Views On News 07 February 2016

FACEBOOKFREEBASICS
VIEWSONNEWSFEBRUARY 07, 2016 `50
THE CRITICAL EYE
www.viewsonnewsonline.com
THE HOOT
REPORT
A violent year for
press freedom28
TACKLING
TOXIC DELHI
By Papia Samajdar 46
EDIT
Death of a Dalit
04
INDO-PAK
Media’s
Track-II
role 38
SHEELA
RAVAL
The story
of Abu
Salem’s
moll 32
RobotJournos
12
SUNIL
SAXENA
Tick-tock
internet 22
With artificial intelligence taking over
journalism, will reporters and anchors
become redundant? AjithPillai’sspecialreport
SWATI
PRASAD
Earth on
the boil 50

JUDGING BY THE viral attention which a tragic incident has
attracted in both mainline and social media, the suicide of
Dalit PhD student Rohith Vemula has shocked the conscience
of the entire world. The outpouring of grief and outrage over
the death by hanging of the 26-year-old has been overwhel-
ming. Once again, whether the issue relates directly or indi-
rectly to the simmering issue of intolerance which has been
smearing India’s “modern” face internationally, the debate
has been reignited at a time when the Modi government least
wants incidents like this to begin surfacing in the world media
and on the Indian political stage.
Whether or not this is a discrimination controversy involv-
ing miscarriage of justice to Dalits, the community is bound
to raise the heat on it, especially in the run-up to the UP elec-
tions in which the support of this vote-bank is crucial to the
victor. The hapless Rohith, in his heart-rending suicide note,
blames nobody but himself. He singles out no enemy. He
wants no revenge, no vindictiveness. All he asks is that the
scholarship money which he is owed, and which was held
up by the government following his expulsion from the hostel
and common areas of the campus, be paid to his family so
they can meet his burden of debt
from which he was financing his
education.
The matter has become another
big political millstone around the
Modi government’s neck. Why is
this so? Nobody can directly ac-
cuse the prime minister for the
occurrence of this tragedy. He prob-
ably did not even know about the
events which transpired before the
story hit the headlines. What is in-
escapable is that the atmosphere
has been so vitiated by the govern-
ment’s meddling in educational in-
stitutions that such tragedies will
inevitably come back to haunt the
government.
Ever since the Sangh Parivar
brought Modi to power, there has been an attempt by pow-
erful elements supporting him to spread the RSS’s thinking
into institutions of learning in order to wean the country away
from Nehruvian principles and Lohia’s doctrines. These at-
tempts remained unhidden, thanks to the controversies in
appointments to the Film and Television Institute of India
(FTII), the Censor Board and school textbook overseers and
questioning the minority status of universities like Aligarh
Muslim University.
W
hat this entails is the stirring up of student politics.
As a result, the ABVP (the student arm of the BJP
and RSS) has become exceptionally active and
looks to support from the center. Vemula’s problems arose
from a scuffle the Dalit students union had with some mem-
bers of the ABVP. Even by the admission of the ABVP student
involved, it was a minor scuffle. Student spats occur on every
campus and they are usually handled by the university
authorities or through counseling. But in this case, the matter
was referred by friends of the ABVP to BJP Union minister
Bandaru Dattatreya, who, in turn, referred it to Union HRD
Minister Smriti Irani.
Had the ABVP not been involved in the fracas, would a
local student scuffle have been reported to one of the sen-
ior-most ministers in the Union cabinet? And would the sus-
pension orders against which Vemula protested with his own
life have been issued without a nod from the center?
Sadly, these are the questions being asked by everybody.
The lesson from this tragedy is that a government elected to
push economic and social progress should concentrate on
getting on with the process of governing the nation rather
than being side-tracked into involving itself with appoint-
ments to educational institutions and paying needless heed
to student politics.
Not heeding this will lay it increasingly vulnerable to
attacks and accusations when Modi least needs them.
THE DEATH OF
A DALIT
EDITOR’SNOTE
4 VIEWS ON NEWS February 7, 2016

