-The Hindu   As TRAI prepares to regulate ownership of news organisations to ensure pluralism, big media houses fear shrinking profits and state control by proxy Rahul Khullar, the straight-talking chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), listened attentively to the senior management executive of Bennett Coleman and Co. Limited, one of India's largest media conglomerates. The latter disagreed with the premise of the discussion - that there was a "problem,"...

-Frontline Corruption tends to be greater in periods when there is a state-engineered redistribution of wealth in favour of a few at the explicit or implicit expense of the many. Liberalisation is one such period. IT cannot be verified and may not be true. But, the view that the record of graft and corruption during the two-term, nine-year rule of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is the worst in India's post-Independence...

-The Hindu Ask any television journalist why they sometimes behave in the manner they do - aggressive, over-the-top, loud, over simplifying complex issues, whipping jingoism and hysteria with little restraint - and the reaction is unanimous, "This is what sells." Ask any general entertainment channel official why they invest in shows which often reinforce the most conservative and patriarchal of attitudes, and the response is similar, "This is what people...

-Live Mint Move could assume significance given the pressure facing a government battling a series of corruption allegations New Delhi: A parliamentary committee on Monday sought to make a case for controlling the media-both print and electronic-through a statutory regulator, a suggestion that could assume significance given the pressure facing a government battling a series of corruption allegations. The standing committee on information technology called for such a regulator on grounds that the...

-Economic and Political Weekly The Saradha group's collapse has possibly bankrupted lakhs of small investors robbing them of their life svaings, and has rendered thousands of its agents jobless. The scam highlights the failure of the government and its regulatory agencies to reign in the mushrooming chit fund companies in West Bengal. It also brings under the scanner the Trinamool Congress' proximity with the tainted group. In the wake of the...