British judicial enquiry examined the Murdochs about News of the World scandal. Rupert Murdoch apologized for failing to take measures to avert the hacking scandal. He cast himself as a victim, and said that the scandal was hidden from the owners‘ top executives. He seemed to blame the subordinates for not alerting him to the practices being used at the newspapers to secure its scoops. He predicted that the news business would be ‘purely electronic ‘ in five, 10 or 20 years. He cautioned the judge regarding regulatory measures envisaged consequent to the scandal. He said the press guarantees democracy, and we want democracy rather than autocracy. The Committee in its report indicated Murdoch by saying that he is not fit to exercise the stewardship of a major international company. It is now left to the House of commons to decide whether News International committed contempt of parliament, and if so what punishment should be imposed on the organisation.
The work style of Murdoch has always remained a matter of debate, admiration and criticism. Prof Daya Thussu, West-minister University, UK has written about such working style. Some features of this style are
* focus on commercial interests
* ownership of the different type of media, and aggressively work towards it
* use political contacts regarding the ownership rights against the promise of good publicity.
* exploit rules
* put sensational and glossy programmes and news for commercial benefit
This working style is confined to Murdoch group, but is more less extendable to other media groups too. The strictures passes by the committee are not thus restricted to News Corpn.only. The criticism against Murdoch is quite old. His media expansion in the UK and the work culture were matters of debate. It was alleged that in the UK, there was support from Thatcher and in the US from Regean. The media moghul sobriquet is thus not entirely on the basis of respect.
The charge is not against an individual but against a type of work culture in the media organisations. It may be a political charge, but political system represented by the parliament has a right to raise it.
We have much to worry here against the above background. Let alone the media owners, do the political forces here have even the courage to bring to book the errant journalists? How many times the individual rights and the right to privacy have been uphold while doing journalism? Murdochisation is not on decline. The politicians will have to tell the media at times, “ You have erred. You be responsible. “