ISLAMABAD - Senate Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting has sought details from the management of Pakistan Television (PTV) about the appointment made in the state-owned television during the last three years as well as coverage given to various political parties.
The Senate panel that met under the chairmanship of Senator Kamil Ali Agha, the other day, recommended that PTV board of directors should be reconstituted, as it would help improve its performance. Senator Kamil Agha in his remarks said that the aim of the committee was to suggest recommendations to remove the bottlenecks in the way of smooth working of state-run TV.
He said that PTV was an important national asset and all out efforts would be made to bring improvement its functioning. The committee underlined the need to train the existing staff of PTV on modern footings. Traditional approaches are no more viable, the committee observed.
The chairman directed that press attaches deployed in foreign countries should be directed to ensure regular transmission of PTV at their respective countries. The committee also asked PTV to take steps to improve the quality of its programmes.
Managing Director of PTV Yusuf Baig Mirza informed the committee that PTV transmission was being watched in around 54 countries around the world. MD said PTV had seven channels, while work was currently underway to launch PTV world- an English content channel.
He said coverage of PTV home had reached to 89 percent of the country while PTV news coverage stood at 78 percent.
Mirza said present number of PTV boosters was 100 while 35 more were in the pipeline. Around 135 boosters would be in place to ensure the coverage of 94 percent population.
Principal Information Officer of Press information Department (PID) Muhammad Azam informed the committee that PID arranged projection of all official activities of the federal functionaries and accorded full coverage and projection to these activities in both print and electronic media for information of general public.
“PID extends full support to both electronic and print media journalists in terms of providing accreditation cards enabling them to attend official functions with out any hindrance,” he added. He said that at the federal level, it was the responsibility of PID to release public sector advertisements to the newspapers through a transparent and systematic procedure.
Secretary information Ch. Rashid Ahmed told the committee that some departments were not releasing advertisements to newspapers through PID that was violation of rules.
He said summary has been moved in this regard to the Prime Minister to prohibit these departments from releasing advertisements directly.
The committee directed the Ministry of Information to furnish details of three years regarding issuance of advertisement to newspapers.
The committee was informed that PID had established a social media cell for quick dissemination of information about government activities to major social media news-works.
Senators Rubina Khalid, Syed Zafar Ali Shah, Pervaiz Rashid, Muhammad Daud Khan Achakazi, Najmul Hassan, Shirala Malik, Farhatullah Babar, Dr. Saeeda Iqbal and Saeed Ghani attended the meeting.