Prasar Bharti act 1990

Media is a mediator of information between the citizens and the State. It is

the fourth pillar of our democracy which has a responsibility in shaping the
public opinion. A vibrant and a free media is to be necessary for a healthy
democracy. As media has the nature of questioning and criticism, so it has a
vital role in the whole countries. This means that, for any country which has
aspired to democratic norms of governance, should have a free and fair
press.

The Act grants autonomy to All India Radio and to Doordarshan, both of
which were previously under government control. The Act received the
assent of the President of India on 12 September 1990 after being
unanimously passed by Parliament. It was finally implemented in November
1997.

Prasar Bharati is India’s largest public broadcasting agency. It is a statutory

autonomous body set up by an Act of Parliament and comprises the
Doordarshan Television Network and All India Radio, which were earlier
media units of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.

During the emergency time as well as other times, Doordarshan was used for
government propaganda. Thus, the Prasar Bharati Act, 1990 was established.
The main motive of the Act is to provide freedom to electronic media i.e. the
All India Radio and Doordarshan.

Objective
The twin objectives of the Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India)
Act of 1990 are crystallised in Section 12 of the law. Section 12(3)(a)
mandates that Prasar Bharati ensure that “broadcasting is conducted as a
public service.” Again, Section 12(3)(b) reinforces that the purpose of
establishing the corporation is to gather news, not propaganda. The Act
came into existence after decades of post-independence struggle to free
broadcasting from the stranglehold of the government. The legislative intent
of the Act finds an echo in the Supreme Court’s 1995 judgment in The
Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting versus the Cricket
Association of Bengal, which said the “first facet of the broadcasting freedom
is freedom from state or governmental control, in particular from the
censorship by the government… Public broadcasting is not to be equated with
state broadcasting. Both are distinct.” The Prasar Bharati Corporation’s main
objective is to provide autonomy to Doordarshan and Akashvani in order to
“educate and entertain the public.”
Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India) Act,
1990

This Act extends to the whole of India. The Act provides for the
establishment of a Broadcasting Corporation. The Act defines composition,
powers and functions of the corporation. It grants autonomy to the All India
Radio and Doordarshan which were previously under the control of the
government. Section 3 of the Act deals with the establishment and
composition of the corporation. The corporation is a body corporate having
perpetual succession and a common seal with the headquarters in New Delhi.

Amendments and recent draft bills regarding the Act

The Prasar Bharati Amendment Act of 2011, amended provisions to ensure

that all posts in Akashvani and Doordarshan, barring few exceptions, shall be
deemed to have been transferred to the Prasar Bharati from April 1, 2000.
The amendment act had defined the service conditions of several of the
employees in some of the key areas.

The Information & Broadcasting ministry recently took a major step by

drafting the Prasar Bharati Establishment of Recruitment Board Rules, 2020,
Prasar Bharati is supposed to be an autonomous body, yet it does not have a
mechanism to hire its employees. Consequently, government officers
belonging to other services generally come to work in Prasar Bharati on
deputation. Over decades, the Prasar Bharati Recruitment Board could never
be set up because the I&B ministry and the public broadcaster often had
differences over its structure.

Section 3: Establishment and composition of

Corporation

Structure of the Prasar Bharati Board

The Act specifies General Superintendence, direction and management of
affairs of the corporation. Prasar Bharati Board does all such acts and
exercises all those powers which may be done by the corporation.

The Board shall consist:

• Chairman;
• One Executive member;
 • One member (Finance);
• One member (Personnel);
• Six Part-time members;
• Director-General (Akashvani), ex Officio;
• Director-General (Doordarshan), ex officio;
• One representative of the Union Ministry of Information and
Broadcasting (India), to be nominated by that ministry and;
• Two representatives of the employees of the corporation.

Section 4: Appointment of chairman and other

Members
The President of India appoints Chairman and other member except for ex-
officio members, a nominated member and the elected members. There shall
be not less than six meetings every year but three months shall not
intervene between one meeting and the next meeting.

Section 12: Functions and powers of Corporation

Functions and Objectives of Corporation

The main motive of the corporation is to educate, inform and entertain the
public. By conducting and organizing public broadcasting services to people,
it has become easy to provide the information to the people in an easy
manner. It also ensures the balanced development of broadcasting on radio
and television.

