shri vinod sharma - Rajya Sabha

should be no live coverage of Zero Hour and if, at all, there should be deferred
coverage of the Zero Hour because it is the Zero Hour which turns the rest of the
work done in Parliament into a big zero. Now, indeed, there is some gravitas to
this argument because it is the job of the Speaker to determine whether certain
remarks being made in the heat of the moment need to be kept on record or they
need to be expunged. But, then, no such authority of the Speaker can be
exercised if the proceedings are being telecast live. But, I think, this problem needs
to be addressed from the Members' end, that why do Members need to shout if
they have a valid point to make in the House and how much truth is there to the
allegations of the Opposition that it does not get adequate talking-space in
Parliament to make its points to put the Government on the mat. These are
questions that need to be debated by the political class themselves. But, whether
the media is being a facilitator or not in the arrival of such consensus, I think, the
answer is in the negative, because, first of all, the media is not interested; the
media is more interested today in knowing when Kareena is planning to marry Saif
Ali Khan or whether SRK will come and sing at the Commonwealth Games or not.
I think he has made an announcement that he is going to sing or do something
there. There is nothing wrong in it because they too are national icons. But there
has to be some order of priority. There has to be some judicious mix of news.
There has to be adequate reflection on a good debate happening in Parliament in
various newspapers. I know newspapers like the Hindu are doing it. And I know
that a couple of other newspapers are also doing it. But it is not being done
adequately enough. If a Member of Parliament who delivers a good speech in
Parliament does not find a single line attribution in the newspapers, and if he feels
like a good reporter whose excellent story has been spiked or not printed, I think his
grievance is valid.