Syllabus must reflect changing times, media schools told

Chairman of Prasar Bharati A Surya Prakash said on Monday media schools offering courses in journalism must devise their syllabus as per the readers’ interest and changing times.

Speaking at an interaction with mediapersons organised by Press Club of Bangalore, he said that people do not have patience and time to read more than 75 words of news or watch a video clipping for more than two and a half minutes.

“Therefore, the institutes have a responsibility of training students to write a piece of news in such a manner that it reaches the people effectively within the given word limit and time. The institutes, considering this, must change their syllabus every year,” he said. 

Noting that some of the programmes on TV were not in good taste, Prakash said that they were making noise, instead of giving news.

“It is all a process to gain more TRP. If the same continues, viewers will move away from TV channels,” he said. Replying to a question, Prakash suggested that television channels must restrain themselves.

He said, “Media should not be controlled by anybody. Even the Prasar Bharati cannot control it. They should restrain themselves.”