What drives `mainstreamø mediaøs response to the North East?

IN Media Practice | 25/01/2005

This decline affects not just the ignoring of NE India, it also includes the blotting out of rural, peripheral and tribal India.

Rupa Chinai

Two decades of close involvement in the newsrooms of the mainstream Indian press has provided insights into the thinking and working of Indian journalists and the business houses that shape the response to media coverage of the North-East (NE) region.

The

Assam

agitation of 1980 and the turmoil in the region was a bench mark, when for the first time the Indian media acknowledged its neglect of this region: that none of the `mainstream` media had a correspondent placed in this vital and sensitive region; that they were dependent on coverage provided by correspondents based in distant Calcutta and that the aspirations of people in the NE were not being communicated to the rest of

India

. Some effort was made to rectify this situation thereafter.

The 1980-90`s were still the years when Indian journalism believed that like the judiciary, it is an arm of democracy that has an important role to play in ensuring social justice and in the task of nation building. Despite the many constraints it faced, primarily from penny-pinching newspaper managements, Indian journalism struggled to provide widespread coverage of news, and support it with background, critical thinking, insightful analysis and writing of a fairly high order. Although coverage of the NE region during those years left much to be desired, mainly because of constraints on travel, it had at least found a place in the news bureau.

The current decline in meaningful coverage of the NE by the Indian media must be examined in the light of an insidious trend that has been at work over the past ten years, as I have seen it. This decline affects not just the ignoring of NE India, it also includes the blotting out of rural, peripheral and tribal

India

.

Time and again, we are seeing the miserable failure of the Indian media in covering issues that matter. Obsessed with lifestyle and trivia, the nations leading dailies stand accused of missing out on major news as it happened -- be it the death of farmers in states like Andhra, malnutriton deaths in Maharashtra, or the protest of Manipuri women against rape in Imphal. Though some newspapers do make belated attempts to recover lost ground, their coverage has amounted to little more than a `flash in the pan’, and one has little idea of the ongoing ferment until there is some explosion.

Owner-driven editorial diktat provides no room for editors to apply independent judgement in pursuit of issues such as development in NE India. This scenario is likely to change with the opening up of the trade link between India and South Asia, but the genuine interests of the people of the North-East who face overwhelming changes in their position as a corridor to this trade link, will I suspect, be met with the same cynical disregard. The more serious issues they face will continue to be relegated to the `NE page’ brought out in the Kolkota edition, which is considered to be enough to keep the north-easterners satisfied and keep advertising money from this region rolling in.

The owners and managers of one of

India

`s leading daily newspaper`s have articulated their media ideology succinctly. Some nuggets: A newspaper is a brand, and its goal is to sell products being promoted by advertisers and their clients. Our job is to nurture a lifestyle that will promote the use of these brands. Our target audience is 18 to 36 years age group - not a day older. We seek to provide them the daily national and international news they would want to keep in touch with, and issues that would concern their immediate existence. Rural, tribal and peripheral

India

is not of daily interest. States like Bihar are of no interest at all. Focus on the urban metros, and in a city like Mumbai, Colaba (an up-market area) is important, not Dharavi (a slum area) etc….

Missing in this diktat of owner-editors is the absence of understanding that the Indian media has a vital role to play in blowing the warning whistle long before the explosion, be it in political, social or health crisis. It has a role in creating an enlightened public opinion and a meaningful government response when it explains background, creates an understanding of the linkages, draws out the voices and experiences of the most marginalised segments of society so that we can accurately know why and how things are going wrong.

Over the past five years one has seen a shift towards reams of space for fluff and trivia. Well-researched, investigative articles that provide news, background and analysis are increasingly relegated to inside, left-hand pages and severely slashed or spiked. While there is a welcome attempt to make writing readable and filled with human interest, it is veering towards an extreme of stylised writing -- novellas that end up trivialising serious subjects. Journalists are no longer encouraged to travel, develop contacts, or enhance their knowledge of a specialised area. The emphasis is on yardage -- the number of stories produced daily -- not the quality that is put out. Increments, promotions and the worth of a journalist are decided on that basis.

