If the channels available to us via the cable operators are providing us with an engaging focus on the American presidential elections due next month, they are also providing to the people an amazing variety of the spice of life. With that there is spotlight on the international and the national scenario.
Assuming the world is becoming a smaller place with all this spectacular growth in Information Technology that is unfolding every minute in our lives, leaving us breathless more often than not, there are indeed going to surface ethical issues, relating to what can be telecast in societies like ours, where the turmoil and the torment of social life are also calling for attention.
Having said this I want to begin with a PTV current affairs programme called Such Tau Yeh Hai, which went on air at least twice in the week, and perhaps it was shown even more times. The subject of this panel discussion, audience participation included, centred around the status, role and significance of theatre in Pakistani society. Enlarge this canvass to include media in Pakistani society or substitute it with Television in this country. It is necessary that we continue to evaluate the role and the future of Television as a medium in Pakistan and the impact that it is having on our lives. I often feel that we do not realise it really, or at all.
Theatre as recreation (or art?) is more Lahore specific and based there evidently, and hence the panel came from that provincial capital. And so did the artistes selected, in a way. So the ambience being discussed and analysed and criticised was Lahore's theatre world. The underlying or over-articulated emphasis was on vulgarity and obscenity, with particular reference to dialogues and dances, and the inability the connivance of the concerned to stop or curb what was regarded as being unhealthy and downright harmful to Pakistani society. Islamic values were being overlooked and trampled upon, and that the people were upset, and angry.
This particular Islamabad based programme was focusing upon recent criticism of the female artistes on the Lahore stage dancing in ways that were regarded as "vulgar and obscene" and that the local administration was unable to play the required role as censor. What also emerged from the discussion was that the dialogues were also in bad taste, to say the least, and significantly there was not a single word of support for what ever was supposed to be typifying Lahore's stage. In fact, even the dancer-actress Meghna, who appeared to be there to symbolise the young female artistes who lend glamour to the stage (that has become integral to staging plays now, it seems), said that because Lahore's dancers were overstepping the prescribed limits a time has come for PTV to discuss the issue. And to analyse the issue there were people like Kamal Ahmed Rizvi, Samina Ahmed, Jamil Bismil, Hafiz Salman Butt, representatives from various departments expected to keep a watch on what was happening on the stage of the culturally rich city of Lahore. There was a Deputy Nazim an EDO, and others to represent their strata of the officialdom. It needs to be underlined that the anchor person also indicated that he had personally gone to the theatre to see what exactly was the extent of the "problem" arising out of dances and dialogues. Strange it seemed that the theme of the plays didn't matter at all, and all that mattered to the producers and the audience was a commercial success born of a superficiality, flippancy and cheap thrill that an audience can get addicted to. From whatever one heard in this PTV programme one world assume that Lahore's theatre is growing in rather unhealthy ways.
It made one think of Pemra when it was said by the participants, like the EDO, that for the five particular theatres that were under mention there wasn't enough staff to monitor and check what was being shown. He said that often this was what happened: as long as the censor staff was present in the auditorium, the script officially certified was followed. Once that staff had left, there was a free for all - an off-the-record dance and dialogue followed. Like what they do in certain cinema houses, allegedly screen uncensored footage, -entire movies in certain cases.
I think it was the Deputy Nazim who said that he did not have the cable at home, and was in no position to actually see what was being shown on the cable TV, therefore. Hafiz Salman Butt said the sad and disgraceful thing was that women were being exploited for Lahore stage, and the media in general, and even the veteran TV artiste Samina Ahmed agreed with this. Jamil Bismil, the noted stage and TV actor and director, was sarcastic to say that the people in this programme were talking as if they were all angels and that there was no real problem!!
The contents of a discussion like this one on PTV were candid and realistic and, it seemed applicable to other forms of commercial art like cinema too.
****************Now look at this side of Television that we have in society, and perhaps it is a countrywide context. For, of late I have seen letters to newspaper editors complaining that even in the elitist parts of Islamabad (is not Islamabad only elitist, I wonder?) there are cable operators showing "obscene and pornographic channels/programmes". To this there were rejoinders to say that those viewers who found it impossible to see such telecast, should use their remote control gadgets!! It is this response and dissent that reflects the deepen social change that is taking place in society.
A couple of days ago in Karachi, the Pakistan Electronic Media and Regulatory Authority, Sindh region, conducted raids in "continuation of the drive launched against cable operators relaying obscene and pornographic channels/programmes".
An agency report revealed that the PEMRA enforcement teams conducted raids all over Karachi against cable operators who were violating the Authority rules and regulations despite warnings from the Council of the PEMRA. The raids were conducted against CTV operators of Korangi, Landhi, Akhtar Colony, Qayyumabad, Federal B Area, and Hub River Road. The channels described as being obscene and objectionable were "MM, MM2., Mnet Series," and it was further indicated that DVDs and CDs were also being used. Apparently the rules do not allow any cable operator to show anything on his own, and he has to strictly relay what he gets on the approved channels.
