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Meet AZAM KHAN correspondent at Express Tribune; lately building public awareness of Cyber Crime Bill 2015 and its consequences on Freedom of Speech
By Maida Khan
Azam Khan, 31 years old journalist is working with Express Tribune since 2010. Parliament, Human Rights and Information Technology related developments are the beats he covers. Unlike many other correspondents and authors, he has contributed 1402 news stories on The Express Tribune’s website during last four and a half years. Mr. Khan is also passionate about working on special assignments.Image may be NSFW.
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Academic career of Azam is in line with social sciences but he wasn’t journalism student. He did his masters in Defence and Strategic Studies from Quaid-e-Azam University Islamabad. 9/11 incident’s coverage on local and global media especially; The Guardian and The New York Times intensified his concern in journalism hence, motivated him to join this field. Mr. Khan started his career as journalist in May 2008. He devoted seven years of his life to this field.
“If I would tell you the name of my favorite journalistic figure, you might not be familiar with him because I idealize people based on their working skills and ethical performance rather than the face value.”, said Mr. Khan when he was asked about his favorite journalistic figure or inspiration in his sphere. According to him Pakistani journalists associated with electronic and also Urdu print media needs to polish style of stating news like a reporter. Image may be NSFW.
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Near him, duty of journalist is not just to tell 5W’s and. Public counts on journalists to know about truth related to any issue, and gives very noble position by 1 H (who, where, what, when, why and how) to the public, it’s also an important component of their duty to investigate the facts they are reporting. It sounds good to claim one self a journalist, but it’s not easy to realize the responsibility one carries being a journalist on his/her shoulders believing in them, playing with their minds and sentiments for remunerative purposes; that’s disgusting in his opinion.
“Express Tribune had the most extensive online readership.” – Bilal Lakhani
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Before joining The Express Tribune, Khan served as reporter in The Nation newspaper. He also hosted Radio Pakistan’s current affairs program both in Urdu and English for last five years. Express Tribune, Pakistan’s solely intercontinental allied newspaper with global version of The New York times launched in April, 2010. Azam joined Express Tribune in 2011, and felt he was then at the right place. Express Tribune accommodated his creative skills contrary to prior organization he had served. According to the note by its publisher Bilal Lakhani, this English Newspaper of Pakistan had the most extensive online readership on both local and global level in 2012.
“Online readership of our paper is thousand times more as compared to print side.” – Azam Khan
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Sharing his perspective about the impact of social media on news he asserted, audiences now particularly rely on social media to acquire news updates. Therefore, news institutions remain active 24/7 on their official news websites and Facebook plus Twitter pages. “Occasionally, we divulge news on the web directly from field, you can see Live News section on our official website. Online readership of our paper is thousand times more as compared to print side. Moreover, traffic on our Facebook and Twitter pages is thousand times more as compared to readership on our official website. We get immense response from audience side on social media.” Mr. Khan states that Express Tribune has separate desk to handle online news stories. “Our web desk knows about each and every story and how much time was given by a reader while opening a specific story.” Number of re-tweets, shares, likes is accessible on their official website to know how much audiences have shared and liked their content plus they can also spot traffic of readers on some specific news story. To make audiences stay tuned to their website, they try to provide chunk of critical information on any subject in form of headlines/tickers. And then they upload full edition of that news story as soon as possible.
Social media acts as marketing tool for us – Azam Khan
“When any of our correspondents uncover some creative or critical idea, we first advertise it on social media like what we will be publishing soon on our website. In this way, we grab the attention and interest of readers. As I stated earlier, we get thousand times greater response via social media therefore, we share official web link of full news story with some captivating description on our social media pages and audience click that link to read full news. This is also one supreme tactic used by us to increase traffic and make audiences stay on our official news website.” Being journalist, Mr. Khan feels that he feels less constrained by the traditional rules and regulations on social media. Periodically, he gets to know about some story on social media. Mainly, Twitter is of great importance for journalists. Journalists use Twitter as news source because many officials uses this platform to propagate their messages. But, responsibility to verify the authenticity of that news is part of journalist’s duty. Social media might be an astounding instrument but near Mr. Khan it cannot be an alternative for face to face communication which makes it easier for journalists to interrogate and question the facts on the spot; and he loves this part of his job where he can hold people accountable for their acts.
Cyber Crime Bill 2015: Speak Now or Never!
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Since past few months many journalists and social media activists have been fighting for freedom of speech on digital media. Prevention of Electronic Crimes Bill 2015, will allow Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to block any information or content which they might feel infringing the ethical laws on digital media. Activists and journalists believe that Cyber Crime Bill 2015 will not only restrict the digital space of an individual, but will also infringe the right to speak one’s mind (freedom to speech and opinion). Mr. Khan also believes so. He devoted many of his writings on this issue for building public awareness.
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“Debates are going on about this Bill. We can’t give any judgmental opinion before this Bill appears in its final. But there are certain things which people need to know. Government officials in their speeches color the black and white reality in such a manner that a common person gets convinced for its implementation. As stated by them, one of the reasons to implement this Bill is to penalize people who are involved in posting ones pictures without permission anywhere. Hearing this statement, all of us seem to get convinced by their idea to implement this Bill. When in reality, political condemnation or critical analysis on government measures would be considered as hate speech. By giving this authority to PTA government would regulate the information flow and content on digital media. PTA would be able to block content posted via any digital medium without defining the obscenity or immorality in the content. They would have access to private chats of individuals. Social media was able to create an impact on people’s life as this medium provided counter narrative to spot and observe second side of the story. Government is trying to curtail freedom to express one’s opinions on social media. Its good as far as regulation on online criminal activities is concerned but public is unaware of their hidden agendas. Being journalist, it’s my duty to speak for public rights and truth despite threats from some government officials.” (Journalists threatened for reporting on Cybercrime Bill)
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This reporter was none other than Mr. Khan. Covering PAT and PTI marches, he was brutally beaten up by police while reporting on the condition of protesters and posting their pictures on social media. He identified himself as media person but still he became victim of police violence. “I was taking and posting pictures of a mother and her infant child during tear gas shelling. Police came and beaten me with clubs and I got head injuries. I was shifted to hospital and posted news related to this incident from my bed (Personal account: No justice for journalists attacked during sit-ins). You can observe what cost we pay being journalists to provide people truth. I feel pity when I see unethical practices prevailing in this noble profession. Like Western countries media in Pakistan should be localized but unfortunately our media is centralized.”
At the end, he quoted very famous saying as a message for all journalists:
‘A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for’
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Observing his manifestation of devotion towards his duty, we hope that soon Mr. Khan will reach the elevations of success due to his valor and exceptional abilities.
About Author:
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Author is an aspiring journalist. She is multi-talented and very much committed to her work. She started her career in journalism as reporter from PTV News Islamabad. She did not confine herself to journalism field only. She is great writer, director, producer and photographer. She has excellent communication skills. “Jack of all trades” is an appropriate term to define her versatile personality.