Why isn't the Press Council doing more to end the unethical practice of "paid news"?

That is the theme of an op-ed piece in Mint by P.N. Vasanti, director of the New Delhi-based research organisation Centre for Media Studies.

Here are some relevant excerpts for the uninitiated:

While there has been debate on and off over the relevance of the Press Council in the prevailing media scenario, the debate over so-called paid content has revived the argument over the role of the agency and whether there is any point in keeping it alive.

At the core of the latest controversy is the sale of space in the print and time in the electronic media. What’s carried in that space or time isn’t labelled as advertising for the benefit of readers and viewers, but masquerades as legitimate news.

While this trend itself is not new, it has become more deeply entrenched and even institutionalized in recent times. P. Sainath broke the story in The Hindu about politicians who engaged in the practice during the Maharashtra state elections of 2009. He even gave specific prices for the various types of coverage sold by newspapers, besides showing how the same write-ups praising chief minister Ashok Chavan were carried in three different newspapers during the elections.

Media students will find the whole article instructive.