Dr Baru highlighted the media’s role in catalysing
environmental awareness. He expressed concern that Agenda 21 negates the media’s
role. The focus has been more on collecting and disseminating information rather than
interpreting and mainstreaming it.
He referred to the media as a battleground for addressing sustainable development issues.
It collects myriad, incoherent ideas from society and converts them into powerful,
collective social opinion, which becomes a critical tool for policy-makers. Since the
media is a constituency of policy-makers, the challenge of addressing issues of
environment, poverty, and unemployment essentially lies with it. Since media has to grab
public imagination, it also feels the need to sensationalize some issues, a phenomenon
that has generated heated international debate.
He highlighted the media’s limitations in the context of events like DSDS, for
instance, the print media operates in a framework meant to be read and not heard or voice
concerns. It can only communicate through the medium available. However, he acknowledged
that the debate on environmental issues is a global movement in itself, which the media
cannot ignore.
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