The Northeast

Covering the North East cauldron

BY VIKAS KUMAR| IN BOOKS |11/10/2017

What are the constraints and dilemmas of newspapers in the North East as they seek to cover current and ancient conflicts? A new book has insights.

 

Tell us and we'll tell the world

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |07/02/2016

Some kinds of sponsored trips for journalists are not a bad idea. In January  the Sikkim government took journalists from Delhi to study how the state had become  India’s first fully organic farming state. The trip was meant to coincide with the prime minister's visit to Sikkim to  announce this..

 

When reportage illuminates

BY ANUP KUMAR| IN BOOKS |01/02/2016

The latest book on the North East is essentially journalistic ethnography--it explains complexities and leaves the judging mostly to the reader.

 

A governor’s strange wisdom

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |24/11/2015

The Governor of Assam and Nagaland, PB Acharya gives the Assam Rifles-Naga Press controversy a fresh lease of life.

 

Guardians of the law attack free speech

BY PRASHANT REDDY THIKKAVARAPU| IN CENSORSHIP |16/11/2015

Between the state and some high courts, free speech is constantly under attack. The Assam Rifles order is only the latest in a string of diktats.

 

Blank editorials today

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |16/11/2015

The editors of six newspapers in the North East have issued a statement  reacting to the Assam rifles order. Three have left their editorial space blank today. The Morung Express said, “On the occasion of the National Press Day, The Morung Express is exercising its independent choice to leave the..

 

The army is totally out of line

BY THE HOOT| IN CENSORSHIP |14/11/2015

“Would the Assam Rifles dare extend the same order to ‘national’ media houses?”

 

The horror of the ‘encounter’

BY ANURAAG BARUAH| IN BOOKS |09/11/2015

An army officer’s confession reveals chilling details about ‘live kills’ and how awards for officers are linked to body counts.

 

Bold new plans by North East rebels

BY Rajeev Bhattacharyya| IN BOOKS |12/06/2015

Rajeev Bhattacharyya's new book reveals that North East separatists plan to establish their own government in Myanmar, like the Tibetans' in Dharamsala

 

Myanmar - a media operation?

BY SUBIR BHAUMIK| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |11/06/2015

As junior information minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore entered the Times Now studio, the complexion of the war changed.

 

KBC trailer breaks new ground

BY JAYANTA MADHAB TAMULY| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |13/08/2014

The bold new trailer highlight prejudices against the north east.

 

Redesigning media education in the Northeast

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN REGIONAL MEDIA |30/08/2013

Recently, the under-reported Northeast India has witnessed a media boom. Time to review the media education imparted to make it more enabling,

 

Where journalists carry guns

BY ABHIJIT DEB| IN REGIONAL MEDIA |22/06/2013

Almost a year after the attack no arrests in the case of Tongam Rina.

 

Death of a newspaper

IN REGIONAL MEDIA |25/04/2013

In its short lifespan of 18 months, the Seven Sisters Post owned by the Saradha Group made a mark in the North-east.

 

Coverage of the North East declines

IN BOOKS |20/04/2013

In 2012 the North East made more news than usual on the front pages of national dailies and on prime time news. But this was not sustained.

 

News can't 'break' a week later

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |27/02/2013

A lathi-charge by Sikkim police gets coverage on TV channels after seven days.

 

Media must revisit north-east

BY UGEN BHUTIA| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |11/09/2012

Even after 65 years of Independence the national media has been consistently lukewarm towards north-east India.

 

Traditional media abdicated

BY Archana Venkat| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |18/08/2012

By harping on rumours, the media's coverage of the recent exodus of people of North East Indian origin showed that it had little intention of seeking the truth.

 

Know the 'Northeast People'

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |20/08/2012

The national media's idea of the north-east is limited to qualifiers such as exotic, remote, unexplored, unknown.

 

 

Eclipsed by Osama

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |03/05/2011

One anguished reader of The Arunachal Times wrote, "Osama killed Dorjee Khandu". But for the people of Arunachal Pradesh, Khandu is probably more important.