FACEBOOKFREEBASICS
VIEWSONNEWSJANUARY 22, 2016 `50
THE CRITICAL EYE
www.viewsonnewsonline.com
A MATTER
OF DEGREES
By Bikram Vohra 50
TAKE IDIOCY OUT
OF THE IDIOT BOX
By Ajith Pillai 40
RAKESH
DIXIT
Ad windfall
for MP
websites
22
HowFreeIsIt?
MANTOSH
SHARMA
The
Republican
Trump Card
28
MAMA
SH
Th
Re
Tr
28
ChrisDaniels,V-P,Internet.org,onhowtheprojectwill
maketheworldmoreconnected12
AnopenlettertoMarkZuckerberg
onwhyhisplanisflawed16
Anchor Review Governance
ABHAY
VAIDYA
Indian
media’s
terror
coverage 20
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C O NLEDE
Robot the Reporter
A TV channel in China recently used a robot to present the weather.
It sparked speculation about whether artificial intelligence would
eventually replace TV anchors and desk editors. AJITH PILLAI reports
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Managing Editor
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Production
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CFO
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Circulation Manager
RS Tiwari
18
22
News websites have broken the rules of newspaper headline
writing and grabbed the reader’s attention. It’s time newspapers’
online teams followed suit. SUNIL SAXENA
12
SOCIAL MEDIA
ClickbaitHeadlines
In the virtual world, a lot happens in one minute as immense data is
shared on FB, Twitter, YouTube and Skype. SUNIL SAXENA
JustaMinute!

Governance
T E N T S
R E G U L A R S
Edit..................................................04
Grapevine.......................................08
Quotes...........................10
Media-Go-Round...........................11
As the World Turns.........................17
Design Review................................42
Breaking News...............................44
Web-Crawler....................................53
Vonderful English............................54
Press Freedom
under Fire
28
32
2015 was not good for free speech in
India as journalists and writers faced fatal
attacks, threats and sedition cases.
Excerpts from a report by TheHoot
Management programs are rendering
young graduates unemployable and
renting the social fabric of our country.
HARISH CHAUDHRY
EDITORS’ PICK
TV REVIEW
3624
Visuals by a
photographer
who obviously
has an eye
for it.
JAIDEEP
SAMARTH
Frame
by
Frame
SHUTTERBUG
SPOTLIGHT
BOOK EXCERPT
The Education
Business
41
No Number
Game,This
46
Cover design and photo imaging: Anthony Lawrence
50PlanetonEdge
Besides greenhouse gases, scientists
believe that global warming is
also caused by microwaves from
satellites, cell towers and antennas.
SWATI PRASAD
38Media Moves
An Indian and a Pakistani channel
have staged a parallel dialogue
initiative, showing that Track II peace
efforts can work. MEHA MATHUR
The Story of
Salem’s Girl
In this extract of
GodfathersofCrime,
journalist SHEELA
RAVAL recounts her
interactions with
Monica Bedi, former
partner of gangster
Abu Salem
Don’t Opt for
That MBA
FILM REVIEW
Chalk N Duster is about schools
putting profits over learning. It makes
the viewer introspect and is worth a
watch. RAMESH MENON
The Delhi government’s odd-even
project worked as an emergency
measure. But will it lead to a long
term policy to curb air pollution?
PAPIA SAMAJDAR
7VIEWS ON NEWS February 7, 2016

Grapevine
MovieBuffs
Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam is in
trouble. The party was red-faced when
Congress Darshan, edited by Nirupam, carried
articles that criticized Nehru’s policies and labeled
Sonia Gandhi’s father as a “fascist soldier”. The
Congress Disciplinary Committee, headed by AK
Antony, slapped a showcause notice on Nirupam
for the “grave lapse”. But the buzz is that the former
Shiv Sainik is leaning towards the BJP. So the love
lost is mutual.
CongressEditorinaSoup
After the announcement by an
Italian senator that one of
the two Italian marines, accused
of killing two Kerala fishermen,
would not be sent to India to face
trial, Chief Minister Oommen
Chandy urged Prime Minister
Narendra Modi to get him over.
People are now worried that the
PM will take the CM’s request lit-
erally and put Italy as part of his
next itinerary. However, he has
the option of deputing someone
more familiar with the terrain
and language, like RaGa, for
instance?
ItalyCalling
BJP leader Subramanian
Swamy has taken upon him-
self to speak on behalf of Hindus.
He proposes that Hindus offer
“Lord Krishna’s package” to Mus-
lims, whereby in return for “three
temples”, they keep “39,997
mosques”. Of course, he has ben
“politically correct” and has in-
cluded the Ram temple in Ayod-
hya in the list. He has asserted
that the Ram temple is, after all, a
legal and an archaeological issue.
While Delhi was under
the odd-even scheme,
Chief Minister Arvind Kejri-
wal and his deputy Manish
Sisodia took time off to
watch the special screening
of the recently-released
Hindi filmWazir, along with
the director and the star cast
at a Vasant Kunj cineplex.
Must have been another car
pool experience for the VIPs!
Swamy’sProposal

