Manipur, misinformation, Revanna: Three issues ignored by Big Media this election season

 Broken News

Published in Newslaundry on May 2, 2024

Link: https://www.newslaundry.com/2024/05/02/manipur-misinformation-revanna-three-issues-ignored-by-big-media-this-election-season

The absence of something in the media is often not noted, especially in election season. But this morning, some readers of English newspapers in Mumbai, the city where I live, might have noticed the absence of Narendra Modi on their front pages. Barring The Indian Express, which had a front-page advertisement by a TV channel about an “exclusive” interview with the prime minister, a story on increased GST collections literally trumped anything Modi might have said the day before.

He still features in all newspapers because he has not ceased making controversial, and therefore newsworthy, declarations. 

In this last fortnight, since my previous column, Modi’s speeches have dominated the news cycle. Beginning with his provocative, inaccurate and hate-filled speech in Banswara, Rajasthan on April 21, where he called Indian Muslims “infiltrators” and declared that the Congress planned to give away the ordinary person’s hard-earned money to those “who have many children”, Modi has continued daily to make statements that have featured prominently in the media.

The front page of The Indian Express a day after Modi spoke in Banswara.

 This is probably a well-calibrated media strategy by the BJP to ensure that the dominant narrative in these elections remains focused on what Modi says. It also ensures that the Congress party, the focus of Modi’s attacks, must constantly counter everything he says. Its response, however, rarely gets the same prominence as Modi’s statements. 

Given the extent of the prime minister’s half-truths and outright lies in the last fortnight, it is incumbent on the media to fact-check. This has not been a norm in mainstream media and in the last decade, since the BJP and Modi came to power, such fact-checking is notable for its absence. 

However, in recent days, at least some in mainstream media are doing what ought to be routine. Perhaps this is happening because it is election season, and even though the outcome seems predetermined according to political pundits, there is always a sliver of uncertainty. 

 

Some newspapers, like The Hindu, ran a fact-check after Modi’s Banswara speech, especially on what he claimed was in the Congress party’s election manifesto. Scroll called out Modi’s lies in a clear and incisive article headlined: “Fact-checking five days of Narendra Modi’s speeches: A catalogue of lies”. And even a mainstream TV channel like Aaj Tak, not known for being even slightly critical of Modi in the last decade, ventured to point out rather gently that what he had stated in Banswara was not based on facts. 

Ironically, Modi’s statements turned into a bonus for the Congress as journalists and ordinary voters began downloading its manifesto and reading it. Election manifestos are rarely the subject of any prolonged discussion in the media. 

Apart from these fact-checks, there were also a couple of strong editorials, such as this one in The Hindu.  Yet, despite the reporting and comment on Modi’s speeches, and complaints by the Congress and concerned citizens, the Election Commission of India took its time to decide whether what he said violated the Model Code of Conduct. As has been extensively reported, instead of sending Modi a notice in response to the complaints, the EC chose to skirt around the issue by sending a notice to BJP chief JP Nadda. 

Simultaneously, and perhaps attempting to appear even-handed, it also sent a notice to the president of the Congress, Mallikarjun Kharge, in response to speeches by Rahul Gandhi and Kharge during the campaign. At the time of writing, there have been no further developments on these notices.

Moving away from Modi and his election speeches, the other major story this last fortnight was the sex abuse controversy involving Prajwal Revanna, the MP from Hassan who belongs to the Janata Dal (Secular), founded by former prime minister HD Deva Gowda, who also happens to be Revanna’s grandfather. He is the JDS candidate again for the same seat.

Mainstream media’s response to this terrible scandal, where literally hundreds of women appear on recordings where they are being sexually abused by Revanna, needs to be noted. While the media has focused on the tapes, their provenance, how they were made public, the motives of the people who did this, and the impact of this on the BJP which has partnered with the JDS in Karnataka, little attention has been paid to the women who were at the receiving end.

The story that must be investigated is not just why Revanna recorded these abuses, or how those tapes got out, but the system that allows these powerful men to exploit powerless women. It is precisely this imbalance in the power structure that led to global focus on sexual harassment at work in 2018, including in India, following the exposé by the Washington Post and the New Yorker about Hollywood producer and serial abuser Harvey Weinstein. The outrage then led to many more exposés. It also resulted in demands for change in the system that permitted this type of exploitation to continue unchecked. 

