Text, Image and Vision: Media Representation of India's Northeast and Democratic Space

Trapped in political, military, security and administrative praxis, policy implications and assumed cultural and aesthetic necessities, media coverage of India’s Northeast since independence falls between severe under-representation and stereotypical information. Acknowledging this peculiar situation, the study, conducted through 2010, attempted to be innovative while putting in perspective the issues confronting media representation of India’s Northeast.

The primary objective of this study was to probe the nature of media “coverage” of the Northeast by the mainstream media based in Delhi, often called the National Media for its wider reach and influence in policy matters. It also looks at the media in the Northeast to assess its coverage using some of the techniques adopted to study the media.  One of the key arguments put forth points to the fact that information deficit and inadequate media representation or under-representation leads to diminishing space for debate over issues confronting the people of the Northeast.  

Some highlights of the study are:

1. The study problematizes the politics of representation, construction and production of perception that began with the unproblematic usage of the idea of ‘Northeast’. Not only the media, but also the academia use the term without a nuanced understanding of either the official or the notional usages of the “signifier”.
2. The rapid expansion of the media in India does not necessarily lead to wider coverage of the country's marginal or peripheral regions. The news covered by the metro-based media is insufficient compared to the quantum of issues confronting the Northeast region.
3. The primacy of what constitutes news from the Northeast during the study period (November 2009 to April 2010) has been mainly decided by two basic parameters. One, insurgency related events and incidents starting from violence to surrenders and peace talks. Two, security and external affair related events.
4. Not only are women under-represented in the media coverage but also in media related professions. The study also highlights some of the issues confronting gender imbalance in the media profession.
5. The “everyday construction” of image of the Northeast by the media is linked to the state's conception of the region.  It highlights how modern nation states attempt to use print and electronic media as means to reinforce the idea of an established order.

Recommendations and suggestions:

1. The news media as an essential component of a democratic state needs to play a contributory role in challenging stereotypes.
2. The media should overcome under-representation and misrepresentation of the Northeast despite constraints of corporatization, apathy and lack of knowledge the region.
3. Media democratization is possible when views and interests of all are covered irrespective of commercial or corporate gains.
4. The role of the news media should go beyond reportage based on parameters of violence and security alone.
5. The media should generate new opinions and move beyond images constructed by colonial administrators that still seem to linger on in the post independence era.
6. The quantum of media content should be balanced regardless of the size of location specific readership.
7. The media should take note of the existing gender gap in its coverage and also under-representation of women in the industry.

8. Metro-based news media should take care to cover lesser known 'worldviews' from the margins and peripheries.

Download the Report as pdf file.

The author is responsible for the facts, views or opinion expressed in this report.

For a more comprehensive report of the project, please contact us directly. We would appreciate any feedback, review or comments.