Rani Mukherjee, busy with her
new-born daughter, had to
issue a clarification after a Pak-
istani news website wrote about
how she had tweeted her support
for a referendum in Kashmir. She
clarified that she has no social
media platform. However, the
twitter handle @_rani_mukherji
has been expressing quite a few
controversial views on the Kash-
mir issue. Seems like the woes of
not being on social media too
are many!
Twitter TroubleBesetsRani
—Illustrations: UdayShankar
—Compiled by Roshni Seth
MissingMP?
Recently, the Supreme Court held
that “temples cannot prohibit
the entry (of women), except on the
basis of religion.” Though the court is
going to examine the issue on Febru-
ary 8, a section of people are asking
why only minorities should have the
right to their practices in India. Or is
this a case of religious apartheid?
Last heard, many Hindu women had
decided to sign petitions to “restrict”
themselves to save the sanctity of
the temples!
ReligiousApartheid?
Firebrand MP from Nawada,
Giriraj Singh, who is a union
minister as well, has been declared
“missing” by the people of his con-
stituency. Posters were put up all
over Nawada with his photograph
and his “achievements” that
include “missing” from his con-
stituency. The posters mentioned
that ever since winning the Lok
Sabha seat, he “has been missing
from Barbigha; whenever called,
his PA says he is busy and puts
down the phone; even after be-
coming MP he has not been able to
do any work under his MPLAD
fund in Barbigha, and he is occa-
sionally seen on TV”. The posters
further added that if anyone sees
him next time “please inform im-
mediately”. However, Bihar police
later pulled down the posters.
MunnabhaiFoxed
ByBaba’sAdvice
Yoga guru Baba Ramdev
recently visited Yerwada
jail, where “Munnabhai” San-
jay Dutt has been jailed, to
teach asanas in return for the
promise to give up tobacco in-
take as “dakshina”. He is re-
ported to have told the
inmates that some UP gang-
sters had come for treatment
in his yoga camp and had
offered to take care of those
against him. “Jinhone aapka
nuksaan kiya hain, hum un
logon ko patka denge (Those
who have hurt you, we shall
pin them down)”. Munnabhai
is now wondering whether the
goons would be after him if he
does not heed Baba’s advice.
So he has wisely asked Baba to
pray for him.
ComedyofErrors
The valedictory session of the Indian
Science Congress in Mysore was a
laughter riot. Karnataka Education
Minister TB Jayachandra addressed
the late former president Dr APJ Abdul
Kalam as “Alm” while the president-
elect of ISC, Prof DN Rao, addressed
former prime minister Deve Gowda as
the “PM of India”. Deve Gowda men-
tioned the Prime Minister as “Dr
Modi”. What’s more, Gowda reached
the podium for his speech before his
turn arrived. The announcer was so
fast that the dignitaries, unable to keep
pace, issued wrong certificates to
the winners!

