ASIA/INDIA - Indian Catholic Press Association marks 40th anniversary “The Catholic community was among the first to take an interest in the field of the media, often thanks to work of missionaries”, Father Babu Joseph, spokesman of the Indian Bishops Conference told Fides

Bangalore (Fides Service) - “At the age of forty a person is mature. And the Indian Catholic Press Association, ICPA is marking its 40th year of activity looking at the past and to the future”. Father Babu Joseph, spokesman of the Indian Bishops Conference told Fides
. “ICPA - Father Joseph said - was formed in 1964 to bring together Catholic papers and magazines, news agencies and publishers, journalists and students and docents in journalism. The founding members were editors of Catholic dailies Deepika, Kerala Times and Thozhilali and weeklies The Examiner, Herald, Sanjivan, Raknno. Today ICPA has 150 members. Since it was established ICPA has organised meetings and seminars to promote reflection and growth in the sector of Catholic media”. Among ICPA’s main objectives mentioned by Father Joseph, to build relations and friendship among the members, to inform and form and to encourage research in the field of communication.
Referring to the activity ICPA on the scene of the media in general, Father Joseph says the media in general India have grown in number. But many play to the popular culture of consumerism and market driven economy and to baser sentiments. “Even the media has become a bazaar where fierce competition exists” he says. Market monopolies in the media are created an sustained by powerful industrial houses. “Where does Catholic Christian media figure in the modern media bazaar? Have we moved with the times, is our voice heard enough and opinions taken seriously by the media in India?” Father Joseph asks.
Father Joseph recalls that the “Christian community was the first among all other communities that moved into the media world. This was largely due to the efforts of missionaries who realised the paramount importance of media in the modern world. Christians missionaries codified alphabets for many languages and dialects in India, compiled dictionaries, wrote manuals of grammar, established printing presses and published newspapers and magazines. But this initial momentum was not sustained as time went by for a variety of reasons.” Father Joseph discerns three reasons for the slow down in the progress of Christian media in India: media seen as propaganda and rightly avoided by the Church; lack of professionally formed Catholics to engage in the media; lack of Church resources .
“‘The Church and the Mass Media’” was the theme of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India General Body Meeting in January this year - Father Joseph said - and the Bishops underlined the need for more engagement in the media. “The Church - the priest concluded - should begin a recruitment drive to enlist more of our journalists who can collaborate with the Church in its efforts to face the contemporary challenges. ”
On the occasion of its 40th year ICPA awarded one of its annual Father Francis D’Britto, editor of Suvartha for the last 21 years, for having made this monthly periodical “a dynamic instrument for social awareness and change”. Father D’Britto has used his writings to champion the cause of the peace, expose social evils and corruption and promote the rights of the poor, the farmers.
(PA) (Agenzia Fides 15/3/2004 lines 43 words 470)