This article explores the issue of dalits’ inclusion in the media industry. It argues that under-representation of dalits in Indian media leads to an exclusion of news on dalits. [This was presented in the “National Conference on Ethical Issues and Indian Media” held on 26 and 27 November 2010 and in Periyar University, Salem, Tamil Nadu.] [J Balasubramaniam (balumids@gmail.com) is with the Department of Journalism and Science Communication, Madurai Kamaraj University.] The basis...

This book discusses a new poverty agenda for Asia and the role of social policies in economic transformation and reducing poverty. The poverty-reduction agenda is well known. So is the debate over poverty. No one disputes the fact that poverty of income (or expenditure, as countries such as India do not collect household data on income) is an imperfect measure of poverty, as there are non-income dimensions, too. Consequently, we...

There is a fundamental inequality in the governance arrangement in New Delhi that continues to plague the United Progressive Alliance. Members of Congress party president Sonia Gandhi’s National Advisory Council feel they have the right to criticise the government and its functionaries all the time, while no one in government is willing to return the compliment. In an interview to this newspaper, (March 13) the self-proclaimed father of India’s green...

A WikiLeaks cable that suggests the Congress was paying MPs to support the government during a vote of confidence has triggered a ferocious new assault on the government by the Opposition.  "This government must quit," said LK Advani, BJP leader, adding that "The PM must take responsibility and resign...he has no moral authority to lead the government." The Indian players who star in the cable have denied its claims. Pranab...

The Union ministry of rural development is thinking of referring the two recent MGNREGS-related murders in Jharkhand to the CBI after arriving at the conclusion that the job scheme has been taken over by a contractors’ mafia in the state. According to a highly placed source in the ministry, the Centre was now convinced that the Jharkhand government was not taking adequate measures to undo the wrongs in the scheme. “Since...