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The Union Minister for Information & Broadcasting and Culture, Sh. S. Jaipal Reddy said today that the media representatives of SAARC countries should work towards creating an atmosphere of goodwill in the region. Inaugurating the Second Conference of Editors & Working Journalists of SAARC Countries here today, he said the region needs to work towards a common economic zone for which the regional media will have to play role of “Ambassador of Goodwill”.
Shri Reddy said despite prolonged prevalence of poverty, countries in the region continue to be dominated by the historical baggage of wrong priorities and mindset. The ongoing information revolution has opened immense opportunities, which need to be collectively tapped to aggressively work towards routing out poverty from the region. He said the media should rise above narrow national identities and play the role of trendsetter.
Shri Reddy said as a first step in this direction SAARC should work towards facilitating free movement of journalists in the region which can work as a catalyst towards changing the political mindset and drive the region towards a collective effort in that eradicating poverty and creating atmosphere for common economic zone.
Secretary, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Shri Navin B. Chawla said in the era of breath taking technological advances in the media scene, the conference would help further strengthen the process of mutual dependence and cooperation. It can work towards evolving a common strategy to draw attention towards the common problems of the region.
The SAARC secretariat representative Shri Pradhumna Shah drew the attention towards the recommendations of the SAARC Information Ministers Conference. He said the SAARC Information Centre is being set up in Nepal which would facilitate exchange of information among the member countries. Outgoing Chairman of the conference Mr. Enayetullah Khan of Bangladesh talked about the communication gap and said media interaction within the member countries has to improve and SAARC can play an important role in this direction because of being an autonomous body.
The new chairperson of the conference, Smt. Shakuntala Mahawal, Principal Information Officer, said the forum would help in expanding the horizons of understanding and issues pertaining to media of the south asian region.
Agenda for the two-day conference includes country presentations on current situation of print and electronic media in member countries, consideration of directives from the 3rd meeting of SAARC including proposal to set up SAARC recognized regional media forum and discussion paper by Bangladesh for setting up of a SAARC Media Development Fund. The conference will also work towards identifying points relating to print media for evolving a SAARC Common position for presentation at the World Summit on the Information Society scheduled in Tunis in December next year.
The conference will also provide inputs for the revised plan of action on information and media as it is being felt that many items of the action plan of 1998 have become outdated due to innovative developments in the field of information technology. The Heads of TV and Radio organizations at their Third Meeting held in Thimpu in April 2004 has identified some areas for inclusion in the revised plan. These include development of SAARC media training academy to carry out training programmes/courses for human resource development in ICT sector, encourage member countries for e-government and e-strategies and also work towards establishment of gradual digitized technology for TV and Radio. A similar action programme for print media is also to be worked out by the conference.
Delegations from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka are attending the two-day conference. Indian delegation is led by Smt. Shakuntala Mahawal, Principal Information Officer, Government of India who took over as the chairperson of the SAARC Editors and Working Journalists Conference today.
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