Senior, experienced journalists who earn high salaries, by virtue of the years they have put in, are being forced out of their jobs with the termination of their contracts. Those protected by wage board laws are being put into `surplus rooms` where they are forced to sit the whole day without work, disallowed contact with other departments, and in a state of utter demoralisation and despair. Unable to find jobs in a tight job market, and unable to pursue a career change at this stage in their life, they are forced to accept this humiliation for the sake of a miserable monthly pay cheque on which their families are dependent.

Meanwhile journalist recruitments increasingly focus on raw, young `freshers’, who come in at inflated salaries, are made to work long hours, are brainwashed into following the organisation`s brand of journalism, who are judged for their loyalty and commitment to the organisation they work for, and by their ability to conform, rather than the ability to ask incisive questions, creativity and leg work. Fellowships enabling journalists to travel and study issues are discouraged.

We have now reached a stage where, barring some rare exceptions, commercial and business interests form the bedrock of editorial policies, where it is owners and advertising managers, and editors with the mindset of corporate managers, who determine editorial decisions. A constant state of insecurity has ensured that editors in many newspapers are in no position to provide inspired leadership or foster an atmosphere in which journalists can work without fear or favour.

This experience of the print media forces one to put this question: Does the Indian media believe it owes any responsibility to this country and its people for the quality of its coverage? With what right is it blotting out vast sections of this country that have no other means of being heard? While helping themselves to advantages such as freehold land, subsidy on equipment or newsprint, and other sizeable benefits, what right have newspaper managements got to subvert the functioning of the free and independent Indian press? If readers do not get satisfactory answers then they must respond decisively by stopping their subscriptions and conveying their dissatisfaction.

While this represents my first-hand experience of the Indian print media, this scenario is also true of the corporate culture that is being practiced by Indian industry and business. Putting profits before people, it is perpetuating a culture of consumerism with its adverse health effects on the individual and society. In seeking to emulate the worst aspects of western culture, we are perpetuating a work culture that is detrimental to Indian health, morale and development potential.

Development in North-East India:

Recent years have seen huge sums of `development` money being poured into the NE region, particularly in states where violence has escalated. The prime motive in New Delhi has been to wean the people of this region away from insurgency. In the absence of any meaningful development plan their approach has in fact accentuated the problem by creating an elite segment within an egalitarian society and generating corruption. The social havoc `easy money` has created in several NE states is there for all to see. Its impact is particularly felt on the youth of this region, who seek access to luxury goods and aspire for material prosperity, often at the cost of bartering common natural resources for short-term individual gain.

Strikingly absent in their thinking is a concept of a long-term future, the possibility of individual and community prosperity, and the question of what will they be left with when the flow of money from Delhi stops. Lacking skills and knowledge base, many individuals are aspiring to do `business` and are falling into the hands of a cartel of middle-man either from within their own community or outside. The region`s rich natural resources and agricultural base are being sold off at a throw-away price because communities do not have the means and skills required to create a `finished product` from processing to design and packaging in their own areas.

Neither is the community equipped to connect with the market. There is a vast, appreciative market that exists for NE products in the rest of

India

. It also exists in neighbouring

Bangladesh

and

Burma

. The market also lies across the river -- so many urban areas of the NE are crying for fresh fish, vegetables and fruit, and the irony is that just across the river, there is a glut of agricultural products that cannot reach the market. Thwarting the development of these markets is absence of basic communication infrastructure. By failing to focus on this responsibility, successive governments, it would seem, have sought to keep the economies of the NE region in a state of bondage.

How one enables a community to be at the core of every development activity is a key factor one is slowly beginning to understand. The experience of Khonoma village in Nagaland, declared a `green village` by the Centre and being prepared for eco-tourism with a massive grant, is beginning to provide insights into what this means in reality. This experience needs to be closely followed and documented because it provides important learning experiences on the struggles of a village to have a say in its own development process.

