The press has a duty and responsibility to discipline itself

When I heard over the radio the other day that the greatest need of our people was more protein in their diet, it set me thinking. With the present price of meat, fish, eggs and cereals, lower middle class and poor families, who form the majority of the population, do not get the proteins they need for a healthy life. But there is the Soya bean which contains as much protein as one gets in meat and which can be grown in most parts of the island. It is the main source of protein in countries like China and Japan. What prevents it being grown in Ceylon on a significant scale?

The speaker on the radio who knew what he was talking about aroused my interest and started a line of thought. He communicated successfully. Not only am I growing the Soya bean in a very small garden; I am also trying to add it to my diet. There are thousands, nay millions, who need this kind of communication.

This may seem to be a trivial example of the need for communication. There are doubtless more important functions to be performed by communication media, whether it is the press, advertising or the radio. In a developed country, where the traditions of democracy are understood and well established and patterns of government have taken shape over hundreds of years of trial and error, it is easy to build on foundations that are solid. In a developing country the nation has to be created first. The battle has to be fought on many fronts; the safeguarding of democratic institutions, the economic struggle, racial, religious and linguistic divisions and class consciousness.

I spent 30 years of my life helping to produce newspapers. That was more than 25 years ago and anything I say about their role may be old-fashioned. I shall however try as far as possible to avoid invidious comparisons and criticism, and deal with their functions in transforming values in a general way.

The advantage a free press enjoys over the legislature and executive and other limbs of the modern state, nowadays, is that it can reach and communicate with millions of people every morning and afternoon, feeding them with news and views, garnishing the dishes skilfully to stimulate and tempt the appetite of readers.

This places a tremendous responsibility on a free press, for in general most people take their opinions as well as facts from their newspapers. These facts and views can be affected not only by selection, omission and change of emphasis - for newspaper space is limited - but also by carelessness and failure to verify and check up. On rare occasions the fallibility of the press is shown up, as when someone's death is announced before it takes place. When Mark Twain read about his own death, he said that the news was exaggerated.

Walter Lippmann, one of the most respected American journalists of our time has said: 'As the free press develops, as the great society evolves, the paramount point is whether, like a scientist or a scholar, the journalist puts truth in the first place or in the second. If he puts it in the second place, he is the worshipper of the bitch goddess success. Or he is a conceited man trying to win an argument. In so far as he puts the truth in the first place, he rises towards - I will not say 'into' but 'towards' - the company of those who taste and enjoy the best things of life.'

'Without criticism and reliable and intelligent reporting,' adds Lippmann, 'the government cannot govern. For there is no adequate way in which it can keep itself informed about what the people of the country are thinking and doing and wanting. The most elaborate government intelligence service is an insufficient provider of the knowledge which the government must have to legislate well and to administer public affairs.

'Where there is a turbulent, pluralistic electorate, the rulers, the official bureaucracy, and the legislature will be in the dark, they will not know where they are going if they are deprived of the competitive reporting and the competing editorial commentaries, and also the forum in which the spokesmen of the various shades of opinion can have their say. That is what a free press is supposed to provide.'

All this may seem a counsel of perfection, especially at a time of transition fraught with many uncertainties. But the basic principles enunciated by Lippmann hold good. The history of the press in Ceylon demonstrates how freedom of opinion was reached as a deliberate policy of the government. The first Ceylon newspaper was a government organ, namely the Government Gazette. It published in addition to public announcements, local and foreign news and contributions in prose and verse. Independent newspapers took over from the Ceylon Government Gazette, and the Ceylon Observer - the oldest of them - was started in 1834, less than 50 years after the birth of the London Times.

In Ceylon there are eight or more daily newspapers in the three languages, with an estimated circulation of 300,000 and five weekend newspapers which sell about 400,000 copies. Only the radio is more pervasive as a means of mass communication than the press. A free press can, however, be more influential in a democratic country than the radio since the radio does not involve itself in controversial matters and is expected to be impartial. In the present situation in Ceylon doubts have been raised on the question of whether the climate is congenial to a wholehearted service of the community by the press. Nothing is said here - in defence of a venal press, which is a danger to democracy. But a press in the end lives by the confidence it inspires in its readership and newspapers which publish lies are soon found out.

If there is insufficient variety in newspaper ownership and too much concentration in Colombo, the reason is the enormous cost of production, with typesetting machines and rotary presses large enough to attract advertisers, and in recent times the enormous increase in price of the paper on which newspapers are printed.What then is the role of newspapers in a developing country like Ceylon which is anxious to preserve democratic forms of government? Here are some of the things which should be the concern of a responsible press.

As I have said earlier, the fundamental problem of a developing country is that of creating a nation from the different ethnic and religious groups which form its population. This is something which the newspapers should never allow themselves to forget.

It is the duty of the newspapers to clarify and highlight issues which matter and to insist there should be an order of priorities. Otherwise a great deal of time and energy will be wasted on window-dressing and deception. One of the most important issues before the country is that of unemployment. Even at the risk of slowing down economic development efforts must be made to find employment for those who have little or none. This involves a change of attitudes. Everyone must recognise the fact that our salvation lies in increasing and improving our agriculture by using all that experience and science has taught us for getting the best that the land can yield.

The press as I said, is Colombo-centred. It must learn to see the problems from the other end of the telescope as well.

In developing countries, people are too preoccupied with politics at the expense of other useful activity. This is more so when kissing goes by favour. We all like political gossip, and most political gossip is based on rumour and half-truths. It is usually malicious and often damaging.

The press must take its share of responsibility. We can do with more well-informed and purposeful discussion of the real problems confronting the country and less with trivia about individual politicians. The press has a duty to discipline itself. A press is free because the public as a whole wanted it to be free. This inevitably means that the public is concerned in the way in which the freedom is exercised.

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