 

Khasi daily completes fifty years

IN REGIONAL MEDIA |17/12/2010

The newspaper that fought for Meghalaya’s statehood and reported on the struggle to gain it has turned 50.

 

IE lobbies for large dams in Arunachal

BY Himanshu Thakkar| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |25/10/2010

A series of reports and editorials that began appearing in the Indian Express beginning October 8 makes the newspaper sound like a mouthpiece for the Arunachal Pradesh CM and the pro-dam lobby.

 

Axiomatic journalism

BY Pradip Phanjoubam| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |10/07/2010

The classic story-telling strategy of the media is for the story teller to develop an axiom or hypothesis on what he would be reporting, and then collect information that suits the axiom.

 

Are NGOs from the North East suspect for the media?

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |08/06/2010 

At the end of the press conference one wondered-- had the two women been from so-called ‘ mainland India’ NGOs would the media have asked the same questions?

 

Blacked out blockade

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |21/05/2010

 

PM takes note

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |26/11/2008

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has taken note of the killing of two journalists in the North East in the space of a week. A statement said he has spoken to the chief ministers of Assam and Imphal  about taking immediate steps for prompt and fair investigations into the killings. Unidentified..

 

Journalists in the Northeast fight back

BY nava| IN REGIONAL MEDIA |20/03/2006

Assam and Manipur have witnessed strong responses by journalists to attacks from militants as well as police and security personnel.

 

Thai portal thrives on plagiarism

BY Nava Thakuria| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |13/03/2006

Check out Asian Tribune`s coverage of the Indian Northeast. Almost every story can be traced to one already published somewhere.

 

 

BSF vs Bangladesh media

BY Nava Thakuria| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |20/06/2005

The Daily Star investigates BSF allegations and declares them unfounded.

 

 

Poorly paid, Insecure in North East

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |09/07/2004

Poorly paid, Insecure in North East

 

Living with Information Imbalances

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |23/05/2003

Excessive Information about north India is at the expense of the northeast part of the country..

 

Sikkim publisher faces criminal charge

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |01/01/2002

 

 

 

Arunachal Pradesh

 

CCTV monitors for journo safety

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |19/03/2014

After repeated attacks on the media in Arunachal Pradesh, the state's Chief Minister Nabam Tuki has directed police to provide 24x7 security and have CCTV cameras installed in all newspaper offices in Itanagar, reports the South Asia Mail. Last month, journalists shut down publications in protest after a local students'..

 

Even bullets cannot silence Tongam Rina

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |14/07/2013

A year since the dastardly shooting, the main accused is still absconding, but I'm not giving up,

 

Don't use sedition, scrap it!

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |04/08/2013

And most definitely not for textbook writers who wrongly omit Arunachal Pradesh from a map of India!

 

Helping Rina recover

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |12/04/2013

Tongam Rina, associate editor of Arunachal Times who had been critically injured after being shot at point blank range by unidentified gunmen in July 2012, has been invited by a German NGO for a one-year stay in the country. Rina has been invited by 'Hamburger Stiftung', a German NGO that cares for journalists in..

 

No arrests yet in Tongam Rina case

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |18/01/2013

Seven months after she was shot, journalist Tongam Rina is still waiting for the culprits to be nabbed.

 

Inaction in Arunachal

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |06/08/2012

Almost three weeks after she was shot in Itanagar, Tongan Rina, an associate editor with the Arunachal Times, is suffering from severe post-traumatic stress disorder  while her assailants have not been arrested. All journalists associations need to urge the state government to bring those who shot her to book...

 

In this day and age?

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |17/07/2012

Posted by Jarpum Gamlin, Editor of Eastern Sentinel published from Arunachal Pradesh on Facebook : Need reporter(s). Preference would be given to candidate(s) with teaching background. Females may avoid applying lest they think they are hard-working and mature enough to give due importance to job. ..

