Jairam Ramesh, Azad on Congress ‘media panel’

A perceived communication gap with the media has prompted the Congress Party leadership to constitute a special panel comprising its 15 most articulate members to interact with the media, particularly to participate in television discussions.

The panel has apparently been formed because the leadership was worried over unimportant, ill-informed or incompetent spokes persons making TV appearances and making a mess of the party's image.

It comes against the backdrop of the party's perceived failure in countering the opposition's high-voltage propaganda on corruption, despite skeletons rattling in their own cupboards.

Members of the union ministry on the panel, announced by Congress media chairperson Janardan Dwivedi on Friday, are health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, information and broadcasting minister Ambika Soni, parliamentary affairs minister Pawan Bansal, environment minister Jairam Ramesh and rural development minister C P Joshi.

Although the Congress media department shortlists leaders for appearances on television, a change has been brought about by including senior ministers in the panel for presenting the party's views – even if most of them are ministers of state rather than cabinet ministers.

The other members of the panel are Girija Vyas, Abhisek Singhvi, P C Chako, Raj Babbar, Renuka Chowdhary, Sanjay Nirupam, Jayanthi Natrajan, Manish Tewari, Mohan Prakash and Shakil Ahmed.