My studies of health conditions in four interior districts of Nagaland reveal the abysmal state of primary health facilities, the total lack of awareness on preventive health and inability of communities to cope with simple, easily cured illnesses.

It is important to follow the experience of a village like Chizami in Phek district, Nagaland, which is not sitting around waiting for government to do things for them. It has taken the initiative to set up its own health centre, and trained its young people to become health workers who help the villagers in knowing how to tackle their health problems. Another important initiative taken by this village is donation of land to create a centre for the NE, where the youth of this region can find an alternative to insurgency by developing their knowledge and skills base.

The NE media has a vital role in communicating these experiences so that communities can learn from their neighbours and are better prepared to discuss the issue of development that would be beneficial to them.

I believe that vital to the future of the NE region is the development of the NE media. It is essential that journalists here have an understanding of background on economic issues, of history, of international experience and debates, so that they can begin to ask the right questions, critically examine policies as they emanate from Delhi and their state capitals, and be able to follow through on what happens in their implementation thereafter.

The NE media must begin to speak on behalf of the region, and be able to represent the aspirations of the many myriad communities here. A piecemeal solution to problems can only result in the kind of instability we have seen here. In taking a holistic view in its coverage, I believe the NE media will finally come into its own and be a force that is heard and respected across

India

. This will happen when it facilitate a process of dialogue that takes into account the many microscopic groups here, each of whom hold aspirations for their language, culture and development. Solutions can emerge when there is a basis of respect and understanding.

I often remember the words of Bihu Ram Bodo, a writer, an intellectual, a school master, who was General Secretary of the Bodo Sahbitya Sabha. He was a man who loved his people, the Bodo tribe of

Assam

, well enough to tell them the truth about themselves, and who was silenced for ever by those who found his truth too bitter to swallow. Speaking at that time about the All Bodo Students Union he said, ``They are simply accusing the Assamese people of being chauvinistic and anti-Bodo. May be they are both, but still you have to have a dialogue with them. Our solution lies in Dispur, not just in Delhi``.

I believe there is truth in his words and it applies to the myriad communities of the NE -- the Karbi, Mishing, Rabha, Kuki, Naga, Meitei as well. In thinking about the ongoing Indo-Naga dialogue, a question one confronts is: After 57 years of bitter struggle, what are the Naga going to be left with? I believe the answers to this question will begin to emerge when Naga society as a whole begins to engage in a dialogue within itself, as it has started to do; as also a dialogue with its neighbours and ordinary people in the rest of

India

.

That the media has a vital role to play in engaging individuals and society in this process of dialogue struck me forcibly one night during a clandestine meeting arranged in Imphal for me to meet two young commanders of the Kuki National Army. They told me how they had been responsible for pushing a bus load of innocent Naga and Meitei passengers over a cliff, during the height of the Kuki-Naga conflict. This encounter chilled me. I realised that in their present mindset, there was no way I could reason with them. Yet, they were not hardened criminals, they needed someone who would listen to them and continue the process of dialogue with them.

This dialogue is made possible by someone who can understand what has brought them here, and who might be able to plant a thought that my some day germinate into a more creative and responsible response to their problems. It is the culmination of history, of depravation, the break-up of the social fabric that breeds such inhumanity. A media effort at creating that space for dialogue might enable individuals and communities to see their own history with new perspectives.

There is an enormous fund of goodwill that lies amongst ordinary people in the rest of

India

for the communities of the NE region. Such goodwill should be harnessed for the development of your schools and colleges, health services, for infrastructure building. It should be harnessed for the development of your products and the building of markets. It should be harnessed to create a highly professional media that is well educated and well connected in every field. Irrespective of how political questions are ultimately settled, the fact is that we are neighbours, and our long term survival depends on the building of people to people linkages for our common good and equal benefit.

Courtesy: The Shillong Times (Features)