The PPI news report said that raiding team seized three head-ends and disconnected transmission of two loop holders for injecting illegal contents. The teams also confiscated equipment of illegal/default CTV operators.
And the PEMRA, Sindh Region, once again informed subscribers that they can contact phone number 111-736-111 to lodge complaints against CTV operators for poor service or any misconduct/violations. Perhaps here is opportunity for me to wonder why my cable operator is unable to provide me with some Pakistani channels while he is so generous with overseas and Indian channels, Which makes it pertinent and only fair to mention that cable operators are unable to compel residents who buy the cable service to pay for it, even when it is something like Rs200 a month. Even in posh areas where educated people reside, the recovery of this Rs200 a month is a huge challenge and which failure serves as a disincentive for cable operators to improve their service. All is evidently not well here too.
****************Neither is the world of cinema in Pakistan in healthy shape; neither the film production end, nor the cinema house - downstream as it were. That is another tale and not quite within the purview and jurisdiction of this column. But Geo for the last three Mondays, in its Follow-up With Fahd programme has been trying to make the relevant authorities wake up to the raid conducted by Karachi police on a cinema hall, Prince in mid August, where initially 30 women and 100 men were arrested. Initial reports had alleged that the cinema hall had turned into a "brothel". In this raid, police, humiliated and harassed women inside the cinema hall, and the way they were shown in TV news reports(and print media)had evoked an angry response from the public, who were shocked at the way the women had been treated .
Fahd Hussain had focused on the issue ,and even last week he read out the e-mail that he had received from Pakistanis at home and abroad, that were severely critical of the way the police had behaved. Both Fahd Hussain and TV viewers who had seen the follow-up on the police raid on the cinema house were resentful of the way in which the Karachi police had behaved with the women, and the programme was part of a pressure campaign to seek justice in the matter. The Sindh Home minister had promised an investigation into the matter.
One needs to mention with a measure of appreciation that this is not the first time we have seen TV being used so directly in public interest, and where editorial freedom was manifest without vested interest, or advertising and public relations being the pretext for covert messages.
From what I have said above, an interesting scenario appears to be emerging. That the stage in Lahore is , in the wake of public demand, seeking to violate the rules, and is being discussed on television,. And good old PTV at that. Then the cable operators in the light of public demand, violate PEMRA rules, and there are raids conducted, and this too is argued and enthusiastically over TV, and finally police raid a cinema hall, and ill-treat women and this infuriates a TV anchor person and leads to viewers responding to condemn the law enforcing agencies for their unfair manner of operation .The question that arises is: how far can raids by police and other such agencies go in the context of public demand and opinion? This is just one question. There are others too, that relate to ethics, and morality in this Islamic Republic. Let us bear in mind the fact that there are TV channels that have regular, weighty, authentic Islamic programmes, and in this very society there is the QTV, a round the clock Islamic channel.
And that is a very good channel, and very popular with viewers. We need to have a closer look at it very soon. I watch it quite regularly, and it is significant to see the number of viewers who phone in for seeking answers to their questions, or clarifications and guidance to the ambiguities they are troubled by in their daily individual and family lives.
****************If there has been a notable rise in the number of commercial and economic programmes along with the entertainment portfolio (music in abundance) there has also been a healthy, welcome increase in the political programmes where interviews are conducted with candour and freedom to talk about the past - the past of this country to talk about and as if confess the mistakes and even the tragedies that this country has lived through. A kind of accountability as if. Or does one call it a media trial, though not quite? That is another game altogether. We now even have Television discussing the ways in which the print media works, and the frustrations it faces. Even the Wage Board gets highlighted.
During the week there was a very interesting conversation in the programme "Jawab Deyh" (Geo) in which the host Iftikhar Ahmed tried to interview his guests in a hostile manner which somehow appears rather contrived, and unnatural. This week he had a former Chief Minister of Balochistan Taj Mohammad Jamali, and the interview was watched with keen interest, a reason for which was the current spotlight on Balochistan. The province is once again the centre of interest, for reasons new and old.
Taj Mohammad Jamali was quoted as saying that Balochistan was likely to become the "future California of Pakistan". The newspaper advertisement publicising his interview quoted him as saying thus: Manpower coming to Gwadur from other parts of the country should be given the right to vote after ten years.... Some Jamalis were not punished by NAB due to their links with the armed forces.... Kalabagh Dam is inevitable for the production of electricity, but a link canal should not be constructed with it".
Host Iftikhar Ahmad also asked him about his (Jamali's) desire for a second marriage, and he did not duck the issue. He counter questioned "Who does not want to marry a second time?" And that is where I sign off this time.