U O T E S
Rajdeep Sardesai,
print and TV
journalist
Can I have @bhogleharsha job
for a season? Or trade places?
Talking cricket in Australia nicer
than talking politics in India?!
Amitabh Bachchan,
Bollywood actor
Most valuable, reliable, authen-
tic REVIEWERS ARE the audi-
ence. NEVER EVER DISREGARD
THEM!!WAZIR badumba
Tavleen Singh,
journalist
Deeply saddened by the suicide
note of the Dalit student. Hyder-
abad University’s vice chancellor
should be publicly shamed.
Mukhtar Abbas
Naqvi, vice
president, BJP
No“destructive agenda”will be
allowed to dominate "develop-
ment agenda", we will have to
maintain atmosphere of pros-
perity and harmony.
Shekhar Gupta,
print and TV
journalist
Hope those outraged by politics
on #RohitVemula suicide also
debated morality of exploiting a
jawan’s beheading, harassing
grieving family.
Vir Sanghvi, print
and TV journalist
One of the greatest failures of
Indian secularism: Kashmiri
Pandits, refugees in their own
country, victims of ethnic
cleansing. Shame!
Why is it that a teacher
who shaped many lives has
no road or ‘chowk’ named
after him or her whereas a
corporator does?
—Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at
the Times NOW Amazing Indians
Awards 2016 ceremony
What can a country expect of a
person who does not fulfill his
responsibility towards his family?
—HRD minister Smriti Irani, accusing
Rahul Gandhi of cheating the people of
Amethi, whom he had described as his
extended family, on NDTV
Leave her. She is referring to
some scam… Whenever
something good is attempted in
the country or in Delhi, some
forces create all sorts of hurdles
—Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, after a young
woman threw ink at him at a
thanksgiving function on the
odd-even scheme in Delhi
Half a dozen people cannot
determine what is right for
society or what is not for
society...What business do you
have to be a schoolmaster?
—Filmmaker Shyam Benegal,
referring to the role of the Censor
Board, at the Pune International
Film Festival

EDIA-GO-ROUND
Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Arun Jaitley has
said that film certification guidelines need contemporary in-
terpretation and should be “non-discretionary”. “In most coun-
tries, there is a mechanism for certifying films and
documentaries, but it has to be ensured that in doing so, artistic
creativity and freedom do not get curtailed,” Jaitley said. He was
meeting the government-appointed Shyam Benegal panel to look
into the revamp of the Censor Board of Film Certification.
Union Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting
Rajyavardhan Rathore said that the committee would provide a
holistic framework for interpretation of the provisions of Cine-
matograph Act and Rules. Meanwhile, Benegal said that there is
a need to move towards a new system of grading films in terms
of age, maturity, sensibility and sensitivity instead of censorship.
“Film certification
needs re-interpretation”
Shekhar Gupta, former editor-in-chief of
The Indian Express, and Barkha Dutt, con-
sulting editor of the NDTV, have joined hands
to launch a digital media startup called The
Print. The announcement was first made on
Twitter. Senior journalist Ruhi Tewari, who
has previously worked with The Indian Ex-
press and the financial portal Livemint, has
joined as associate editor of The Print.
The first offering from the newly-formed
venture is titled Off The Cuff, and its first edi-
tion began with Gupta interacting with Nikesh
Arora, president and chief operating officer of
SoftBank Corp.
Barkha Dutt also said: “NDTV’s relation-
ship with the television remains as-is, as The
Print builds multi-media platforms in the digi-
tal and events space."
Shekhar,Barkha
launch The Print
Nambath heads
The Hindu
Suresh Nambath, National
Editor, The Hindu, will be
managing the news and editorial
operations of the newspaper until
a new editor is appointed. This is
following the resignation of Malini
Parthasarathy, who tendered her
resignation to The Hindu board
less than a year since taking over
the reins from N Ravi in February
2015. According to media
reports, the resignation was
accepted by the board with
immediate effect. The Hindu on
January 4 frontpaged
Parthasarathy’s decision to
resign, while stating that she
would continue as Wholetime
Director of Kasturi and Sons Ltd.
Areference to former Prime
Minister Indira Gandhi’s
rule as “worse than British
rule in India” on the Bihar
government’s official website
was removed following
strong objections from the
state Congress.
The paragraph in question
read: “It was he (Jayaprakash
Narayan) who steadfastly and
staunchly opposed the auto-
cratic rule of Indira Gandhi
and her younger son, Sanjay
Gandhi. Fearing people’s re-
action to his opposition, In-
dira Gandhi had him arrested
on the eve of declaring Na-
tional Emergency beginning
June 26, 1975... Thus, in
Free India, this septuagenar-
ian, who had fought for
India’s freedom alongside In-
dira Gandhi’s father, Jawahar-
lal Nehru, received a
treatment that was worse
than what the British meted
out to Gandhiji in Champaran
in 1917, for his speaking out
against oppression.”
Indira mentionremoved from website
—Compiled by Ankur Mehta
Suresh Nambath