 

Newspaper office attacked

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |17/04/2012

The Arunachal Times office in Itanagar came under attack reportedly by a "group of unidentified people". The Associate Editor for the paper states that more than ten people carried out the attack inside the ofifce, "while a few more waited outside." Several computers were damaged in the incident. However no..

 

One more in Arunachal

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |24/03/2012

Itanagar got its sixth daily earlier this week, called Independent Review. This is in addition to   The Arunachal Times, Echo of Arunachal, The Dawnlit Post, Eastern Sentinel and Arunachal Front.

 

`Divisive' media report sparks row

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |15/09/2011

"Come One, Come All" was the slogan at the Nyishi Dignity Rally on September 13. A report in the Times of India which was critical of the Nyishi tribe has brought the community together in a concerted effort to get to the root of the story.

 

No papers in Arunachal

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |20/12/2010

Arunachal Pradesh did not get  newspapers  for  second  consecutive day, on Dec 20. The working journalists of the State have gone for indefinite strike  since December 18 with their demand to nab the culprits associated with an assault on two women  journalists on December 12. They demonstrated in front of..

 

Arunachal’s Chinese footprint

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |23/06/2007

Most areas in Arunachal Pradesh are unable to access both All India Radio and Doordarshan, because they are jammed by the more powerful Chinese transmitters that are used to air Chinese radio and television programmes to the residents of the Arunachal

 

 

 

Meghalaya

 

Meghalaya High Court gags the press

IN REGIONAL MEDIA |29/05/2015

An already beleaguered media in this hill-state will lose its freedom after this order.

 

Climate change via FM

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN COMMUNITY MEDIA |16/05/2010

Families in remote areas of Meghalaya are now getting information about climate change via a popular FM radio music programme in Khasi.

 

The hills are alive with the sound of FM

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |28/02/2010

In a region mired in bloody conflict, the magic of radio is back and has struck an emotional chord with the music loving populace of the region.

 

Anatomy of an ethnic clash---Part II

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |18/06/2005

The Press decided to boycott the chief minister D D Lapang and the home minister Dr Mukul Sangma till they withdrew the cases and apologized.

 

Conning aspiring reporters in Meghalaya

BY linda| IN REGIONAL MEDIA |12/06/2005 

Who or what is the Bharatiya Adarsh Samachar? Or the Adarsh Political Party which shares the same address?

 

Anatomy of an ethnic clash

IN MEDIA PRACTICE |30/05/2005

Was it by design or sheer ignorance that the media whipped up an ethnic scare in Meghalaya last week?

 

Who cares?

| IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |27/09/2004

The North East is simply not on the mainstream media’s radar. On September 22 when a helicopter crash killed a Meghalaya Minister and two MLAs, it figured as a front page brief in the Times of India. But in the Pioneer, Hindustan Times and Asian Age

 

Ban in Meghalaya

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |15/08/2004 ?The Aøchik National Volunteers Council (ANVC) has banned sale of The Meghalaya Guardian in the three Garo hill districts of Meghalaya from Saturday. The members of the Shillong Press Corps will meet on Monday morning to discuss the matter.

 

Rude encounters with Internet censorship

BY Vij| IN DIGITAL MEDIA |01/10/2003

An Internet discussion group created by a militant outfit of the Khasi tribe in Meghalaya invited government censorship, which in turn triggered a ban on thousands of Yahoo! Groups.

 

 

Mizoram

 

Defamation case withdrawn

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |07/10/2017

The Wire reports that the Essel Group has withdrawn a defamation case against it for a story published in June this year based on a CAG report, about lottery irregularities in Mizoram. The Gauhati High Court's Aizawl bench stayed the defamation proceedings in the case. The interesting part is that the case..

 

Mizoram who?

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |05/12/2013

People in the Northeast can be forgiven for wondering if they belong to this country. Because Mizoram was not deemed important enough electorally to merit an exit poll (even as it recorded the highest voter turnout) it did not even get mentioned on TV on Dec 4 as a state..

