I&B representative on Prasar Bharati board complains against chairman

I&B representative on Prasar Bharati board complains against chairman

The spat between the I&B ministry and Prasar Bharati, which erupted last week, has turned serious with I&B additional secretary Ali Rizvi complaining to the ministry that he was “unfairly shouted down” by chairman A Surya Prakash in the board meeting on February 15.

At the gathering, some senior PB officials had taken “strong exception” to the ministry’s alleged interference with the organisation’s autonomy.Rizvi, an I&B representative on the PB board since October last year, was present in the meeting where PB officials, including Prakash, reportedly objected to the ministry seeking to terminate the services of all contractual employees of the autonomous body that functions under the ministry. Senior I&B officials said Rizvi’s written complaint is serious and is being looked into.

According to senior ministry officials, the disagreement with Prakash started a few days back when the ministry refused to extend the services of two professionals — Kishor Malviya, a former TV journalist hired as a consultant to head content in DD Kisan in 2015, and Sai Srinivas, currently an adviser to PB chairman. The ministry has sent a dissent note on the extension request of Srinivas and has verbally turned down the request for Malviya.

Prakash said the allegations by the ministry officials were baseless. He also denied having shouted at Rizvi, adding it was the ministry representative who “made several attempts to obstruct his speech and was not letting him listen to others”. “The allegations will fall flat if the proceedings of the meeting are made public,” he said. Prakash said he has already complained to top officials in the government about the ministry’s intervention.

The “trimming” of “expensive staff ”, said ministry officials, was part of the Centre’s attempt to bring down the PB’s operating cost by half. The Sam Pitroda Committee, formed to revive the public broadcaster, had suggested in 2014 manpower audit and reduction in staff strength of the body. Last year, a parliamentary standing committee had also questioned the delay in conducting the manpower audit and had asked the ministry to prepare an action plan on the committee’s suggestions. “Accountability and fiscal prudence are our topmost priorities,” a ministry official said.

“We have noticed that consultant and advisers are imposing their decisions on the gazetted officers of the government. All contractual employees will have to go, without exceptions,” an official said, adding when the job of PB chairman itself was part-time, why he needed a full-time adviser “was not clear”. Prakash had, in the board meeting, opposed the directive of the ministry to cut out contractual employees, calling the move a contempt of the Prasar Bharati Act.

Last week, it was reported that the Prasar Bharati board had a problem with the ministry’s proposal to hire two senior journalists, Siddharth Zarabi and Abhijit Majumdar, as it “was not in favour of hiring media persons on exorbitant compensation packages”.

While media reports said it was ministry’s proposal to hire the two journalists, details of a meeting of a search and selection committee — comprising PB CEO Shashi Shekar, chairman Prakash and PB member (finance) Rajeev Singh — showed it was the committee that had approved the hiring.

ET has reviewed the minutes of the meeting that was held at 6 pm on January 15, 2018, which had approved Zarabi’s name as head for TV news. It had recommended Majumdar as chief editor (Prasar Bharati news service). The committee had also suggested that a sub-committee of the board be consulted “to advise on the kind of remuneration to be paid to the new inductees”.

It had also cited measurable targets for the professionals — channel viewership and monetisation for Zarabi; news service operations, digital traffic goals, volume and quality of reporting for Majumdar.The minutes of the meeting were signed by Vempati, Prakash and Singh. It also said the committee had identified the professionals (Zarabi and Majumdar) for hire and was of the view that for “overhauling DD, more such news professionals would be required”.

The Economic Times, New Delhi, 21th February 2018