One of the ironies of the public relations profession in India is that in spite of India's reputation as an IT superpower, the Internet is not a part of most organizations' public relations campaigns. Most companies restrict themselves to paying mere lip service to the importance of the Internet and make no attempt to leverage its speed and reach for their benefit. There are no winners in this scenariothe online community loses out on information and the organization on a potential global audience. It is essential that organizations in India recognize the power of the Internet and avail the benefits that it offers them. If they do not, they could find themselves being overtaken by their foreign counterparts. Whatever the Internet lacks, it is certainly not competition!

It has been in India for almost a decade now. But even today, the Internet rarely merits more than a sundry mention in the public relations programs and strategies of most organizations in the country. This is more than a bit ironic, given the fact that India is considered an IT superpower and its programmers are considered among the best in the world. The sad truth is that in India, the Internet is yet to be acknowledged as a medium in its own right.

The biggest reason for this cavalier treatment of the Internet is the perception that the Internet is just like the other media such as print publications, TV and the radio. I remember a CEO of a FMCG company being surprised when I quizzed him about PR initiatives on the Internet. "Why do we need any special measures?" he asked. "The Internet is just like television or newspaper. You just get the information on a monitorthat's all! The information essentially is the same." He could not have been more wrong. While it does have some of the properties of the other media, the Internet can under no circumstances be considered on the same plane.