The Revanna scandal, and earlier Sandeshkhali in Bengal, tell us that not enough is known yet about the extent of sexual exploitation within the political system. Even if it is known, it has not been exposed. Incidentally, while many mainstream television channels focused on the Sandeshkhali scandal, where women had allegedly been sexually abused by politicians belonging to the governing Trinamool Congress in the state, they have barely touched the Revanna scandal. The JDS is an ally of the BJP in Karnataka whereas the TMC is fighting the BJP in Bengal. 

This seamy side of Indian politics and political parties is a story that has barely been told. There are a few instances that pop up now and then. But the message from the Revanna episode is that in a situation where the power equation is so grossly skewed as in India, women without power are silently bearing the worst kind of sexual exploitation. It is a terrible indictment of our system and needs to be thoroughly exposed.

Let me end with the other absence that mainstream media has yet to fully rectify, its reporting on Manipur. May 3 marks one year since the beginning of the ethnic strike that has divided the state, where thousands have been displaced, and several hundred killed. The violence has not abated and continues almost every day.  

It is a time for us in the media to introspect. To what extent has our sporadic coverage of the troubles in this north-eastern state over this year, contributed to the union government’s callous indifference to Manipur? 

There have been spurts of media focus on Manipur, such as in June last year, when the May 3 incident of two Kuki women being paraded naked and thereafter raped by a mob of Meitei men became public with the release of a tape of this incident. Or more recently, because of the violence that occurred during the elections. But regular reporting in mainstream media on the horrific levels of daily violence and difficulties that ordinary people on both sides of the divide encounter has been largely missing. 

In fact, the complete story of what happened on May 3 is only just beginning to emerge. The Indian Express in a front-page story on April 30 – headlined, “Manipur chargesheet: Women paraded naked made it to police Gypsy but told no key, left to the mob” – tells us the extent to which the local police were complicit. The story is based on a chargesheet filed by the CBI, which is investigating the incident, last October in the Gauhati High Court. 

A more detailed piece by Makepeace Sitlhou in Article 14 tells us what the survivors of this assault are going through. Together, these articles remind us that the price of the media ignoring the tragedy that has unfolded in Manipur is being paid every day by the people in the state who have survived the violence. 

General Elections 2024 | The missing women in Indian politics

Published in The Hindu, Sunday Magazine on April 21, 2024

Link: https://www.thehindu.com/society/india-general-elections-2024-the-missing-women-in-indian-politics-bjp-congress-narendra-modi-womens-reservation-act/article68071489.ece

Phase 1 of the General Elections 2024 is over. There is still a long way to go before June 4 when the votes will be counted. Till then, we will be inundated with endless speculation, conjecture, guesses, accusatory statements by opposing sides — and the ritual photographs of women lining up to vote, holding aloft their election identity cards.

That image has become a cliché. But behind it is a story that has changed little, much like the photo itself. It is the story of Indian women and politics, why they are there, why they are missing, and whether anything will change in the near future.

Going by the candidates already in the fray this election, it seems as if change, if any, is incremental. Women constituted only 8% of the candidates in the first phase on April 19. This could change slightly by the end of the election cycle.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, women were only 9% of the candidates. And fewer were elected. In fact, the success rate of women candidates was a little over 10% in 2019.

Also, although there were more women in the current Lok Sabha — 78 — than previously, they added up to only 14%. These low numbers contrast sharply with the increase in women voters. In 2019, their numbers were marginally more than that of men — 67.18% women compared to 67.01% men.

This data, however, masks the other granular details. In several States, this time there are no women candidates. In others, only a handful. For instance, in Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, out of the six parliamentary seats, there is only one woman candidate, former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti. In Uttarakhand, of the five seats, there is one woman, a Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate who comes from an erstwhile royal family. In Punjab, so far, only two women have been selected. One is Praneet Kaur, who switched sides from the Congress to the BJP. Kaur is a four-time MP from Patiala and was earlier married to former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh, who left the Congress and joined the BJP in 2022.

In the bigger States, there are more women contesting, but their percentages are still low. In Tamil Nadu, for instance, 76 women are contesting out of a total of 950 candidates for 39 seats. Although this is an increase from 2019, when 67 women contested, they add up to only 8% of the total. In 2019, only three of the 67 women who stood for elections won.

