Pakistan

PEMRA issues notice to TV channel for violating ethics during Ayesha Gulalai’s presser

Three journalists had accused the channel of trying to portray that they were behind Gulalai's harassment allegations

News Desk August 08, 2017

MNA Ayesha Gulalai. PHOTO: File

The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (Pemra) has issued a show-cause notice to private news channel ARY News for violating journalistic ethics on the complaint of three senior journalists who belong to the Jang Media Group.

A statement issued by Pemra on Tuesday read that journalists Abdul Qayyum Saddiqi, Azaz Syed and Ayaz Akbar complained to the authority that while airing MNA Ayesha Gulalai’s press conference on August 1 wherein she accused Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief Imran Khan of sending lewd text messages to the party’s women, ARY News portrayed them as “architects of Ayesha Gulalai’s press conference and her PTI-bashing”.

PTI female members face constant harassment within party: Ayesha Gulalai

Saddiqi further complained that while covering the issue, the rival channel ridiculed and insulted him, and also showed his and the other complainants’ pictures with misleading captions, insinuating that they had a hand in Gulalai’s allegations.

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This act of ARY is equivalent to demeaning senior journalists, Saddiqui said to Pemra.

In response, the regularity body has issued a show-cause notice to the channel seeking its reply by August 15 and also summoned its chief executive officer on the same day for a personal hearing.

PEMRA warns TV news channel for its official's 'threatening, inappropriate language'

“Airing such content is against journalistic ethics and deemed an attempt to lead viewers astray,” Pemra stated, adding that ARY News had also violated various clauses of the Electronic Media Code of Conduct.

Pemra will initiate ex-parte proceedings if it does not receive a response from ARY by the set date and its chief officer fails to show up for the hearing.

COMMENTS (8)

Zubair | 7 years ago | Reply PEMRA instead of questioning Mr Qayum Siddiqui as to why and what he was feeding at press conference, is seeking explanation from ARY. What an Irony!