I am
Robot the
Reporter!
The day has come when robots act as journalists, churning out
neat, error-free copy or as anchors speaking with a sweet
voice.Will automation eat away more jobs and do the work of
desk-bound journalists?
BY AJITH PILLAI
Lede Artificial Intelligence
Journalism
OURNALISTS in India do not
need to set the alarm bells ring-
ing. At least for the next few
decades, reporters are not going
to be replaced by robots attend-
ing press briefings at the BJP
headquarters on Ashoka Road.
Neither will the editor be supplanted by a new
mechanical device which can be programmed at
will by the management at the behest of vested
interests. But run-of-the-mill tasks like process-
ing news and data—currently tasked by
staffers—could well be left to a computer in the
days to come.
Last month, Chinese news agency Xinhua re-
ported that Dragon TV in Shanghai had, for the
J
“I will not go so far as to say
that the algorithms developed
today can replace all journalists.
And I do not expect software to
write an editorial about the lack
of human rights in China any
time soon. But remember, to
disrupt an industry you do not
need to replace all jobs within it,
just a significant fraction.”
—Federico Pistoni, in “Robots Will
Steal Your Job, But That’s OK”,
his best-selling book in 2012

gaming giant Tencent released a 916-word busi-
ness report on its portal QQ.com on China’s con-
sumer price index for August. The article penned
by a robot created a sensation. It was by many ac-
counts, an impressive economic analysis which
examined the prospects of the Chinese economy
during the ongoing slowdown.
The Hong Kong-based South China Morning
Post quoted business journalist Lie Wie as saying
“...The piece is very readable. I can't even tell it
wasn't written by a person. I've heard about robot
reporters for a long time, but thought they only
operated in the United States and Europe. I'm
not ready to compete with them yet.” The robot
journalist, christened Dreamwriter, churned out
the report in a minute at the inhuman speed
first time, used a “female” robot to present the
weather report live on its morning show. “I'm
happy to start my new work on the winter sol-
stice," robot XiaoIce said during her debut. She
had a “sweet” voice, reportedly more human than
what one associates with a mechanical device.
The news, widely reported in local and inter-
national media, caused concern among the jour-
nalist community in China as a section feared
that robots could threaten their jobs. Would the
day not be far when news anchors would all
be XiaoIce clones, many wondered. Were their
fears unfounded?
SENSATIONAL REPORT
Earlier in September 2015, Chinese social and
WHATYOU CAN DO,
WE CAN DO BETTER
Smart robots can
do the work of
desk-bound journalists
and news anchors
more efficiently and
with fewer errors
Photo Imaging: Anthony Lawrence

NEW FRONTIERS
Sun Microsystems’
Vinod Khosla thinks
computers will replace
80 percent of doctors
Security beefed up across city
ahead of Republic Day:
Securityinthecityhasbeenbeefeduptopre-
ventanyuntowardincidentsonRepublicDay.
Policemenhavealreadybeendeployedatall
theentryandexitpointstocheckvehicles.Ac-
cordingtoseniorpoliceofficials,theforcehas
beenfullygearedupforanyemergency...
(ThistemplatecanbeusedforRepublic
Day/IndependenceDay/Diwali/Holi/New
Year’sEveandwhathaveyou.Amentionabout
apossiblebombthreatorterroristattackcould
beavalueaddition.Thisisaremarkablysafe
storyasnopoliceforcewilldenythatitisnot
onhighalert!)
Showers bring relief from
scorching heat:
JoywaswritonthefacesofmanyDelhiites
asthefirstmonsoon(orpre-monsoon
showers)broughtrelieffromthescorching
summerheat...
(ThestoryholdstrueforMumbai,Kolkata,
Hyderabad,Kochioranywhereelseexceptthe
higherreachesoftheHimalayas.Weathersto-
riescanalsoplayaroundwithstatistics—
“Highesttemperaturerecordedona
Wednesdaymorningin64years”or“Coldest
summersince1942”.)
Journalism
of 15 words per second!
It is not in China alone that robot journalists
have been making news. In 2014, Associated
Press (AP) in the US partnered with artificial in-
telligence company Automated Insights (AI) to
use the latter’s Wordsmith platform to compute
and analyze quarterly earnings of companies.
The result: In January last year, CNBC and others
carried a story—“Apple tops Street 1Q (first
quarter) forecasts”—which was written by a
computer with no human intervention. It faith-
fully followed the AP stylebook and went unno-
ticed by readers as machine-made.
Philana Patterson at AP, who implemented
the robot journalist program, has been quoted
saying that the Wordsmith has improved effi-
ciency although it has not caused any loss of jobs.
The news agency, which used to process 300
quarterly reports, now handles 3,000 of these
with ease, thanks to automation. However,
human intervention, she admits, was required
for updates and analysis even as the basic work
was done efficiently and with fewer errors than
when done by desk-bound journalists.
ROBOTIC NEWS
But something equally remarkable happened on
Predictable
Stuff?
One often comes across routine
reports in newspapers that do not
quite qualify as sensational news
but nevertheless find display on the
front pages. Such stories, referred to
jocularly by some in the profession
as examples of “churnalism”, involve
formulaic writing and little else. It
could well have been written by a
robot reporter programmed to spin
out copy within a template fed to it.
Here are some typical stories
which a machine could have
churned out in a jiffy:

