By
GLOBAL multimedia magnate Rupert Murdoch is a touch like the satellites that much of his empire revolves around: for him and his Australia-based company News Corp., the sky is the limit. He knows no national boundaries. He is awe-inspiringly powerful. He is forever in full flight at altitudes that few human beings aspire to, let alone attain. And he is unstoppable. Indeed, Rupert Murdoch is the future.
Is that why such a nationwide furore has been sparked by his reported request for uplinking rights from India during a recent meeting with Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda? Is that why India is running scared? But can we run away from the future? Especially when it is already here. Well, almost.
Murdoch, after all, is the media's top turnaround artist, a mega-deal-a-day conjurer, a corporate Wizard of Oz who has more tricks up his sleeves than P.C. Sorcar Jr. But for all his strengths, there is much in Murdoch's style that puts people, and nations, on the defensive: his reputation as a rapacious businessman who cannot see beyond the bottomline, his track record as a media baron who has hired and fired more editors than anyone cares to remember, his ways as a one-man band who can call in the favours from politicians whenever and wherever he wishes. He can fly in and out of countries and confer with heads of state and other key leaders almost at will.
It is Murdoch's unique flair for making quick, often cavalier decisions that keeps him going. In the early '90s, a crippling debt crisis nearly put paid to NewsCorp. —as much as $7 billion came due in one month—but Murdoch emerged, as only he could, from the spot of bother virtually unscathed. And infinitely stronger. Today, NewsCorp., in which Murdoch's family concern Cruden Investments holds a controlling 32 per cent stake, is worth $18 billion. In 1995-96, the company, the world's fourth largest media conglomerate with diversified interests in print, films, TV, publishing, aviation and the Internet, posted profits of $1.12 billion, up 11 per cent from $1 billion in 1994-95. Murdoch is flush with cash. And he is raring to make a dash for all the virgin areas still to be conquered.
Actually, there are not many left. In Australia (where he was born), in the UK (where he was educated), in the US (where he took citizenship in 1985 in order to be allowed to own TV stations), in China (where, perhaps for the first time in his life, he was tamed), Murdoch's conquests during the past four decades and a half have been the stuff of folklore: always starting from a position of disadvantage, he has invariably managed to clamber right to the top. Wherever NewsCorp. has planted its flag, it flutters above every other banner. And the ceaseless rollout to new territories and media sectors shows no signs of slowing down. Japan—where Murdoch recently bought a 21.4 per cent stake (worth almost $400 million) in Asahi National Broad-casting Company jointly with Masayoshi Son of Softbank Corporation—is all set to be the next port of call. Waiting in the wings are South America, continental Europe and Russia.
India's wait, of course, is over. Already a major presence here with its diverse bouquet of channels, STAR TV, 100 per cent owned by NewsCorp., has now invested $12 million on a 60,000 sq ft building in Bombay to house its studio and Indian production headquarters. "The facility will be ready by the end of this year," says Gene Swinstead, STAR TV India's managing director. But he allays fears that the network will stop farming out production work: "It will not affect our programme content as we will still be commissioning products."
STAR TV has also leased a 3,300 sq ft property in Bombay for its corporate headquarters in India, which seems set to emerge as a crucial cog in the global Murdoch media machine. In NewsCorp.'s 1995 annual report, the tycoon said: "The opportunity we see in Asia is truly staggering. As we continue to build our business there, we are more convinced that STAR TV has a very bright future."
The Hong Kong handover is a year away and although Swinstead has ruled out the possibility of STAR TV shifting its base from Hong Kong to Bombay, it is a trifle unlikely that China is not weighing on Murdoch's mind at all. Says John Elliot, the former Financial Times correspondent in Hong Kong: "There is concern among journalists and politicians about how free China will allow the media to be. It is entirely logical that people like Murdoch would keep a pullback plan ready. Many Hong Kong residents have acquired second passports so that they can migrate to Canada or Australia if things begin to go wrong under the Chinese."
Murdoch can play the game better—and bigger—than anyone else. But that is perhaps not his principal strength. His amazing adaptability and often dazzling perspicacity are. Murdoch's corporate credo is pretty simple: where there's a rule, there's a way around it; where there are stubborn competitors, there are more stratagems than they can keep track of to shake them off; where there are sceptical prime ministers and presidents, there are clear, unhindered routes into their inner chambers. Indeed, Murdoch has rarely, if ever, failed to convince the powers-that-be, no matter where in the world they are, to view the hustle and bustle of business from his standpoint. And play along. He's done it in Australia and the UK. And he's done it in the US and China.
