Venkaiah Naidu pushes for effective communication outreach

New Delhi: Union minister for information and broadcasting M. Venkaiah Naidu on Thursday asked for an effective communication outreach for seamlessly reaching out to the common man about the benefits of flagship initiatives of the Narendra Modi government. 

He said the news framework should focus on local content, development and bottoms up approach. The emerging information flow should aim at transformative and emerging new India with effective communication outreach. “The GST and Swachchh Bharat campaign were classic examples of communicating reforms and seamlessly reaching out to the common man about the benefits of such flagship initiatives of the Government,” Mr Naidu said this while inaugurating the Doordarshan Regional News Unit workshop on Thursday.

He also highlighted the important role of Doordarshan in the communication landscape.

Objectivity in news and information dissemination was critical for people to understand and pursue issues. “The regional news units played a critical role to play in a linguistic and culturally diverse country like India and catered to local aspirations and addressing communication needs thereby bringing out a synergy in government communication,” the Union minister said.

The I&B minister further emphasised on the critical role of RNUs, as the communication outposts to reform mindsets, enhance administrative performance and transform nation through the broadcast of success stories which had significant impact on the lives of the local people. He appreciated the efforts of RNUs which telecast a total of about 146 daily News Bulletin in 23 languages for a cumulative duration of more than 30 hours daily. He also added that the RNUs need to work in collaboration with the state governments to bring about transformation in the emerging New India and perform proactively the responsibilities of a public broadcaster. He also called upon the participants to focus on innovative thinking, out of box ideas, new methods involving technological tools and a foresight to understand the changing media landscape.

Naidu said the I&B ministry was in the process of bringing out a complete overhaul in the Indian Information Service Cadre in line with the changing information and communication paradigm. The focus would be shifting towards strengthening of the regional infrastructure and personnel to fulfil the communication and information needs of each and every section of the society across the country.