The use of Twitter has seen a significant rise among the journalists in India since 2007 as they find it helpful to assimilate, disseminate, and spread news to the people. But in Odisha the trend is yet to catch up among the media persons. SAMATA KUMAR JOSHI's study shows that the scribes in the State still consider the site complicated.
The protests against Salman Rushdie's presence at the Jaipur Literary Festival by fundamentalist groups is undemocratic no doubt, but he wasn't the only one targeted. The movements of other writers, journalists and researchers are continuously restricted in free India. A FREE SPEECH HUB comment.
On January 18th, thousands of websites went dark to protest against two US bills that threaten online security and freedom of expression. MIR UBAID delves into the details.
The unseemly rush to initiate punitive action against Google, Facebook and other sites illustrates our systemic inability to deal with 'problematic' content, and our laws only fossilize this intolerance, says GEETA SESHU
Even as journalists and others in Britain have condemned the racism exhibited by BBC in an India Special edition of Top Gear, the Indian newspapers have by and large neglected the issue. RICHA KAUL PADTE questions the priorities of the corporate media houses. Pix: Jeremy Clarkson
The large media houses have been giving full play to every opinion of the Chairman of the Press Council of India even on issues that are beyond the purview of the council. ARCHANA VENKAT wonders why the Katju-speak is almost always Page 1.
A newspaper has a right to campaign on issues it believes in. It also has the right to pick any sponsors it chooses. But in a country where conflict of interest questions are seldom raised, it is also good to put such doubts squarely on the table, says SEVANTI NINAN
The 24x7 channels have turned on the election tap in full force. But some of them take the cake. Star News had Deepak Chaurasia doing a live debate programme with politicians and an assembled audience somewhere in Uttar Pradesh with cameras mounted on cranes. The amazing audience was all male, as though women in UP do not vote! When asked a question by the anchor they would
shout, abuse,and almost descend to fisticuffs with those whose views differed. Reasoned debate, UP style.
Funny how the media becomes a champion of free speech when it wants to and wants to curtail free speech when it suits its ideology. While Times Now did extensive coverage on the unfair ban on Rushdie to visit JLF, on another programme the channel's editor, Arnab Goswami moderated a debate about the ABVP ban on Sanjay Kak's film on Kashmir being shown at a college in Pune. He asked another filmmaker if he had obtained a censor certificate before putting his film on the web. The filmmaker said a censor certificate was not needed to screen to private audiences or to stream live on video. Goswami quickly retracted::"We must remind ours .. more>>
