Now that the electronic media have finally joined hands and formed Pakistan Broadcasters Association, their first priority should be to assert the right of private channels to advertising worth billions that is being denied them.
When Pakistan Television was started, the federal government provided funds for its infrastructure and all operational expenses. The advertisements were few in the early days and were inserted only between programs.
PTV did not remain content with government funds. It sought advertising aggressively and introduced commercial breaks within programs, despite strong protest by the viewers. It also persuaded the government to impose a license fee on all TV sets. Fee was also imposed on the owners of VCRs and satellite dishes, even though PTV did not provide any service to them.
PTV claimed to follow the BBC that gets revenue from the license fee but ignored the fact that the domestic service of BBC did not carry any advertising. PTV wanted both advertising revenue and license fee.
During 1990s, the elected governments, being unable to collect enough taxes to meet even their own basic needs, asked the PTV to fend for itself. A managing director was appointed who knew nothing about good television but all about advertising. The result was that programs were reduced to bits that were inserted between interminable commercial breaks.
This undesirable situation could be justified only by the lack of alternative channels for the advertisers. Now, there are more television channels than the advertisers can make viable with their support. And many more are on the way.
In 2004-05, PTV earned Rs 2.2 billion in advertising while the license fee got it over Rs 2.4 billion. Now that the fee is compulsory for everybody and is collected through electricity bills @ Rs 25 per month, PTV no longer has any right to advertising revenue. Only the private channels should get advertising as they have no other source of income. The freedom of media becomes meaningless if the private channels are deprived of a very large part of their due income. The government must provide a level playing field and deny the PTV the double revenue.
In fact, PTV doesn’t need so much money because it does not know what to do with it. It plans to start four regional channels (in addition to “PTV National” already devoted to regional languages) when several private channels are already meeting the need. PTV will only make life very difficult for all of them. When it has already leased out STN’s countrywide network of local TV stations because of its inability to run it, why does it want to waste money on new channels? It also plans to start a DTH service (satellite-based direct-to-home television), which should be a task for the private parties, not for the national television.
Pakistan Television must get out of the mindset that was imposed on it by lack of government funds. Now it should learn to live within its means. Its guaranteed revenue from the license fee will be enough for it as it does not need more than two channels. It will be a great achievement if it can provide quality content for just these two channels, one for entertainment (PTV1) and the other (PTV2) for news and current affairs. What it really needs is a head, who knows all about content but nothing about advertising.
Radio Pakistan should also be free of all advertising, leaving the revenue for the private radio stations. Since it will have no other source of income because its license fee was abolished long ago, the logical course will be to merge Radio Pakistan with PTV. The merger was started years ago, with “Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation” as the proposed name for the new entity. Unfortunately, vested interests sabotaged it. The plan should be revived as the merger will benefit both radio and television – and the people.
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