 

Perfectly provincial

BY LALRAMLIANA VARTE| IN REGIONAL MEDIA |26/05/2012

The front-page tapestry of Mizoram dailies is so overwhelmingly regional that national news does not find place in it unless it is remarkably significant.

 

 

Sikkim quake - Where is the story?

BY TERESA REHMAN| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |22/09/2011

After more than 36 hours a few national TV channels managed to reach Sikkim. Their news capsules were buried between Modi's fast and Ranbir Kapoor's new release. The satellite channels aired from Guwahati were quicker and more pro-active in their response..

 

Sikkim publisher faces criminal charge

IN MEDIA FREEDOM |01/01/2002

There seems to be no justification for Bhattarai's arrest fifteen months after his newspaper published a report that, while controversial, did not affect public order in any way.

 

 

Tripura

 

BJP’s Tripura man

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |15/03/2018

Anyone who is 45 minutes late for a press conference  should apologise. But BJP's man in Tripura Sunil Deodhar offered neither apology nor explanation when he turned up at 3.45 pm for a 3 pm meet at the Mumbai Press Club. Deodhar is from Mumbai, and should have known how..

 

TRS commandant held for murder of reporter in Tripura

BY GEETA SESHU| IN MEDIA FREEDOM |22/11/2017

Bhowmik’s body was brought by four TSR personnel to the Agartala Government Hospital at 2.15pm, two hours 15 minutes after he was shot dead.

 

Another journalist killed in Tripura

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |21/11/2017

Two months after a journalist was killed in Tripura by mob violence, another scribe was shot dead today by the personal security officer of a commandant of the Tripura State Rifles. Shantanu Bhaumik's murder in September this year was followed by the murder on Nov 21 of Sudip Datta Bhaumik who was..

 

‘Why did the police not stop the mob?’

BY GEETA SESHU| IN MEDIA FREEDOM |22/09/2017

Shantanu Bhowmick was clearly marked out since he worked for DinRaat channel which was perceived as being pro-CPM,

 

Tripura CM censored

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |16/08/2017

Thanks to the Hindu and TOI one knows what it was that the Tripura CM said that DD found unpalatable. Indian Express's long story taken from PTI does not give details, nor does the CM's speech figure in IE's inside page round up of CM's speeches. PTI is known for self censoring stories related to media...

 

Tripura: when reporting is concealing

BY LINDA CHHAKCHHUAK| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |31/08/2016

The media betray flagrant bias in reporting on the tribes people and, in the process, conceal the truth about a major demographic transformation.

 

Media silence over Tripura scam

BY SUBIR BHAUMIK| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |08/09/2014

An order to Tripura schools to use their funds to buy books written by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar and former bureaucrat Sanjoy Kumar Panda is a scandal.

 

Killings at Tripura

IN MEDIA WATCH BRIEFS |19/05/2013

Three staffers  of a newspaper in Tripura, Dainik Ganadoot, were killed on Sunday after armed men attacked the paper's office.  According to police, the motorcycle-borne assailants barged into the office  at the Palace Compound at about 3 pm and stabbed a proof reader and a driver on the ground floor..

 

Those mythical bomb blast deaths 

BY Nava Thakuria| IN MEDIA PRACTICE |04/10/2008

How did the media report deaths in the Agartala bomb blasts when nobody died,

 

 

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The new term for self censorship is voluntary censorship, as proposed by companies like Netflix and Hotstar. ET reports that streaming video service Amazon Prime is opposing a move by its peers to adopt a voluntary censorship code in anticipation of the Indian government coming up with its own rules. Amazon is resisting because it fears that it may alienate paying subscribers.                   

Clearly, the run to the 2019 elections is on. A journalist received a call from someone saying they were from Aajtak channel and were conducting a survey, asking whom she was going to vote for in 2019. On being told that her vote was secret, the caller assumed she wasn't going to vote for 'Modiji'. The caller, a woman, also didn't identify herself. A month or two earlier the same journalist received a call, this time from a man, asking if she was going to vote for the BSP.                 

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