Role Of Media And Democracy Essay

821 Words2 Pages

Media and Democracy

Democracy is commonly defined as a government of the people, by the people and for the people. Freedom and democracy walk hand in hand. Democracy is only compatible with a free economy. It is completely incompatible with a system that provides for a governing authority with coercive power. We live in a society today where the media plays a pivotal role in how we see the world, and how our opinions are formed, whether it is from what we watch on television or what we gather from newspapers or internet. Media acts as an interface between the common man and the Government. It is a very powerful tool with the ability to make and break the opinion of people. If media tells the public that this picture is being demanded as one …show more content…

India has the largest democracy in the world and media has a powerful presence in the country. In recent times, Indian media has been subject to a lot of criticism for the manner in which they have disregarded their social responsibility. Dangerous business practices in the field of media have affected the fabric of Indian democracy. Big industrial conglomerates in the business of media have threatened the existence of pluralistic viewpoints. Post liberalisation, transnational media organisations have spread their wings in the Indian market with their own global interests. This has happened at the cost of an Indian media which was initially thought to be an agent of ushering in social change through developmental programs directed at the non-privileged and marginalised sections of the society. Though media has at times successfully played the role of a watchdog of the government functionaries and has also aided in participatory …show more content…

There are numbered of news channels that have maximum coverage throughout the country. Media contribute a lot to develop public knowledge but even after years of success, media could not alter public’s attitude towards issues. Media should discourage smoothly such attitude of public. Demonstrations and protests are good to increase pressure towards the solution of any problem, but there should be a proper way to express which should result oriented.
The society in Bangladesh is highly polarized along political lines of two major political parties the Awami League (AL) and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). Newspapers could remain outside and allegedly are toeing the party lines. As a result, people do not always get a total picture of particular issue or event and get influenced by biased opinion/analysis. This also acts as some sort of censorship by the journalists or newspaper owners. Similarly, the journalists unions are divided on political lines, which is a barrier on the development of

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