Media censorship impossible: Jaitley

Censorship of information in the present age is “an impossibility”, Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley said on Thursday but observed that aberrations like ‘paid news’ are likely to creep in when news organisations do not have “realistic” financial models. He said the definition of news and the behaviour of consumer have changed with technological advancement and “something that camera cannot capture is hardly news these days”. Articulating his views on the media scene at a function here, Jaitley said, “One of the worries is that the financial model for all (news) organisations must be a realistic model. Because if the financial model is not a realistic model, then imperfections will enter. And these imperfections will lead to aberrations. Paid news is one such aberration.”