In Uttar Pradesh, with 80 parliamentary seats, the first phase has seen only seven women contesting compared to 80 men. We will have to wait for the final figures from Bihar, which has 40 parliamentary seats. Rajasthan, with 25 Lok Sabha seats, has 10 women candidates, while Gujarat with 26 seats has so far got eight women contesting although this number could increase. In Kerala, out of 194 candidates contesting 20 seats, only 25 are women.

Will reservation help?

The only two States where political parties have committed to field more women are Odisha (Biju Janata Dal, 33%) and West Bengal (All India Trinamool Congress, AITMC). In 2019, 41% of AITMC’s candidates were women.

Will the picture change if the Women’s Reservation Act is finally implemented? It was passed last year after being on a slow burner since 2008, when it was introduced.

It could, because the experience of elections so far has shown that barring a couple of exceptions, no political party is willing to commit to ensuring that one third of its candidates are women for either Lok Sabha elections or for State assemblies.

The reasons are obvious. While no political party objected to the introduction of 33% reservation for women in panchayats and nagarpalikas in the 90s, the idea of this being replicated in State legislatures and the Parliament has been resisted. There is much more power and money at stake, and simply put, men who have dominated electoral politics do not want to cede this space to women. Or any space for that matter. Despite decades of struggle for equality in the widest sense, and loads of political rhetoric about ‘Nari Shakti’, Indian women continue to fight each step of the way for recognition and for the rights guaranteed to every citizen.

Most of the women who do make it, despite this, are generally from political families, or women who have a public profile that a political party thinks it can leverage to win the seat. In both cases, the women must have financial resources, or the ability to raise resources. In fact, money power has been a major factor in Indian elections for decades. It discourages independent women, or even men, who have been active in the civic and political space, from contesting.

Not all the women elected from political families are silent spectators. They have made their mark and become politicians in their own right. Take Supriya Sule from the Nationalist Congress Party, for instance. She is the daughter of a powerful and experienced politician, Sharad Pawar, and this paved her way into politics. But her interventions in the 17th Lok Sabha have established her as a politician in her own right.

In the past, you could say this also about the late Jayalalithaa, whose entry into politics was facilitated by men. But she emerged as a strong politician who could win multiple elections, and served as chief minister of Tamil Nadu six times.

With their own might

We have also seen a few women without political connections who have managed to get elected and have performed exceptionally well as parliamentarians.

Take the feisty Mahua Moitra from the AITMC. As a member of the 17th Lok Sabha, she intervened, asked tough questions, and would not be bullied. For this, she paid a price. Apart from the expected misogynistic comments from some male members of Parliament, and vicious trolling on social media, Moitra was expelled from the Lok Sabha on charges of allegedly accepting money to ask questions. She is contesting again and her opponent from the BJP is a woman from an erstwhile royal family. It will be one of the more interesting contests to watch.

Moitra follows in the footsteps of other such women, not least Mamata Banerjee, the only woman chief minister in India today. Banerjee has succeeded without any godfathers. Also, while Mayawati’s influence is diminished today, one cannot forget this Dalit woman who fought against casteism and sexism to become a factor in Uttar Pradesh politics.

There was also the late Sushma Swaraj, who was outspoken but also had the ability to work with people on the opposite side of the political divide. One of those with whom she had a friendly relationship was Sonia Gandhi, who came into politics by accident, but whose presence in the Congress Party and in Parliament has shown that she has mastered the game of politics.

Women who are already active in politics, in the larger understanding of that term, also make a mark if elected. For instance, in the 1977 elections, held after the Emergency imposed by Indira Gandhi, when she and the Congress party were defeated, several women were elected as first-timers. Women like Pramila Dandavate, Mrinal Gore and Ahilya Rangnekar from Maharashtra were already veterans in politics and social movements. During their time in Parliament, they worked with other women members cutting across party lines to push through several important laws that affected women, such as the Dowry Prohibition (Amendment) Act, 1986, and made important changes in the rape laws.

In contrast, there are women who have been in the Lok Sabha for several terms, yet their voices are hardly ever heard. These would be the women political parties select because they can win based on their popularity as actors, for instance, or in seats where there had been an erstwhile hereditary ruler. We note their presence only if they are selected again as candidates during an election.

There can be no argument, given the realities of the status of Indian women and of our electoral system, that without reservation, the percentage of women in Parliament and State assemblies will not reach the desired one-third of the total. These bodies are supposed to represent “the people”. If half the population does not find representation, then clearly something must change.

