Any programme taken up by the government would be informed to the people only through media. If the government takes any policy decision or if a minister wants to make any announcement, it has to be done only through media. So, the government officials or ministers should have access to media within a short notice.
So, in any state secretariat, there is a publicity cell, managed by the Information and Public Relations department. This cell will have a media centre where media persons belonging to all media houses on “Secretariat beat” assemble and from there, they would go to the departments and ministries to get news.
Whenever the chief minister or any other minister wants to hold a press conference, it will be communicated to the reporters in the publicity cell and within minutes, they could attend the press conference.
This simple logic is missing in chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who is considered to be media savvy. There is no publicity cell in Velagapudi Secretariat. And there is not even a place for the media persons to sit for some time and attend press conferences whenever they are held. They are now forced to come all the way from Vijayawada, travelling for nearly 20-25 kilometres through narrow roads to reach Velagapudi.
And there is no facility for them to file their reports from within Secretariat. They have to go back to Vijayawada to file reports. In the meantime, if they get a call for another press conference, they have come back to Velagapudi again.
The journalists are now demanding that they should be given some place to work within Secretariat and take rest.