Following are the objects, namely;

• To provide the autonomy to Akashvani and Doordarshan, so that to

ensure the function in a fair, objective and creative manner.
• To uphold the unity and integrity of the country.
• To maintain the democratic and social values which are enshrined in
the constitution.
• To look after the safeguarding of the citizen’s right to be informed
freely, truthfully and objectively.
• To spread literacy, agriculture, rural development, health, family
welfare, environment, science and technology.
 • To encourage healthy competition and spirit of sportsmanship by
providing adequate coverage to sports and games.
• To promote cultures and languages of the various regions by
broadcasting many programmes.
• To provide special needs of the youth always organize special
programmes.
• To remove the problems of women, pay special attention to the
upliftment of the women.
• To take special steps for the protection of the children, the aged, the
blind, the handicapped and other vulnerable section.
• To protect the rights of working classes and advancing their welfare.
• To provide the suitable programmes for the needs of the minorities
and tribal communities.
• To promote national integration that will maintain the community
language of the nation.
• To promote research and development activities of radio broadcast
and television broadcast technology.

Parliamentary Committee
According to section 13, it shall consist of twenty-two members of
Parliament, out of which fifteen from the House of the People shall be elected
by the members and seven from the Council of States shall be elected by the
members. The committee shall function according to the rules made by the
speaker of the House of the People.

Powers of Central Government Section 23

According to the Act, the government has the following powers are:

• From time to time when the government may think fit may issue the
directions to the corporation for the unity, sovereignty and integrity
of India.
• The Central Government require the corporation to furnish the
information which government may consider.
• At the time of any difficulty arises, the central government may by
order publish in the official gazette and make the procedure to
remove the difficulties.
• The Central Government has also the power to make the rules. The
rules may be considered in relation to:
 • The salaries and allowances and condition of service in respect of
leave and pension.
• Allowances payable to the chairman and part-time members.
• Control, restrictions and conditions for which corporation may
appoint officers and other employees.
• Conditions and restrictions which a Recruitment Board may
establish.
• Qualifications, other conditions and period of the office of the
members of the Recruitment Board.
• Terms and condition of the service of the officers.
• Form and manner in which the annual statement of record shall be
prepared.

Section 23: Power of Central Government to give

directions
The Centre still holds the reins of Prasar Bharati as it has the power to make
rules for the corporation, issue grants or allowances and control the salaries
of employees.

Section 23 gives the Centre powers to issue directions which it “may think
necessary in the interests of the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India or
the security of the State or preservation of public order” to not broadcast
“any matter of public importance”.

On the context of what true autonomy means for a broadcasting corporation,

the Supreme Court has referred to a ruling by the German Constitutional
Court, which said that “freedom from State control requires the legislature to
frame some basic rules to ensure that government is unable to exercise any
influence over the selection, content or scheduling of programmes”.

Autonomy for Prasar Bharati: Sam Pitroda Committee

recommendations

Sam Pitroda Committee has taken minimal action to strengthen the Prasar
Bharati in February 2014. Certain recommendations have been made by Sam
Pitroda Committee for the autonomy of Prasar Bharati:

• To give the effective freedom to the Prasar Bharati, amend the

Prasar Bharati Act, 1990.
 • In order to frame rules and regulations and to hire manpower
without the approval of the Government, Prasar Bharati should be
given the power.
• Prasar Bharati should become a “Genuine Public Broadcaster” as
against a “Government Broadcaster”.
• To make the Direct-To-Home (DTH) signals in a primary mode.
• To increase the allocation of funds in order to content generation to
50% of the total expenditure within a period of 5-7 years.
• To meet the obligations of the public service broadcasting, satellite
and digital cables TV operations should be expanded.
• To define the social media strategy of Prasar Bahrain.
• To review all the channels, Doordarshan and All India Radio and
their sub-optimal utilization of the resources should be phased out.
• To set up PBC as the third arm of the public service broadcaster,
Doordarshan and All India Radio.
• It should be best broadcasting service in the world using next-
generation opportunities, strategies, technologies and etc.

Some Important Case Laws

Union of India v. Cricket Association of Bengal

AIR 1995
Supreme Court held that broadcasting should be under the control of public
and should be operated by the public statutory corporation.This implicit in
Article 19(1)(a) where the corporations, whose constitution and composition
must be in such order to ensure their impartiality in political, economic and
social matters and other public issues.

The right of free and expression includes the right to receive the information.
It is necessary that citizens have the benefit of the plurality of views and
must have opinions on the all public issues. There must be a diversity of
opinions, views, ideas and ideology among the citizens. Private Broadcasting
is more prejudicial to the right of free speech of the citizens than the
government controlled media.

BCCI-Nimbus Prasar Bharati Case

According to the Court, the objects and purpose of the Sports Act are to
provide access to the largest number of the viewer through sports
broadcasting channels with Prasar Bharati. Court also said that it should be
essentially directed towards those citizens who do not have access to cable
television and only access to terrestrial and DTH networks of Prasar Bharati.
Court also pointed out the virtue of Section 12(3)(c) of the Prasar Bharati
Act.

Union of India v. Board of Control for Cricket in India and Ors

The Supreme Court held that Prasar Bharati cannot engage in free
transmission of the signals of live sporting or cricketing events, received from
content right holders/owners, to cable operators.