There's no reason to believe that he cannot do it in India. Is that why a section of the media and some political groups here have reacted in such horror to reports that Murdoch might be given permission to uplink from India —as if the ominous spectre of an attack from a present-day Attila the Hun were hanging over us?
Says Philip Mathew, managing editor of Malayala Manorama: "In a developing democracy like India, the entry of the foreign press and TV networks can have disastrous consequences." The ban on foreign nationals running newspapers in India was imposed by the Nehru regime after much deliberation, he points out.
But hasn't India changed beyond recognition since then? It may have, but the conditions under which the ban was imposed—fissiparous forces were operating from within and outside the country—still exist, Mathew argues.
Frontline Editor N.Ram is equally unequivocal in his opposition to Murdoch's likely entry: "It would be outrageous if he is allowed to uplink. He will not just ruin Indian TV but the press as well. Murdochism is a recipe for disaster. Witness England where he has gained a stranglehold. Editorial standards have dipped, a culture where editorial rides piggyback on marketing is in vogue and exploitation is the norm."
D.N. Bezbaruah, editor of Guwahati's The Sentinel and chairman of the Editors' Guild of India, is "not afraid of Murdoch" but of "what our journalists and editors will do when they collaborate with him". He clarifies: "In other words, I am afraid of us. The foreign media should be kept out. There is no use trying to introduce new regulatory mechanisms because there is no dearth in this country of laws that don't work."
WHY are the worries so deep-rooted despite protestations that Murdoch hasn't sought uplink rights nor does he have any plans to enter the Indian print media? Swinstead has no doubt where the strident opposition stems from: "It's because of their own inadequacies. I don't think India generally has a free press. It is directed by self-interested proprietors."
Says Pradeep Guha, publishing director ofBennett Coleman & Company, owners of The Times of India: "There is no fear of Murdoch. His interest is only in TV so far, and we are hardly a player in the business. But if he is allowed to enter the print media, we would have to think of a strategy."
What harm can one more "self-interested proprietor" possibly do? Is it the size and scope of Murdoch's global media machine that unnerves India's jelly-bellied media barons, who clearly have no stomach for a fight and are given to spouting the oft-repeated, vacuously pious mumbo-jumbo about cultural imperialism and western conspiracies? Well, on the international stage, Murdoch himself is grappling with a somewhat similar problem as a wave of media mergers sweeps Hollywood and creates tougher competition. But he is not taking to his heels. As a matter of fact, he is prone to brush the frenzy of US takeovers away as only a minor irritant. In NewsCorp.'s 1995 report, Murdoch had said: "We are committed to growth and to change, but we are not convinced that bigger is always better."
But India's prophets of doom are. Not that there is no support for Murdoch, or for that matter for the foreign media as a whole, among Indian media personalities. In fact, it runs deep. The fears that Murdoch will ride roughshod over Indian sensibilities if he is allowed to set up shop here, asserts Kumar Ketkar, editor of the Marathi daily Maharashtra Times, are absolutely unfounded. "There is no reason to stop STAR TV," he says. "For, in any case, you cannot stop satellite signals from being uplinked from elsewhere."
Amit Khanna of Plus Channel, too, finds the chorus of protests rather meaningless. Says he: "I'm not afraid of Rupert Murdoch. If people are, then it arises out of a lack of confidence and ignorance combined with media hype. I am more afraid of Ramanand Sagar because he can make Krishna, which I can't. Entertainment is ethnocentric and I think Murdoch should fear me because I have local talent."
Competition, they are convinced, can only help the Indian media spruce up its act. And leapfrog into the 21st century. "With good management and creative handling of readers, India's media barons can take on Murdoch," says Ketkar. "It should be a good fight." Isn't that precisely what we are trying to shy away from? And what does it tell us about the Indian media? Well, that our newspaper proprietors have got used to a relatively non-competitive situation which allows them free access to a large, constantly growing market. "The foreign media should be allowed because Indians would then attempt to rise above their mediocrity," says columnist Iqbal Masud.
Several of India's top print media houses—notably Living Media, which publishes India Today, and the Ananda Bazar Patrika group—have been awaiting the fruition of their tie-ups with high-profile foreign groups. Only people with vested interests want to keep global players out, alleges N.P. Singh, Living Media's executive director. It is sad, he says, that a minuscule section of the press is being allowed to dictate policy.
