Powerful Friendship Kills Professional Ethics

When Kantipur, the most-widely read vernacular daily in Nepal, came in the scene two years after the restoration of democracy in 1990, people had high hopes toward independent media and other democratic institutions. In fact, Kantipur's early success was due its ability to fill the void that the state media had created. People needed to know more than one side of the story, and Kantipur told them without an agenda. That's what I thought what Kantipur was - a newspaper without it's own agenda, a newspaper that "served" the public - until the day when I met the chairman who told me and my friends why his newspaper would not publish the acts of nepotism of the Vice Chancellor of Kathmandu University where I worked. That was the day when I lost hope in Kantipur. This is the same daily that fought so bravely against the corrupt monarchy. It dared to publish articles by an underground Maoist leader for which the editor and two executives were locked up in 2001.

When we met the chairman of Kantipur Publications Pvt. Ltd., we gave him proof of how the VC had blatantly compromised all academic and professional values in the university. We gave him facts about all acts of nepotism, like appointing his brothers, daughter and close relatives in academic and administrative positions. We told him how he influenced the admission, examination and how he virtually controlled everything in the university. Besides his own act of nepotism, we gave sufficient proof of how other administrative heads are directly involved in policy-level corruption. We met the Chairman as members of a newly formed professors' association that was agitating to oust the VC.

(Please remember that the editors of Kantipur told us they cannot publish without the publisher's consent.)

After listening to everything that we had to say, he frankly told us, "The VC is my friend. I have known him for 20 years now. He has asked me not to publish anything against him. What you are saying is true. But I will not publish."

We had nothing to say after that. We did not argue. We did not rationalize. Later, we discussed how a poor country like ours is ruled by a bunch of corrupt people who thrive purely on such collusion.

How can we further the cause of democracy if universities and media don't function transparently? How can media serve the public if they have their own favorite agenda?

Later, we organized a series of protests against nepotism, corruption, and lack of transparency in the institution. We took the case even to the prime minister who heavily favored the VC. It was the biggest revolt in the history of the university. After our visit to the PM's office, one of the technical staff was called by the dean in his office and threatened to fire him if he went against the VC. Three days later, he committed suicide. No media reported it. The regional reporter from Kantipur had sent the story, but it was not published. The newspaper killed the story in favor of the VC. The wife of the deceased gave a testimony to the media that was sufficient to charge the dean with second-degree murder. But, we later heard that she was silenced with a job in a remote area. The media did not report. The media is least interested to go beyond the PR loop that successfully feeds the 'good image' of the VC who has been head of the institution ever since its establishment in 1991.

I think we have to go beyond write-what-you-see model of journalism to find-out-so-that-others-can-see model if we have to serve in the public interest.

(Originally written for JMC ethics blog.)