A Piece of Irresponsible Journalism? (October, 1981)
Every now and then materials appearing in this journal seem to give unintended offence to various readers. The lattest to do so is the news report entitled “Refugee Schools May Come Under Tibetan Administration” from our May 1981 issue. Some of the Indian heads of the Central Schools for Tibetan have tended to see the piece as a malicious personal attack on them. The editor, who also happens to be the publisher of this journal and the author of that particular item, has received more than one threat of libel suit.
The sentence cited as defamatory appears around the middle of the report and reads as follows: “Some of the school heads are notorious for raping girl students, corruption and administrative ineptitudenss.” Now that the legal counsels of the offended parties have pointed out to me, the sentence taken by itself does appear a bit strong. However, I believe that if the entire report is studied properly it will become clear that no attempt at defamation has been made. It has reported a fact—that Tibetans wish to run these schools themselves. The rest of the item deals with the reasons why they feel the need for this change. In other words, this section is made up of what they feel or what they say they feel, not of concrete verifiable facts. And it has prefexed with the following sentence: “Although Rikha (Secretary of the Tibetan Education Council, the only person quoted in the report) was reluctant to admit to this reporter, it is generally believed among Tibetans—students, teachers, as well as rest of refugee community—that administrative mismanagement is almost entirely to be blamed for the poor performance of the Tibetan schools.”
In restrospect, I think if there was any breach of journalistic practice committed, it was in my failure to begin each and every sentence with “Tibetans say” or some similar phrase. The matter of rape cases, corruption and administrative ineptitudeness were mentioned not as facts known to the reporter but as rumours heard in the Tibetan community. I believe the reporting of these facts (what the Tibetans say) was necessary as reasons for the Tibetan wish to run the CTSA schools, a piece of news that would be of interest of sufficient number of our readers. I have no means of ascertaining the veracity of these allegations unless I resort to the practically impossible course of spending an extended period of time in each of the schools. I don’t think a short visit to one or two of the schools will be sufficient for this purpose. If I were taken round a school during such a visit, I shall most certainly not witness scenes of rape or misuse of offices; and this will not prove or disprove anything.
I might add here that Tibetans also talk of shortcomings (real or imagined) of some of their own people involved with the running of these schools; and also that they have nothing but praise for some of the Indian teachers. But that particular item of news was not the place to talk about these. It was not a general feature on Tibetan schools, but a topical report on the Tibetan attempt to takeover these schools and, naturally, the reason for this.
I am sorry if some people have misunderstood the intention of that report and hope that this clarification has helped set their at ease.
Every now and then materials appearing in this journal seem to give unintended offence to various readers. The lattest to do so is the news report entitled “Refugee Schools May Come Under Tibetan Administration” from our May 1981 issue. Some of the Indian heads of the Central Schools for Tibetan have tended to see the piece as a malicious personal attack on them. The editor, who also happens to be the publisher of this journal and the author of that particular item, has received more than one threat of libel suit.
The sentence cited as defamatory appears around the middle of the report and reads as follows: “Some of the school heads are notorious for raping girl students, corruption and administrative ineptitudenss.” Now that the legal counsels of the offended parties have pointed out to me, the sentence taken by itself does appear a bit strong. However, I believe that if the entire report is studied properly it will become clear that no attempt at defamation has been made. It has reported a fact—that Tibetans wish to run these schools themselves. The rest of the item deals with the reasons why they feel the need for this change. In other words, this section is made up of what they feel or what they say they feel, not of concrete verifiable facts. And it has prefexed with the following sentence: “Although Rikha (Secretary of the Tibetan Education Council, the only person quoted in the report) was reluctant to admit to this reporter, it is generally believed among Tibetans—students, teachers, as well as rest of refugee community—that administrative mismanagement is almost entirely to be blamed for the poor performance of the Tibetan schools.”
In restrospect, I think if there was any breach of journalistic practice committed, it was in my failure to begin each and every sentence with “Tibetans say” or some similar phrase. The matter of rape cases, corruption and administrative ineptitudeness were mentioned not as facts known to the reporter but as rumours heard in the Tibetan community. I believe the reporting of these facts (what the Tibetans say) was necessary as reasons for the Tibetan wish to run the CTSA schools, a piece of news that would be of interest of sufficient number of our readers. I have no means of ascertaining the veracity of these allegations unless I resort to the practically impossible course of spending an extended period of time in each of the schools. I don’t think a short visit to one or two of the schools will be sufficient for this purpose. If I were taken round a school during such a visit, I shall most certainly not witness scenes of rape or misuse of offices; and this will not prove or disprove anything.
I might add here that Tibetans also talk of shortcomings (real or imagined) of some of their own people involved with the running of these schools; and also that they have nothing but praise for some of the Indian teachers. But that particular item of news was not the place to talk about these. It was not a general feature on Tibetan schools, but a topical report on the Tibetan attempt to takeover these schools and, naturally, the reason for this.
I am sorry if some people have misunderstood the intention of that report and hope that this clarification has helped set their at ease.
posted by editorla at
9:21 PM
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