As the telecom scam over the 2G spectrum reverberates, two magazines (Outlook and Open) have reproduced partial transcripts of certain telephone conversations between Ms. Niira Radia, a corporate lobbyist for the Tata and Mukesh Ambani groups, and several top journalists and politicians. These show journalists illegitimately acting as political lobbyists.
The conversations, wire-tapped officially by the Income Tax department, are part of the record in the 2G case before the Supreme Court. They appear prima facie authentic; and their genuineness isn't denied by most of those implicated.
They show that Ms. Radia tried to recruit Hindustan Times' Vir Sanghvi and NDTV's Barkha Dutt, among others, as mediators who would influence portfolio distribution during the mid-2009 formation of the second Manmohan Singh government. One objective was to give the now-disgraced telecommunications minister A Raja that portfolio.
Another issue was a High Court judgment on the Ambani brothers' dispute over the pricing of natural gas from the Krishna-Godavari Basin. Ms. Radia coaxed or subtly pressured journalists to support Mr. Mukesh Ambani's view. Sanghvi's column in The Hindustan Times relied heavily on her feed.
Both the 2G and the Radia tapes scandals show that India's precious public resources are being undersold or plundered by venal businessmen and corrupt politicians with journalists' help. The two scams haven't fused in public discourse.
But that's because most newspapers and TV channels have blacked out the story despite the media's claim that it's a watchdog of truth and democracy.
The underselling of 2G licences has caused the public exchequer a loss of between Rs.66,000 crores and Rs.1.77 lakh crores, according to the Comptroller and Auditor General.
The Rs.1.77-lakh-crore loss to the public exceeds four times the budget of the UPA's flagship National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. Mr. Raja used four devices or methods.
First, he priced the spectrum licences ridiculously low, less than a third of their reselling price. Second, the application deadlines were whimsically changed to favour certain business houses.
Third, some industrialists were allowed to conceal their holdings in different telecom companies, thus violating the maximu-10-percent-stake rule for two telecom service-providers in the same circle. Among the culprits was Mr. Anil Ambani's Reliance which held a big chunk in Swan Telecom.
Fourth, the licensees were to roll out 10 percent of their networks within a year and all of it within three years. This wasn't done. The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) should have levied weekly penalties of up to Rs.20 lakhs for long delays, or cancelled the licences. This wasn't done.
Finally, DoT gave away spectrum worth Rs.37,000 crores free to several companies.
The 2G scandal is rooted not just in corruption, procedural violations and regulatory failures, but in the deeply flawed 1999 Telecom Policy, since continued. This policy allowed blatantly partisan decisions, including, crucially, allotting spectrum on a first-come-first-served basis.
This makes no sense in a precious scarce resource like the electromagnetic spectrum. Its price was arbitrarily fixed in 2001, when mobile telephony was at a nascent stage. Auctioning spectrum would have been far better, if accompanied by conditions containing larger social objectives -- access for the underprivileged, affordability and prevention of cartels.
The Telecom Policy has encouraged cartelisation against the consumer interest and balanced telecom development.
This makes it imperative that the Parliamentary investigation of the 2G scam cover the Telecom Policy too. This is essential if past malpractices are to be probed, including permission to Reliance to migrate from a wireless-in-local-loop licence to mobile telephony, and the extension of CDMA licences for the Tatas and Reliance to GSM services.
However, what issues do the Radia tapes raise regarding the media's role in the 2G and gas allocation episodes?
Several, including the legitimate limits of the journalist's relationship with his/her source; industrial lobbyists' gatekeeping role and trading of access to magnates with favours; the integrity of anchors and print-journalists; and the state's violation of privacy without a proper legal rationale, which must be strongly resisted.
It's clear from the Radia tapes that Sanghvi and Dutt offered to lobby senior Congress leaders at Ms. Radia's behest so that DMK politicians hostile to Mr. Raja wouldn't influence the choice of portfolios.
They, and other journalists, also discussed DMK and Congress leaders' predilections, various individuals' moves, and key players' strengths and weaknesses. That's legitimate. Journalists often have to engage, pump and cajole their sources, including lobbyists, on issues beyond their primary interest. They also exchange and cross-check information, analysis and interpretation.
Sometimes, journalists use information from one source to extract more dope from, say, their competitors, or get help from other sources to analyse it. But there they must draw the line.
What is illegitimate and unethical is using access to and influence with powerful politicians to fix ministerial berths and key appointments in order to do favours for the lobbyist and his/her company. It's certainly illegitimate to agree to write articles on lobbyists' dictates and offer to get them vetted by them.
The self-justification offered by Sanghvi and Dutt is unconvincing. The claim that NDTV has carried some anti-Raja stories doesn't validate Dutt's offer to lobby Congress leaders on Ms. Radia's behalf. Nor will Sanghvi's excuse wash, that he was only "stringing" Ms. Radia along.
Nothing in either conversation suggests anything but a subordinate, if not supplicant, relationship in a context defined by stakes running into thousands, even lakhs, of crores.
The crossing of professional-ethical lines has dangerous implications for the media's credibility -- its greatest asset. Already, many Indian journalists have become advisers, strategists and publicists for corporations, and serve as "food consultants" to five-star hotels. Some enjoy free perks from airlines, hotels and spas.
That's bad enough. It would be even worse, and ethically more repugnant, if journalists become political fixers or take instructions from corporate lobbyists. The Radia tapes suggest that's precisely what happened. Journalism has reached a new moral-professional low in India. That's tragic for democracy.
Praful Bidwai is an eminent Indian Journalist
