IPR minister assures digital media policy
Source: Chronicle News Service
Imphal, July 28 2022:
There is no digital media policy for the state but the government will soon frame a policy after studying policies of other states and making necessary modifi cation to suit the condition and needs of the state, said IPR minister Dr Sapam Ranjan.
He made the statement in response to a policy cut motion moved by Congress MLA Surjakumar Okram during the discussion of the demand for grants for Information and Publicity in the ongoing session of the 12th Manipur Legislative Assembly on Thursday.
The minister said that it would not be wrong to say that media, which is considered the fourth pillar of democracy, works 24x7 and it is a must to take up development policies and programme for media.
The department has started payment of pending advertisement bills for media houses, he said, while urging other departments to clear their advertisement bill dues in time.
He also said that there was some delay in issuing D1PR card to media persons of the state due to some issues but most of them have been provided so far.
The government has also started a policy to enforce mandatory card display for media persons in government programmes in order to prevent unauthorised people from entering impersonating as media persons.
He also informed that recruitment process had been initiated to fill up vacant posts in the department and results will be declared soon after dis cussing with the CM.
As for the proposed press park at Langjing Achouba, the minister said, local residents are raising objection to the proposal.
The department is also planning to resume audio-visual programmes to create awareness on flagship programmes of the government, which went into hiatus for a couple of years due to Covid-19 pandemic.
Moreover, processes are on to make district information offices fully functional, and to strengthen Manipur Information Commission, he said.
While moving the policy cut motion, MLA Surjakumar expressed concern over the unregulated media channels, which have been mushrooming on social media, and said that these unregulated media outlets are now creating unwanted disturbances to the real media fraternity, who are governed by a code of ethics.
He stressed the need for a mechanism to differentiate between these two types of media.
He also brought up issues related with staff shortage, pending advertisement bill, proposal for transport subsidy for news print materials, assistance to media persons, functioning of DIOs and MIC New Delhi, among others.