People's Democracy

Karat Appeals To PM To Stall UNI Sell-Off

The following is the text of the letter written by Prakash Karat, general secretary of CPI(M), to the prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh on September 21, 2006. 

I HAVE been given to understand that the UNI Board of Directors is moving towards selling a major stake of the news agency to a single media group, Zee Telefilms. The employees of the UNI have started an agitation in defence of the founding principles of the organisation – press freedom, free flow of impartial news coverage and competition -- set out by prime minister Nehru in 1961.

It is also disturbing to hear that there is no transparency on the specific nature and implications of the transfer not to speak of issues regarding retrenchment and VRS of the employees. It is worthwhile to mention that UNI made a modest beginning in 1961. The development of the agency was shaped by committee reports chaired by Dr B C Roy, the then chief minister of West Bengal on the model of Associated Press in United States as a second news agency other than PTI. The agency was incorporated under Section 25 of the Companies Act which enabled it to get tax concessions and allotment of prime land at concessional rates at Rafi Marg.

The UNI has grown into an agency employing 1100 people including 350 journalists posted across the country and the world. Even in 1998, the UNI’s financial performance showed a good performance with surplus touching rupees 30 crores. But unfortunately, due to the subsequent mismanagement, the financial performance of the agency is in a mess.

Therefore, without examining the factors leading to the present financial condition of the agency, handing it over to a private media group is in a way a complete contravention of the spirit and objective with which the agency was founded in 1961. Since information is a sensitive subject and has far reaching implications for upsetting the present balance due to competition between the PTI and UNI, the present move should be stalled. Since there is no independent regulatory agency for overseeing this area, the government itself should assume this power and intervene and come out with an acceptable solution.

I urge you to intervene in this important matter. (INN)