miles from Beverly Hills, California, seven miles
from Universal City, California, seven miles from
Santa Monica, California and 348 miles from
Sacramento, California. In the past ten days,
there have been no earthquakes magnitude 3.0
and greater centered nearby.”
The basic news flash was updated 71 times
during the course of the day by LA Times staffers
and a detailed version even made it to the follow-
ing day’s newspaper. Quickbot had done its bit
by spotting the story and putting it out on the
website in virtually real time.
Schwencke and his team of programmers
have other robots which keep track of crime in
the LA area. The news that it puts can be used or
ignored by those manning the desk of the paper.
With several companies specializing in artificial
intelligence moving into the business of provid-
ing programs for news agencies and papers, the
role of robots in news gathering is only going to
increase in the days to come.
March 17, 2014, when Westwood in California,
experienced a shallow earthquake of 4.7 magni-
tude early morning. The Los Angeles Times
posted the occurrence within three minutes
on its website. It was the first to break the
news. The story appeared under the byline
of Ken Schwencke, a journalist and programmer
with the paper, but it was written by an
algorithm called Quakebot that he had devel-
oped. In fact, Schwencke was in bed when the
quake happened!
The robot had used data from the US Geo-
graphical Survey to put together this rather im-
pressive news flash which did not have any
stylistic flourish but was adequate enough: “A
shallow magnitude 4.7 earthquake was reported
Monday morning five miles from Westwood,
California, according to the US Geological Sur-
vey. The temblor occurred at 6:25 a.m. Pacific
time at a depth of 5.0 miles.
“According to the USGS, the epicenter was six
A GREATER ROLE
Companies specializing in AI
have started focusing on
developing programs for
news agencies and papers
Team India ready for ODI
Challenge Down Under:
TheMeninBluearekeyedupforthecoming
Australianchallenge.TheODIserieswillputthe
bowlingandbattingtotestasTeamIndiatakes
onthemightyAussiesontheirhometurf...
(Don’t we read such curtain-raisers all the
time?Well, similar reports can be devised for
hockey, football or any other sport. In fact, in
the US templates have been fed to computers
by artificial intelligence companies to cover
baseball. Our geeks could surely do the
honors for desi robots and program them to
be cricket-crazy.)
PMO promises big push
for economy:
The government has promised major reforms
to bolster the Indian economy in the coming
months. According to the PMO, providing im-
petus to growth is one of its priority areas...
(Again,avery
safestoryonarainy
dayasnogovern-
mentwilldenythatit
isstrivingforbetter
growth.Similarly
reportsonthe
oppositiontraining
itsgunsontheruling
partyinparliamentorspeculativestoriesona
possiblecabinetreshuffle,RahulGandhitaking
overasCongresspresidentandDawoodbeing
broughtbacktoIndiaarestoriesthathave
stoodthetestoftime.)Allpredictablestuff,
somemightsay.Robotic,nodoubt...
—AjithPillai