 

Inside Indian polls: Modi’s lies, fake news and media that does not question

 Broken News

Published in Newslaundry on April 18, 2024

Link: https://www.newslaundry.com/2024/04/18/inside-indian-polls-modis-lies-fake-news-and-media-that-does-not-question

As the subcontinent heats up, literally, the attitude of the average voter towards the election process that has begun appears relatively cool. From the reports that have emerged so far, there seems to be a singular lack of excitement, even among first-time voters. There is no “hawa” yet of the kind Indian electors are familiar with, at least not so far.

Given the rising temperature across the country, only committed party supporters and those lured by a free meal or some other enticement are likely to brave the heat to attend election meetings. 

 

So how are voters, especially those not certain who they will support, getting information that will help them decide? Are the reports in mainstream media – mostly political speeches by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other prominent members of his cabinet and party, Rahul Gandhi and others in the opposition alliance, and the occasional ground report – enough to convince the undecided?  

As I mentioned in my last column, the media today is not just mainstream TV news channels and newspapers. We now live in a world where people get their information from multiple sources, including social media. Whether mainstream media takes the trouble to report diverse voices and opinions or not, these are out there on social media. 

We have many independent digital news platforms and channels, although if you are a person who principally gets news from mainstream media, when you listen and read what they report, you might think they are reporting from a parallel universe. 

The other alternate universe is of fake and misleading news, of hate speech, of the deliberate twisting of facts to push forward a particular narrative. 

 

An important new documentary on fake news in India is worth a watch. Titled “India’s war on fake news: How disinformation became India’s #1 threat”, the documentary asks: “Why has fake news transformed into an industry in India?” And to answer that question, it meets internet trolls, “to understand the financial and ideological motives that compel them into becoming agents of misinformation.” The documentary also features fact-checkers who are trying to counter this growing menace of fake news. 

While this surfeit of information and opinion is swirling around on social media, what are we seeing on mainstream media?

Mainstream media reports but does not question. For instance, why are we not asking the BJP, with its slogan “Abki baar 400 paar”, where the additional seats are coming from? Or, for that matter, question Rahul Gandhi, who claims the BJP will only get 150 seats. Between these two inflated claims lies the reality that the media ought to be prodding and probing to unearth and report.  

Instead, we are being treated to “exclusive” interviews with the prime minister, which are nothing more than a public relations exercise. I am referring here to the hour-long interview that the prime minister granted to Smita Prakash, editor-in-chief of ANI. Given that Modi has been notoriously reticent about speaking directly to the press in the 10 years that he has been the prime minister, why is he speaking now?

When you watch the interview, you know why. Prakash asks questions and waits patiently while the long answers from Modi are recorded. There are no interruptions, follow-ups, or counter-questions, even when Modi is straying far from the truth. Many people would have seen the interview, as it was relayed on all channels and reported in print.  

The most obvious question, that was screaming to be asked, was on electoral bonds. The prime minister claimed, as he has been doing recently, that the entire scheme was his idea, and was a success. That it brought transparency to election finance. And that unfortunately now, we would be back to the bad old days of black money.

The word “Supreme Court” did not emerge from either the lips of the interviewer or the interviewee. Extraordinary, given the apex court declared the entire scheme “unconstitutional”. And in a process akin to extracting teeth, had to compel the State Bank of India to reveal all the data on who purchased the bonds and which political party encashed them. Independent digital platforms like the Reporters’ Collective and the Electoral Bond Project, run jointly by The News Minute, Newslaundry, Scroll and independent journalists, were central to analysing the data and revealing the clear quid pro quo.

Instead of questioning Modi, this was brushed over. And the prime minister also got away with stating “facts” that can only be called fiction. He said 16 companies that bought electoral bonds were raided by the Enforcement Directorate, and 67 percent of their donations went to opposition parties. Which companies were these? Prakash should have asked. And what about the many more companies whose donations went to the BJP following raids on them?

Perhaps it is pointless to labour these points, as one could not have expected any such interview to be permitted if difficult follow-up questions were going to be asked. ANI provided Modi with a perfect election platform just days before the first round of voting. Everyone was happy. The agency got its “exclusive”, and Modi said what he wanted to say without interruption.

What is more puzzling, though, is how an apparently reputed international journal, Newsweek, could run an “exclusive” with Modi that reads like a series of press releases strung together. It is an “interview” without any questions. And it is the cover story that has Modi’s face and, in capital letters, the word “Unstoppable”.  

