between reality and representation and challenged the same. The discussions and deliberations about the importance of narrating stories and media representations of news stories was quite insightful. This webinar opened an avenue for students to consider the right choice for them when it comes to media laws and its significance.