Journalism Doesn’t Depend on Media Platforms : Anjan Bandyopadhyay
Rijit Banerjee Kolkata: Anjan Bandyopadhyay, the Editor of ABP Digital, attended the MediaNext 2020 conclave and was the first speaker on the first day of the online webinar that focused on Digital Journalism. He talked about the importance of digital media in this age of pandemic and he went on to talk about the convergence
Rijit Banerjee
Kolkata: Anjan Bandyopadhyay, the Editor of ABP Digital, attended the MediaNext 2020 conclave and was the first speaker on the first day of the online webinar that focused on Digital Journalism. He talked about the importance of digital media in this age of pandemic and he went on to talk about the convergence of technology in media as he went from print, television to digital media as of now.
#MediaNext 2020 is being organized by the Kolkata-based Adamas University in association with Sharda University, Birla Global University, DME, AIMEC, Lok Samvad Sansthan, exchange4media, ABP Education and IndiaReal. The mega conclave is being organized over a period of 10 days from June 1, 2020 to June 10, 2020. Each day of the conclave focuses on one specialized domain of the Media and Entertainment (M&E) industry and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on that specific domain.
Bandyopadhyay is one of the leading names in Bengal journalism today. He joined this profession some 32 years back. He traveled print, television and digital – all the three paths during this long span. A familiar face as a TV presenter, he steered the journey of zee 24 Ghanta as the Editor (Input) for many years from its inception. In 2015, Anjan joined back ABP house, from where he started his journey and his home for the entire print career. Anandabazar Digital receives 90 lakh unique visitors per day and is one of the largest news portals in the Bengali language. He writes on various current affairs subjects and analyses issues on camera as well. Recipient of various awards for journalism, Anjan thinks the best of the awards is the love and affection he has received from common people.
He emphasized on the word ‘journalism’ and quoted, “Journalism does not depend on any of the media platforms. Finally, content reigns supreme in every case and there is no substitute for it”. He also added, “According to the needs of the people and the news, the medium of delivery shifts as well”.
He further went on to explain the past times when no other medium of delivering credible news was present. Therefore, print media has a major stake in the news market. In those days, as there was only one medium, people believed whatever was written in the newspapers. He also stressed on the non-existing feedback feature of the print media and how it made communication one-way from the editors to the common people.
After that, there was the introduction of the television era and government-sponsored news channels like the Doordarshan appeared on the mainstream media. Here, people started interacting with each other and on-field reporting came into the place. For example – if a calamity strikes an area, reporters can go in and cover the incident thus creating a humane interest in the story.
He went to explain how digital media bought a great revolution in the field of journalism. Previously, people read and got to know about news from only one medium and they relied on it heavily to serve their need for news in their day-to-day lives.
However, now the circumstances have drastically changed. He explained this fact by a very simple example. He reminded us of the famous aircraft crash into the river of Hudson. Although nobody got hurt but that incident got onto the mainstream media and was telecast worldwide between minutes. There was no journalist on spot but a common person who witnessed the incident took a picture of it and posted it online. Therefore, the buffer time between news being transferred from local areas to media houses decreased significantly due to the use of the Internet and Digital Media.
He also suggested the work on print houses as well. He said that television usually showcases what is going on currently on a particular news update. However, it is the responsibility of the print houses to use their strengths and gather as much analytics as possible and highlight the key reasons on why a piece of news becomes news, what are the factors behind it and more.
However, he also mentioned the emergence of fake news in the country and it is one of the disadvantages of this digital medium. Unethical people and news organizations always try to morph and manufacture news that is untrue and it takes a while to recognize the fake news and the truth.
That’s where the responsibility of credible news agencies comes in. They need to keep their audience aware all the time about the current hoax and the actual truth.
Upon being asked about the success formula of Anandabazar Digital, he replied, “There is no tactics or strategy (of making a news agency more credible). Readers understand everything and they are well-informed amidst living in a digital age. Therefore, our duty as a journalist is to serve people by giving them the truth and unbiased opinion. But I do realize that many journalists these days are highly unethical. Therefore, we should consider our readers as our God and serve them the right information always.”
He added, “News should be presented in a balanced way and the truth should be presented to the reader.”
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