Journalism
According to Kristian Hammond, co-founder
of Narrative Science, a Chicago-based robot-writ-
ing firm, 90 percent of basic journalism could
well be written by computers. And by this he
means collating of data and framing them into
easily read formulaic copy. This entails connect-
ing information through the use of journalistic
clichés employed by journalists while reporting
events, be it natural disasters, crime or sports.
ARE THEY A THREAT?
But can robot-journos be a threat to the flesh and
blood variety of the hack in India? At the mo-
ment it looks unreal—almost like a sequence
from a 21st century version of Aldous Huxley’s
Brave New World. But routine stories like “City
police on high alert”, “Court adjourned till next
hearing” or “PMO promises growth” can well be
churned out by robots without any human inter-
vention other than switching the device on
(See box overleaf).
Those who love to paint alarmist pictures of
the future will hold that there is cause for con-
cern. Automation, they will say, has already in-
flicted damage. In the last 40 years, several jobs
have been rendered redundant in news organi-
zations. Today, telex operators are unheard of
and manual typesetters live only in the memories
of those who worked in another era. Modern
communication and production systems have
created paperless offices which produce
newspapers.
Their apprehensions may sound far-fetched
at the moment. But there are also genuine con-
cerns of the computer outwitting humans. On
December 10, 2015, a one-day meet in
Montreal attended by big names in artificial in-
telligence discussed how to prevent smart com-
puters from robbing people of work and even
harming society.
FACING HURDLES
As for journalism, there is also the added prob-
lem of computers tasked with disseminating in-
formation providing misinformation leading to
panic situations unless closely supervised by hu-
mans. This is the reason why a robot journalist
cannot be left on its own.
A few years ago, Vinod Khosla, Indo-Ameri-
can venture capitalist and co-founder of Sun Mi-
crosystems, shocked the medical world when he
wrote a piece titled, “Do we need doctors or al-
gorithms?” Khosla predicted that computers
which can offer more accurate diagnosis will one
day replace 80 percent of doctors. Many in the
medical profession may not have completely
agreed with Khosla’s prognosis but admitted that
the future doctor will be more machine depend-
ent than his present-day counterpart.
So it is with journalists. Patterson of AP said
in an interview about the introduction of the
robot journalist in the news agency: “One of the
things we really wanted reporters to be able to do
when earnings came out was not to have to focus
on the initial numbers. That was the goal, to
(help them) write smarter pieces and more inter-
esting stories."
So better stories it will be—with perhaps a lit-
tle help from our robot friends. But, ideally,
nothing more than that.
GROWING MARKET
A robotics expert
delivers a lecture at
IIT Guwahati during
its annual robot show
Can robot-journos
be a threat to the
flesh and blood
variety of the
hack in India? At
the moment it
looks unreal,
almost like a
sequence from a
21st century
version of Aldous
Huxley’s Brave
New World.

S THE WORLD TURNS
—Compiled by Shailaja Paramathma
Charlie Hebdo
cartoon stirs controversy
Color complex
in Thailand
Tributes pour for Rickman
British actor Alan Rickman’s death led
to a huge outpouring of grief and
glowing tributes from his friends, co-stars
and the acting fraternity, reported BBC.
Rickman passed away in London on Jan-
uary 14. He was 69, and was suffering
from cancer.
Rickman carved a niche for himself on
stage, television as well as films. He will
remain immortal for films, such as Harry
Potter, Die Hard and Robin Hood: Prince
of Thieves.
According to BBC, a galaxy of celebri-
ties bemoaned Rickman's death, includ-
ing Harry Potter author JK Rowling,
Rickman’s co-star in Harry Potter, Daniel
Radcliffe, Emma Watson, who played the
role of Hermione Granger in Harry Potter
and so on.
French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s cartoon
of the drowned Syrian toddler, Aylan Kurdi, was the
subject of a fierce debate on social media. The cartoon
shows Kurdi with the message: “What would have
happened to little Aylan if he grew up?” The answer: “A
groper of women in Germany.” It draws a reference to
the recent incident in Cologne, Germany, where mass
sexual assaults were reported on New Year’s eve, al-
legedly by refugees.
Many believe that the magazine has gone “too far”
with humor this time but another argument being made
is that it takes a dig on the perception of migrants.
An advertisement for a skin-whiten-
ing product in Thailand has drawn
criticism on social media and sparked
a debate over beauty ideals and
advertising standards by claiming you
“need to be white to win”.
A pale complexion is hugely
valued in Thailand and is associated
with a high social status. Darker,
tanned skin is associated with lower
class people who work in the fields.
The advertisement is for a
skin-whitening pill called “Snowz”,
made by the Thai brand Seoul Secret,
and posted on YouTube.
Wattanapak Jinsirivanich, manag-
ing director of the company that
produces Seoul Secret beauty
products, apologized and said
the advert was not meant to stir
a controversy.
Anew law brought in by the Polish government triggered
widespread protests. It threatened to mar Poland’s
ties with the European Union, which took objection to
the legislation.
According to Fox News, the law will bring the state radio
and television under the control of the government. It was
being seen by the Polish people as “democratic dictator-
ship”. The ruling Law and Justice Party got it cleared by the
Polish parliament and appointees of the ruling party had
taken over key positions.
Mein Kampf, written in the 1920s by Adolf Hitler in
prison, hit German bookshelves after 70 years,
following the expiry of Bavaria’s exclusive copyright. The
new edition is replete with copious footnotes.
Prior to the end of World War II, some 12.4 million copies
were published in Germany. However, in 1945, Bavaria was
handed the rights to the work and it held off publishing the
anti-Semitic manifesto in deference to the victims of Nazi
atrocities. Despite the ban, the book was widely
available online.
Protests over Polish
govt’s media move
Mein Kampf hits
German bookstores