Here are just two examples from this “interview” that illustrate the point I am making:

     On religious minorities who complain of discrimination

     These are usual tropes of some people who don't bother to meet people           outside their bubbles. Even India's minorities don't buy this narrative anymore. Minorities from all religions, be it Muslim, Christians, Buddhist, Sikh, Jain or even a micro-minority like Parsis are living happily and thriving in India.

     On democracy and a free press

     We are a democracy, not only because our Constitution says so, but also  because it is in our genes.

      There are a few people in India and in the West who have lost [connection with] the people of India—their thought processes, feelings and aspirations. These people also tend to live in their own echo chamber of alternate realities. They conflate their own dissonance with the people with dubious claims of diminishing media freedom.

“Dubious claims of diminishing media freedom”? That demands a counter question. But then, there were no questions even though three people, including the CEO of Newsweek, met the prime minister. 

 

In the annals of international journalism, this interview will surely be remembered for some time.  

There is, however, a way around the insistence by the Prime Minister’s Office for questions in advance that are vetted before an interview is granted.

The Financial Times, headquartered in London, interviewed Modi before the general elections were announced and shortly after the state assembly elections, where the BJP did well. Written up as a report rather than in a question-and-answer format, it’s worth reading. Clearly, some tricky questions were asked, and Modi’s responses to them demonstrate his ability to deflect and detract from uncomfortable issues.

For instance, FT asked about the future of the Muslim minority in India, a question that any interviewer, Indian or foreign, would ask. I quote from the article:

      "When asked what future the Muslim minority has in India, Modi points instead to the economic success of India’s Parsees, who he describes as a 'religious micro-minority residing in India'.

      'Despite facing persecution elsewhere in the world, they have found a safe haven in India, living happily and prospering,' Modi says, in a response that makes no direct reference to the country’s roughly 200 mn Muslims. 'That shows that the Indian society itself has no feeling of discrimination towards any religious minority.'"

The most charitable response to such an answer is: Disingenuous and inventive.

Coming back to the ANI interview, the problem with this type of journalism, which fails to probe and provoke, is that it allows a politician to get away too easily. Furthermore, given the way people in India tend to believe anything said by a person in authority, what Modi says, when it is not countered, becomes the truth for most people. After all, the prime minister of India has said this, as an ordinary person would think. Surely, he will not lie.

But he does, as the inimitable The Deshbhakt Akash Banerjee calls out in this video.

When politicians change sides: Welcome to India, land of political acrobatics

 Broken News

Published in Newslaundry on April 5, 2024

Link: https://www.newslaundry.com/2024/04/05/when-politicians-change-sides-welcome-to-india-land-of-political-acrobatics

Some newspapers have named this pre-election period the “dance of democracy”. But skim the headlines and you’ll wonder whether we’re witnessing the “farce of democracy” instead.

Every day at dizzying speed, some politician associated with a party for many years – known well by their constituents as a member of that party which has a particular profile – suddenly switches sides, that too just before the election.

Changing parties is an Indian political game for which we could probably claim copyright. But the speed and pace at which it is being played out in this election season surpasses anything we have seen in the past.

As a result, election-related news reports – and here I am referring to the mainstream print media – would be of passing interest to the average reader who is not steeped in the minutiae of the political merry-go-round. What many readers may well ask is whether the party system, or even elections, have any meaning if this special type of political acrobatics takes place just before we go out and vote. 

Today, there is no way to ensure that the person we vote for continues to represent the ideology of a party they belonged to when they contested, even if some people do vote for an individual irrespective of the party to which they belong. But if the cynicism that underlines the party-switching game gets across to voters, one wonders if more people will hold back and choose not to vote at all. 

As a young man who seemed interested in politics, especially of his home state of Bihar, told me recently, “Even though I was eligible to vote when I turned 18, I have never voted. And I’m not sure I will this time either.”

We know now, of course, why the big political players switched sides. In an excellent piece of reporting, Deeptiman Tiwary of Indian Express put together information that gives us a graphic view of not just who changed parties, but why. For instance, cases against two top NCP leaders – Ajit Pawar, currently deputy chief minister of Maharashtra, and Praful Patel, former aviation minister – were closed shortly after they joined the BJP. Tiwary documents that of the 25 opposition leaders who joined the BJP since 2014, 23 have had cases against them dropped or put in cold storage. The pattern for lesser-known politicians who have had a sudden change of heart and sought space in the BJP is likely to be the same. 

