How caste plays out in India’s newsrooms
This story was first published in News Laundry, and is a transcript of a video report posted by News Laundry refering to their project report on how caste system plays out in the Indian newsrooms. You can watch the full video report (source of this story) by News Laundry by clicking here.
Did you know that three out of four anchors of flagship TV news debates are upper caste? That not one is Dalit, Adivasi, or OBC?
That merely 10 out of the 972 articles featured on the covers of a dozen magazines that we studied are about issues related to caste?
That no more than five percent of all articles published in the country’s six largest English newspapers are written by Dalits and Adivasis?
These are some of the shocking findings contained in the report Who Tells Our Stories Matters: Representation of Marginalised Caste Groups in Indian Newsrooms, which was published last year by The Media Rumble in association with Oxfam India.
Sometime in 1996 a foreign correspondent called up journalist BN Uniyal to ask him if he knew any Dalit journalist, after spending days talking to friends and colleagues Mr. Uniyal was unable to find anyone like zero literally. In 2017, after having conducted a similar search across the country for more than 10 years journalists Sudipta Mondal said he was only able to find eight Dalit journalists in English media and only two of them risked coming out to him.
Between October 2018 and March 2019 News laundry and Oxfam together conducted a research project to find out more about the representation of marginalized caste groups in Indian media, the results were shocking to say the least, three out of every four anchors in flagship debates on TV news were upper caste not one Dalit or Adivasi or OBC. Only ten out of the 972 articles featured on the cover pages of the 12 magazines that we looked at were about caste related issues and no more than 5% of all articles in English newspapers were written by Dalits or Adivasis. The research suggests that Indian media is still dominated by upper castes, scheduled tribes are almost entirely absent while scheduled castes are represented mostly by social activists and politicians not by journalists OBCs are similarly underrepresented even though they are estimated to constitute over half of India's population. The fact that me a ‘Suvarna’ is sitting here telling you all this in a video is testimony to the findings of this report.
The report is basically aimed at opening and informing a public debate on discrimination and social exclusion in media. Let's go back to the basics first, caste is an ancient system of discriminatory segregation that is determined by birth. It is based on notions of purity and pollution and is rooted in the Hindu doctrine, the caste system divides Hindus into four varnas or categories these are, Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, and Shudra, those who fall outside these endogamous groups each with a preordained social function are known as Dalits or Scheduled Castes and Adivasis or Scheduled Tribes the still pervasive caste system unsurprisingly raise its ugly head in our newsrooms - there are vast sections of India's marginalized caste groups who lack access to media platforms and discourses that shape public opinion. This leads to certain voices not being represented in our news ecosystem.
Take for instance leadership positions in newsrooms, of the 121 newsrooms that the report looked at a whopping 106 were occupied by journalists from upper castes and none by those belonging to Schedule Caste or Scheduled Tribes. Let's take a peek at the panelists on English TV news channels, a mere 5.6 percent of panelists across the survey channels belong to Scheduled Castes and shockingly not even 1% of them belong to Scheduled Tribes, what's even more bizarre is that during the discussions on caste issues 62% of the panelists across news channels were from the general category, 89% of leadership positions in English TV news channels belong to the general category along with a 76% of anchors who hosted flagship shows the results got even more skewed when we looked at Hindi news channels where hundred percent of the leadership positions belong to the general category and so did 80 percent of the anchors on prime time shows.
Let's take a look at newspapers, according to the report media professionals from marginalized caste groups do not occupy any leadership positions in the six English newspapers and seven Hindi newspapers that we looked at. In the 16,000 articles that we poured over in English newspapers over 60% of the articles were written by upper caste writers in Hindi newspapers nearly 56 percent of writers belong to the general category the only silver lining was Amar Ujala where hundred percent of the articles published on caste issues were written by contributors belonging to the marginalized caste groups.
Now let's look at digital media 84% of all leadership positions belong to the general category just like newspapers and TV news channels there is no representation from scheduled tribes and scheduled castes in the digital media space, in fact the study found that 56 percent of writers belong to the general category and yes news laundry was also one of the organizations that was surveyed. Now coming to magazines the study chose 12 magazines covering a range of interests
among them 63.5% percent of the total output came from the writers belonging to general category and only 11.2% from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes combined while OBC writers contributed to a meager 1.1%.
Talking about giving space to caste issues only India Today, India Today Hindi, The Caravan and Sarita gave space to caste issues on their covers. However, a majority of the caste stories published in these magazines were penned by general category writers. At India today Hindi this percentage stood at an overwhelming 99.5 percent the report clearly signifies the dire need for the inclusion of marginalized groups in India newsrooms for an equitable and developed society the representation of all is a must and more than anywhere else this applies to our newsrooms.
This story was first published in News Laundry, and is a transcript of a video report posted by News Laundry refering to their project report on how caste system plays out in the Indian newsrooms. You can watch the full video report (source of this story) by News Laundry by clicking here.
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Sujit Nair raises concerns over speculation of DMK-AIADMK understanding to block TVK
Chennai: Journalist and political commentator Sujit Nair has expressed concern over speculation that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam could explore a post-poll understanding to prevent Vijay-led Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam from forming the government in Tamil Nadu.
In a social media post, Sujit Nair said the election verdict in Tamil Nadu reflected a clear public demand for political change and argued that the mandate should be respected irrespective of political preferences.
Referring to reports and political discussions surrounding a possible understanding between the DMK and AIADMK, he said he hoped such developments remained only speculative conversations and did not turn into reality.
Nair stated that if such an alliance were to take shape, it would raise serious questions about ideological politics in the country. He said TVK had emerged through a democratic electoral process and that the legitimacy to govern in a parliamentary democracy comes from the people’s verdict.
According to him, attempts to prevent an electoral winner from forming the government through unexpected political arrangements may be constitutionally valid, but many people could view them as politically opportunistic.
He further said that such a move could particularly affect the political image of the DMK, which has historically projected itself around ideology, social justice and opposition politics. Nair said that in ideological terms, the DMK appeared closer to TVK than to the AIADMK, and joining hands with its long-time political rival only to remain in power could weaken its broader political narrative.
He added that the same questions would apply to the AIADMK as well, as the party had spent decades positioning itself against the DMK and such an arrangement could create discomfort among its cadre and supporters.
Drawing a comparison with Maharashtra politics in 2019, Nair said he had expressed similar views when the Shiv Sena formed an alliance with the Indian National Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party after the Assembly elections.
He said post-poll alliances between long-standing political rivals often create a public perception that ideology and electoral mandates become secondary when political power equations come into play.
Nair also said such developments increase public cynicism towards politics and reinforce the belief among voters that ideology is often sidelined after elections.
He maintained that the Tamil Nadu verdict was emphatic and said respecting both the spirit and substance of the mandate was important for the credibility of democratic politics.