But what about concerns regarding India's national interests and cultural ethos being undermined? Amit Khanna dismisses them with the contempt they deserve. "The western paradigm cannot be applied to the Indian situation," he says. "Send Murdoch to Bihar and see how things operate then. The whole thing is a non-issue. If Nehru's 1955 resolution has suddenly become dear to the Government, it's because we are a nation of schizophrenics. What cultural imperialism can be possible in 1996? If it is possible, then such a culture deserves to be jettisoned. As far as Murdoch's political leanings go, he could be a Nazi for all I care. The owner of Sun TV is in the Union Cabinet—has anyone pointed that out? Has Jayalalitha won in spite of owning JJay TV?"
Media observers are of course certain that it is only a matter of time before television is thrown open to private broadcasters, including foreign ones. The Supreme Court, in 1995, ruled that the Government has no right to cling on to its monopoly on the airwaves. An all-party parliamentary subcommittee headed by Ram Vilas Paswan, which submitted a 104-page report to the then information and broadcasting minister Purno A. Sangma this March, recommended that private satellite TV players be allowed to uplink from India and, to keep a vigil on them, an autonomous regulatory body be set up. In fact, STAR TV does uplink from India during major sports events, as it did during the recent cricket World Cup. But says Swinstead: "It's a somewhat cumbersome permissions procedure. I hope it is refined in the near future."
"You can't stop the march of technology," says Kiran Karnik, chief operating officer of Discovery Channel India. "It is bound to overtake you." A much smarter way of handling technological advances, suggests Karnik, is to stay abreast and innovate. "Laws and regulations should not only keep pace with technology, it should stay ahead. Otherwise, there will be chaos, as there is in India today," he says. In fact, Singapore, Hong Kong, the Philippines have made a killing by letting broadcasters uplink from their soil. "If only someone had foresight, India would have been a major broadcasting base," Karnik says. "And we'd have saved all the foreign exchange we lose because private broadcasters have to go to other countries to uplink."
Kalanidhi Maran of Sun TV insists that Indian broadcasters should be given priority if uplinking rights are granted. "Why should Murdoch get it first?" is his question. "In most countries, national broadcasters are given preference. Hopefully, it won't be any different in India," he says.
In any case, Karnik emphasises, the focus should be on what is coming in and not about where it's being uplinked from. Whether we like it or not, STAR TV, which is 100 per cent-owned by News-Corp., will continue to beam its signals into India, as will Pakistan TV, with its rabid propaganda on Kashmir, from the strong AsiaSat platform. And, yet, India is unlikely to fall apart. As K.N. Hari Kumar, editor-in-chief of Deccan
Herald, says: "The issue is not what goes out but what comes in. A regulatory mechanism has to be evolved."
Says Maran: "The talk of our culture being eroded by foreign TV channels is balderdash. Hasn't it survived 200 years of British rule and numerous other invasions? Come on, let's credit our ancient culture with greater resilience."
Indeed, it is India's specific cultural predilections that have guided the growth of STAR TV in India. Channel [V], for example, has evolved into a customised Indian channel, with its staple of Hindi film music and Indipop. STAR programming across all its channels may go 75 per cent 'local' by 1997.
There is no doubt that Murdoch is an aggressive media player, but his moves in China, if nothing else, should set at rest fears that he will turn a blind eye to local sensitivities if he is allowed a free run. In China, he began on the wrong foot: he angered officials by saying in 1993 that satellite TV posed an "unambiguous threat to totalitarian regimes everywhere". So it took him a while to crack mainland China. The ice was broken when he knocked the BBC off STAR's northern beam to appease officials offended by a documentary. Then he joined hands with the People's Daily for an online version of the Communist Party paper.
And now he is in talks with the official Chinese Central Television, after launching Phoenix, a Mandarin channel. If Murdoch is allowed to shift lock, stock and barrel to India, STAR TV, as also all the other foreign satellite TV players (event-driven channels like CNN, BBC, Dow Jones Television, ESPN et al) who will come in its wake seeking uplink, will be more amenable to control. "STAR TV has always been sensitive to feelings in India," grants Maran. "Would they have junked Nikki Tonight if they weren't?"
But as with everything else that Murdoch does, there is an element of mystery in his designs on India. As his real plans remain wrapped in a mist of conflicting signals, the epithets have come out of the woodwork again: high priest of pap, gutter press baron, dreaded corporate raider, foreman of the information expressways. Who really is Murdoch? The answer could well be coming up next. But only if the Indian Government does indeed open the sluice gates in the sky.
