By Dr. Ashoke K Maitra, HRD Adviser.

A functional Legislature, Judiciary, Police and the Media are the four organs of the State to ensure stability of a civilized democracy.

The Media reports on the ongoing  good and wrong doings in society, provides entertainment through reporting on Sports, Arts , Lifestyle , business, international news, politics and many other areas of human civilization.

Media acts as the conscience keeper of the world and the watchdog of society. It tries its best to mirror the reality of the society to the citizens of the world. Citizens are kept informed of the reality by the media. The Media perhaps is the most important conscience and awareness creator in the modern day civilization.

The journalists are as important as Policemen, Judges, Lawyers, Doctors, Politicians, Administrative Bureaucracy etc. .

In all fairness therefore, the Journalists should be accorded the same protection as is done to the other three organs of the state vis-a vis , Police, Administrative Bureaucracy, Judges and Politicians.

I am surprised the Journalists are not given the same protection, anywhere in the world.

The entire world is going through a worst Pandemic with the Novel Carona Virus. In many countries like Denmark, The Government has come forward and told the industries, not to terminate anyone’s employment and the Government will pay 80% of the wages.

Similarly, the Indian Government too had given advisories to the private sector industries not to terminate workman and executives during this pandemic and give them full wages.  

However, it is coming to our notice that many industries, including the media are using this pandemic to reduce salaries of the employees, sometimes upto fifty percent , some have not paid salary for the last three months and many of them are resorting to force employees to put in their resignation. Some have even terminated employees for no fault of theirs.

This is indeed immoral, against Governments advisories and inhuman to say the least. People work in a large industry to feel protected and believe that the industry will stand by them during the time of difficulty.

However, quite unfortunately, some industries are acting extremely petty, mean minded and anti-human in this very bad time of crisis , where people are economically hit,  are unable to move, are locked in their house have very little source of entertainment and are suffering from Stress and Anxiety.

We expect the companies where people are working should be extremely compassionate, fair and supportive.

On the other hand companies like Asian Paints, ICICI Bank have increased salary as they people are inconvenienced working from home. Most Multinationals have not reduced salaries or terminated people.

However, what is most tragic to note that, in the Media Sector where the journalists are battling the COVID19 like Doctors and essential service staff, are on the streets and reporting without even PPE,  they are being terminated or forced to resign by the very employers they are risking their life for.

This is indeed unfortunate and a total breakdown of Human Resource Management in the media companies.

What is also important to note is that wage cost normally constitute only 7% of the turnover.

For example normally in a newspaper company, if you review the total expenditure , you will find newsprint constitutes 78%, Power about 10%, Wage cost around 7% and the rest is administrative cost.

With the Lockdown for three months and most people still working from home, media and other companies have already saved about 3% in Power and about 1% in administrative cost like Canteen , Computers, Stationery, Housekeeping etc. companies have saved 4 - 5%  of the total expenditure because of people working from home. The cost has gone down and not up .

It is also true income has also gone down because of lack of sales of the products. However, that is a temporary business reality, like international newsprint price going up.

Why is then most companies including Media  resorting to reduce people. The  answer is there is no real reason,  it is just to further reduce costs using the pandemic as an excuse. This is a gross violation of humanity and human rights.

I believe, as far as Media is concerned, The Government must give it the same status as Judiciary, Police and Bureaucracy and give protection to all the journalists and associated staff.

No journalist should be allowed to be terminated at the whims and fancies of the employer.

If this is not done democracy will be severely dented. Let us face the reality, as it is, most Media companies chase advertising revenues and  they put abnormal pressure on journalists,  not to write on erring industrialists and political parties from whom they get advertising revenue.

If the Media companies are allowed to terminate people without any justifiable cause, the Media will be left with very compliant journalists who will do whatever the media owners want and not be able to be fair and neutral. This will be the death of media.

In the long run this will do great damage to the very owners of the media, because the readers will not like to read a newspaper which is more or less an advertisement of the companies. In such a case, newspapers will be 100% Advertisement. The newspaper will be fifty percent as paid Advertisements and fifty percent written by compliant journalists in favor of the Advertiser.

I believe as per present laws of the land, more than 50% of the newspaper cannot be used for Advertisement.

The Journalist Association must take up this matter with the Government to give Journalists protection in the same manner as Police, Judges, Politicians and Bureaucracy.

In another dimension, every employee be it an Executive, Journalist or Workman should know that resignation is an act of will. No employer can force any employee to resign by force. Even if adverse conditions are created by the employer for an employee and the employee panics and gives a resignation,  he /she is well within his /her rights to withdraw the resignation before the relieving letter is given and full and final settlement is done.

Even if the settlement is done , the Journalist can send a letter by Speed Post and Courier , clearly mentioning that the letter of resignation was taken under coercion and duress and  it was taken against his/ her will and therefore, the person has decided to withdraw the resignation.

If an employer issues a Termination Letter, the Journalist who as per law is a workman , as he/she has no supervisory rights, can very well go to the Labour Court and get an interim stay order on the termination. The chances are the employee will win. Even, if he /she loses , you can still go to High Court and challenge the termination and get a stay order.

There is no need to fear. An employee should know his /her civil rights and learn to protect oneself. It is important for all journalists to form a strong Trade Union or join an existing Trade Union and resort to collective bargaining.

At times like this, when some people take to exploitation, normal citizens have to unite without looking at their narrow gains. Right from the junior most journalists to the Editor must unite to fight this menace of termination during COVID 19 times.

Writers should not be weak. They should stand united and fight for justice. If one journalist is terminated, every journalist should refuse to go and work. Then the erring HRD Department of the company will be taken to task.

In my opinion, the owners are not always bad. They need a wise and good Advisers.  If they are influenced rightly, in their own business interest, they always listen.

Unfortunately, it appears,  are witnessing some weak and unwise HRD persons who are resorting to exploitation of innocent journalists to score a brownie point and  carry some favor with the owners.

If they create so much insecurity, the best journalists will leave and they will be left with the sediment. Then sales will fall and along with it , Advertising revenue will fall leading to the death of the newspaper or TV. It is not in the business owners interest to have such a scenario.