RAWALPINDI: Communication and Media Studies Department, Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU) in collaboration with Rozan, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) on Friday arranged a seminar, entitled ‘Improving Media Standards and Promoting Ethics’.

The objective of the seminar was to facilitate media on development of ethical journalism standards and policies and lobby media groups on declared commitments to pursuit ethical journalism practices.

Chairman Press Council of Pakistan, Raja Shafqat Khan Abbassi, Former information minister, Qamar Zaman Qaira, Executive other senior journalists attended the seminar.

Chairperson Communication and Media Studies were the panelists of the seminar while the moderator of session was Executive Director of Intermedia, Adnan Rehmat.

Senior Coordinator Rozan, Shabana Arif gave the brief introduction of their programme of Coalition for Ethical Journalism (CEJ).

She said that media in Pakistan was still in the growing stage and we need to learn new things and for that interaction between stakeholders and civil society is very important.

Adnan Rehmat, addressing the participants, said that information was life blood of any society.

If we are talking about media, more information is consumed by consumers and at their part quality and quantity is equally important.

Ethics are not the legislation; these are the values which were actually derived from the practices of years, he added.

In the discussion panelist shared their thoughts on different aspects related to ethics such as what are ethics, their implementation and regulations, public interest on any issue its clarity and pluralism.

He said that media and journalists are the two segments of society. Media expanded tremendously during last one decade and its major beats are terrorism and violence.

Media is capable to fully perform its duty of being ethical, Zia-ud-Din said, adding that conditions for working journalists are much better now as compared to the time when we worked as a journalist.

Ethics are important because the media - especially the electronic media - is still in its infancy.

Fareeha Idrees shared her experiences of working as journalist and anchor person.

She said that more responsibility lies on reporter.

Talk shows replace the drama and we need to draw definite line between bravery and misbehavior.

Big media houses have some code of ethics but unfortunately upcoming channels and newspapers do not have it.

Absar Alam said that now we don’t have editors in newspapers and director news in channels.

Qamar Zaman Kaira said he appreciated the role of media, actually it’s a driving force and opinion maker.

Shafqat Abbassi said the role of media was appreciable. For strengthening the democracy in Pakistan its role cannot be denied. He said that the editors and director news of channels were responsible enough and, “I think there is no need of regulatory bodies such as PEMRA.”

Dr Ambreen shared her experiences being a child psychiatrist. She said that whatever we see and hear, has a definite impact on our personality, our behaviour and our reactions. In closing remarks Dr Shamim Zaidi said that there is a gap between theory and practice.

Media’s job is to disseminate knowledge but it should not try to create confusion.

Instead of just pointing the flaws we have to come up with the solutions. The session ended with the interactive question answer session.