'Paid news' claim lands Udayavani in a fix, Congress complains to EC

Vijay Hegde, an advocate and the election agent of the Congress candidate K. Jayaprakash Hegde on Wednesday met the deputy commissioner Dr. R Reju, who is also the election officer, and handed over the written complaint.

The Coastal Karnataka's popular Kannada daily has been publishing a series of pro-BJP reports for the last couple of weeks. These pro-BJP advertisements have been camouflaged into news stories and lakhs of rupees have been paid to the paper's owners, the complaint said.

It was said that Mr. Hegde was not keen on taking on one of the mightiest newspapers of the coastal Karnataka, but since the one-sided publicity continued unabated, the Congress candidate had to petition the election officer.

Mr. Hegde was initially apprehensive that if he went against the paper, his pictures and news would be blacked out. But the Congress leaders, including Pramod Madhwaraj, had made public their resentment about the 'paid news' without naming any newspaper.

In the March 14 edition, the Udayavani had carried a 'news story' titled 'State Government's bumper offer for fishermen', which hailed the contribution of the State Government to the fishermen without going into any analysis.

The 'report' also quoted presidents of government-appointed bodies of fishermen, who are also active in BJP. For the last few days, Udayavani has been publishing such pro-BJP special stories on page 12 evoking criticism from its readers and non-BJP party workers.

Speaking to presspersons in Udupi on Wednesday, Mr. Madhwaraj hit out at BJP for misleading people throw 'paid news' and taking the credit for the welfare schemes implemented by the Central Government for fishermen. "The Union Government has implemented several schemes for the fishermen, but the BJP is indulging in cheap politics by taking the credit," he said.

"Doctor Acharya Abhivruddi Kodugegale BJPige Srirakshe," "Sri Kshetra Kachchurina Abhivriddi: Rajya Sarakaradinda eradu Koti Rupaigu mikki anudana," are some of the headlines given to the alleged 'paid news' items. Interestingly, most of these items do not have a dateline, which is a clear deviation from the Udayavani's stylesheet.