Dr. Abdul Raoof | 7 years ago | Reply Media and religion remain the privileged carriers of unidirectional messages in forging the hearts and minds of masses according to material strife for easy, excessive, exclusive, and illicit sex, wealth, power, and honors. When hearts and minds of human species can be trained according to preprogrammed dispositions and responses, producing mere wealth and power worship insects certainly carrying solutions, sense, skills, sanity, serenity, strategies, and systems void societies and States remain the lasting foundations of backwardness, bloodshed, brutalities, bigotries, and barrenness. Media is rarely a mass savior. Though it airs features and discussions among selected few for helping weak and deprived oppressed and suffering men, women, minors, and minorities and providing cooking, health and good living tips, it remains mainly the vehicle of commercial, political and power gains, games, gratification, and glorification. Media has little scope in transforming societies and States in the direction of larger goodness salvation from suppression, slaughters, evil, emptiness, poverty, plunder, dread, dearth, destruction, dullness, delusion, disorders, degeneration, death, dirt, and darkness. Media has no control over the rigid and repressive social, economic, political, and governance structure supportive police and local administration. Mass awareness alone cam never change the dysfunctional, disordered and dreadful dimensions and drives in dark societies and States. Even major political uprising without higher and holier agendas of collective healing, harmony, hopes, happiness, and heights across wider spectrum of men, women and minorities remain derailing and depressing activity. Larger than life leaders were born using divinity connections and discoveries of higher living, livelihood and largeness in the ages lacking mass scale print and electronic media. Leaders in the age of instant mass scale information processing and dissemination are created through images and crafted messages. Media facilitates material strife of organized factions and families through directing mass like the herds of sheep according to pre-determined path of social, psychological and political environment. It became easy task for Supreme Court and other national institutions to steer lion out of the office of Prime Minister into wildness with a nominal “Aqama” job stick owing to the lack of comprehensive and coordinated institutional and individual media support for Nawaz Sharif. With the exception of State run TV Channel, all other media acted as monopoly over particular point of view forcibly excluding all diverse, pertinent and elaborating thoughts and presentations. The initial rise of PTI as the significant political capital party is fully attributed to the continuous thrusts of strong exclusion messages through media and public processions. The leaders of PTI never spare a chance to exploit media space especially on prime times for targeting the masses actively and effectively. Religion even beyond the scope of media enjoys privileged position of disseminating uninterrupted and unchallenged messages for masses. When media has to carry practical attractions also in the forms of mass participations for efficacy of its messages, religion easily shuts downs hearts and minds against all the streams of rights, reasons, rejuvenation, and reconciliation in the names of commands of divinity and deities. Religious sermons remain unable to connect to the real life miseries, muggings, mercilessness, and meaninglessness and present solutions for salvation and surge in fast civilization and forward evolution, beyond primitive clan and congregation survival messages and meaninglessness. Religion particularly in Pakistan has very badly failed in forging a unified nation providing the rights of existence and advancement to all men, women and minorities through the inculcations of universal principles of existence and co-existence translating as equality, justice, rule of law, equal opportunity, least costly and timely justice, and inevitable sanctity of life, property, free choices, personal spaces, conscious expressions, and mutually beneficial exchanges. Whereas media practically acts as the vehicle of localized changes pertaining to the material interests of contesting parties and enterprises, religion remains eternal weapon for resisting mass scale changes in the direction of advancing civilization and forward evolution through filling in hearts and minds with never leaving blanket of hatred, halts, hallucination, and hysteria. When songs and slogans of independence fill in the air and ears for the amusement of broken wings insects and salvation sermons shut down hearts and heads against productive efforts and excellence in good things, the freedom from backwardness, bloodshed, brutalities, bullies, bigotries, and barrenness shall never be realized without major transformations in the roles and deeds of media and religion. Pakistan and many other rigid, rotten, repressive, and regressive societies and States remain buried in mud and meaninglessness of primitive clans, class, creed, cult, clout, and crimes despite the songs and slogans of democracy, independence and national constitution on media and religious sermons of salvation through rituals and reckoning free deeds. CPEC and new Prime Minister, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi can never liberate the masses from the deep drenches of miseries, massacres, mercilessness, and meaninglessness without carrying major transformation in the social, economic, political, and governance structures away from pain and plunder and towards mutually beneficial exchanges, benevolence for weak and deprived and balanced interactions. Living, business and governance based on rights, reasons, rejuvenation, and reconciliation away from the perks, pride, pleasures, profits, plunders, and privileges of class, clan, creed, cult, clout, crown, and crimes can only rescue the society and State of Pakistan from inevitable failure and fall. Independence as State necessarily requires strong provisions for the rights of existence and advancement to all men, women and minorities without references to race, religion, wealth, and power. Media and religion must dedicate their hearts and heads for the inculcation of thoughts, beliefs and actions in living, business and governance aiming at the rule of law, least costly and timely justice, sanctity of life, property, free choices, personal spaces, and mutually beneficial exchanges for all citizens of Pakistan whether or not organized in the form of religion, political party and rival power contenders. Media, religion, society, and State without producing major feeds of collective healing, harmony, hopes, happiness, and heights for all remain agents of dearth, disorders, degeneration, deficits, derailments, delusion, dullness, destruction, dirt, and darkness on earth. Targeted messages and tortured masses without practically sanctifying the rights of existence and advancement for all men, women and minorities practically have little value in liberating mankind and other creatures from the cages of hatred, halts, hazards, hopelessness, and helplessness against all the ill and injuries in wilderness and man-made world. It is never too late to mend the ill ways of living, business and governance. The realization and calls of ousted Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif for New Social Contract beyond media, religion, society, and State worshipped Might is Right and clan cunning, crudeness and callousness wandering, wars and wounds actually are the emergency sirens of producing major transformations in beliefs and living, business and governance in the directions of pain and plunder free realm and peace, production and progress regimes. Dr. Abdul Raoof H. 18, St. 11, near Jamia Naeemia Lahore-5

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Abid | 7 years ago | Reply So obvious now that PEMRA and GEO news, which i dont watch, have colluded in this dirty game

Parvez | 7 years ago | Reply PEMRA needs a lesson in ethics ...... its open favoritism is both transparent and a little boorish.

Faheem Akhtar | 7 years ago | Reply Let it be known that three persons have spoken and have been heard by PEMRA. How speedy is justice if it hurts Nawaz party & Geo/Jang group? Let us see how they cover Nehal Hashmi threat case. Geo/Jang has given no coverage to filing of corruption charges against the renegade MNA by her personal secretary at all. No video of so-called hospital that she has built on occupied land.

asif | 7 years ago | Reply Mir Shakilur Rahman is against Pakistan and behind corrupt dynasties.

Parvez | 7 years ago | Reply Exposing the truth is actually what good journalism is all about....

Sean | 7 years ago | Reply Yes Jhang News Group is behind all this, because we never saw so many reporters from one group on any news conference and this was actually planned by Geo with collaboration of N league and Ameer Muqqam.

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