While this current political circus has established that the BJP is not “the party with a difference” as it once wanted people to believe, welcoming as it is of politicians with serious corruption charges against them, this also speaks to the quality of people entering the political arena. The decline has been evident for some time but now it has crossed new summits.

Which brings us back to the meaning of an electoral democracy with a party system.

The rest of the world is watching this election as well, given the sheer numbers involved, with almost a billion people voting in an election spread over 44 days. There is no other election of this size anywhere in the world. But already questions about the elections and Indian democracy are being raised.

The Financial Times, a well-respected international business newspaper, wrote a critical editorial last week headlined “The mother of democracy is not in good shape”. The paper’s particular concern was the way law enforcement agencies have been used against opposition leaders culminating in the arrest of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. It quotes Rahul Gandhi’s accusation that the BJP was resorting to “match fixing” in this election and says it is puzzled that the governing party should even feel the need to “squeeze the opposition”.

Of course, critical comments such as this in the Western media are most often dismissed by the BJP, which accuses these media groups of having an agenda. Yet, despite this public stance, it is not able to ignore such criticism entirely. We cannot forget that it was the Modi government that banned a BBC documentaryin January 2023 even though it was not going to be televised in this country. 

But apart from these passing pinpricks from foreign shores, there is little that the party need worry about with the Indian media. We will have to wait and watch the quality and the slants in the election coverage, but it would be fair to guess that there would be precious little that’s critical of Narendra Modi or the BJP in mainstream media.

Since the 2019 election, the changed reality as far as the media is concerned is the noticeable growth of small, independent media houses that have used social media effectively to put across a different narrative. We saw this most vividly, as I mentioned in my last column, in the coverage of the electoral bond scam. It was Project Electoral Bond, a joint effort by The News Minute, Newslaundry, Scroll and independent journalists, as well as the investigative work of the Reporters’ Collective since 2019 that finally told us the real story of who paid which party and what they got in return. R Rajagopal of The Telegraph has rightly acknowledged their work in his article “Keyboard guerrillas”. Those stories are still tumbling out (read here).

Also, YouTube hosts numerous news-based programmes by former mainstream TV journalists, apart from Ravish Kumar, in Indian languages that are watched by millions. In cities, your local vegetable vendor, carpenter, plumber, painter, or taxi or auto driver does not have the time to sit in front of a television and watch the news. All of them catch it on the run, usually on their phones. And the channels they watch are not just the mainstream channels that can also be found on YouTube but these independent channels that have a greater connect. 

On the other side is the BJP’s IT cell that’s excelled in using all forms of social media. It is already on overdrive. And assisting it are dozens of YouTube channels, also apparently independent, that daily spread not just disinformation, but also direct propaganda that will help the BJP. Kunal Purohit writes in this piece in Al Jazeera that media studies have established that Indians “place greater trust in news they view on YouTube and WhatsApp, over the news delivered by mainstream media outlets”. The days when we asked someone where they got their information, and the reply would be, “Akhbar mein padha” (read it in the newspaper), are well and truly in the past.

We will have to wait and watch which form of media succeeds in changing people’s minds, or confirming their biases, and whether any of this will have an impact on voter choice.

Electoral bonds, pre-poll coverage from ground zero: Why is Big Media missing big stories?

 Broken News

Published in Newslaundry on March 21, 2024

Link: https://www.newslaundry.com/2024/03/21/electoral-bonds-pre-poll-coverage-from-ground-zero-why-is-big-media-missingbigstories

For the Indian media, the unravelling of the electoral bond scheme is the biggest story. Yet, you would not think so if you read or watched mainstream media.

On February 15, the Supreme Court ruled that the entire scheme was “unconstitutional”. In the interest of transparency, it asked the State Bank of India to put all the information about the bonds in the public domain – who bought them and which political parties encashed them. 

Since then, the fallout of the judgement has been a rollercoaster ride, with the SBI dragging its feet, incrementally releasing the data asked for by the Supreme Court, and the media slowly waking up to the import of the revelations. 

Thanks to live-streaming of the proceedings of the Supreme Court, those interested have been able to watch the persistence of the judges and the resistance of those required to provide the information. It has been educational, to say the least. Those interested can watch the archival footage on the Supreme Court’s website.

But the ruling has been important not just for striking down what was clearly a non-transparent mechanism for political funding, dressed up as essential to curb the role of black money in electoral finance, but also for exposing where the media stands in the face of these developments.

For instance, you would have thought that an issue that involves business, finance, banking, and election funding would be of primary interest to the media, both print and broadcast, that focuses on business. There are so many questions that arise: who bought the bonds, which political parties encashed them, was there a quid pro quo, were some of them bought by shell companies, and so on. 

Yet, if you looked at the business newspapers on the morning of March 15, a day after the SBI began its slow, incremental release of data on the sale of electoral bonds, and only after constant prodding from the Supreme Court, you would not think this was such a big deal. There was minimal coverage in most business papers – a few column inches on the front page and a follow-up inside.

The story got much bigger play in the non-business newspapers, although here too there was considerable variance on the first day. In the subsequent days, some newspapers did go beyond just reporting to making connections between the donors, and the timing of the donations or investigating some of the bigger donors, such as the so-called “lottery king”, Santiago Martin.

Some newspapers did put out helpful charts that would give readers a sense of who bought bonds and how much political parties got. But the final clinching link between donors and recipients can only be established now, as the SBI has finally released all the relevant data. 

These last two weeks establish beyond doubt that the entire electoral bond controversy would never have been unearthed if not for the diligence and persistence of independent digital platforms.

For the record, it was the early stories, such as this one by Reporters’ Collective, that first raised questions about electoral bonds as far back as 2019. Their coverage contributed to the petition that the Association for Democratic Reforms filed in the Supreme Court in 2019, challenging the validity of the scheme.

It took the Supreme Court almost five years before it finally addressed the matter, which is now part of history. But even as the court gave its ruling, Reporters’ Collective and Project Electoral Bond, a joint effort by The News Minute, Newslaundry and Scroll, began the process of unspooling the data being released in a series of stories.  

Some of these stories were followed up by mainstream newspapers. However, what they carried did not add substantially to the information that had already been reported by these independent platforms.

One of the more worrying reports was this one by Tabassum B in Scroll on pharma companies that bought electoral bonds. The story revealed that of the 35 pharma firms that purchased the bonds, at least seven had been hauled up for substandard drugs. 

Many of the stories carried on these independent platforms also suggest a clear nexus. For instance, 41 of the donors are businesses that have faced questioning by either the Income Tax department, the Enforcement Directorate, or both. There is also evidence that after the electoral bonds were purchased, some companies got lucrative contracts. Even if the evidence so far is circumstantial, it is enough to raise serious questions. And that is what the media ought to be doing.

A story such as this, with so many dimensions, also makes it incumbent on the media to find ways to explain it to the ordinary reader. Some of this was done by way of charts that appeared in The Hindu and Hindustan Times. But these would not have been adequate in themselves. Explanatory stories were needed but were largely missing.

You did find such stories elsewhere. For instance, Ravish Kumar, on his YouTube channel, ran more than a dozen programmes in which he explained the entire story in a way that would be comprehensible to a layperson. Similarly, Tippani on Newslaundry by Atul Chaurasia laid out in simple language the significance of the revelations about the electoral bond scheme.

For more than five years, voters have been in the dark about this scheme for election funding. Before we head into another election, it is incumbent on voters to understand who is funding which party. There is nothing complex about that. And surely, with the resources available to mainstream media, this kind of story ought to be a cakewalk.

Yet, an under-resourced independent media has had to step in and dig out the various aspects of this developing story.

It tells us where mainstream media stands today – something we have known – and that for democracy to survive in this country, the survival of independent media is imperative. Without these platforms, we might as well resign ourselves to living in an autocracy pretending to be a democracy.

Apart from the electoral bonds story, we will have to wait and see whether the mainstream media steps up to assessing the performance of the Modi government as it sets out to seek another term. There is little evidence of this being done so far, but I could be proved wrong.

An example of the kind of reporting that is needed is this deep-dive by independent journalist Srishti Jaswal for The Wire on Narendra Modi’s constituency, Varanasi. 

Modi, like other MPs, had adopted several villages and promised them benefits under various central government schemes. Jaswal found there was a considerable gap between promise and delivery. She reports: “While Lal Dhar in Jayapur has a toilet with a broken door, he has no house. Similarly, Mohit Chauhan from Domri village does not have a house but he has a tap and a toilet. Karma Devi from Nagepur has no house, no toilet but she has a tap where water comes three times a day.” 

We need more such stories that inform us about the reality on the ground, rather than just speculative political gossip in the run-up to the elections.