Clickable
HeadlinesAttention-grabbing stories on the web have a lot to do with their
headings, which follow none of the rules of newspaper writing
BY SUNIL SAXENA
EWSPAPER headlines tra-
ditionally have been staid,
sober and short. They have
been built around action
verbs and have primarily
captured the news point in
a few, simple words. This has been true of both
English and Indian language newspapers pub-
lished as broadsheets. Tabloids have preferred loud
headlines, but these were never approved by main-
stream editors.
These mindsets have not changed even today.
Internet desks of mainstream newspapers continue
to follow the same tradition. They may be working
in a different medium but headline writing styles
remain the same. This is where they have been
overtaken by bloggers and new-age websites such
as The Huffington Post, BuzzFeed and Upworthy,
where a new style of headline writing has spawned.
EMOTIONAL APPEAL
These hugely clickable headlines are descriptive;
they use more words; they appeal to emotions;
they freely insert adjectives to inject color and, at
times, seek to influence readers with souped-up
PLAYING ON EMOTIONS
(Left) The direct, hard-hitting headline in
the video conveys the message in no
uncertain terms
N
Social Media
Headlines

#RULE 3
Use adjectives and adverbs freely
Newspaper editors have frowned upon adjectives
and adverbs. They have believed that both gobble
up headline space, and should, therefore, be used
sparingly. In contrast, web editors revel in using ad-
jectives. Almost, every second headline sags with
adjectives. Take these two headings: “21 Haunting
Photos Of The Day After The Bloody Clashes In
Kiev” and “16 Things Only People With Unique
Names Will Understand”. Critics accuse web edi-
tors of baiting readers with an over-kill of adjec-
tives. But the clicks on such headlines are high.
#RULE 4
Create headline moulds
Newspaper editors may be guilty of headlinese
information. And they work.
It was bloggers who first realized the impor-
tance of clickable headlines. They found that the
clicks soared when they used descriptive headlines
with an emotional twist. Soon, these started flood-
ing the net. Every second story that went viral had
a clickable headline. Research conducted by the
Nielsen Norman Group further substantiated the
importance of headlines as it found that only two
out of ten headlines get clicked on an average.
These headlines proved that there is no place
for boring headlines on the web, be it for text or
videos. Headlines must pack a punch. Here are
seven ways in which web editors are rewriting
headline-writing rules:
# RULE 1
Appeal to raw emotions
Web headlines go for the jugular. They strike a raw
chord. There’s a strong stress on emotions. A clas-
sic headline was written for a video created to raise
awareness for Syrian refugee children by SOS Chil-
dren’s Villages in Oslo. It said: “Watch How These
People React When They See A Child Alone In
The Cold Without A Jacket”. There could not have
been a more direct and hard-hitting headline.
The headline had three emotional hooks. One,
it asked readers to watch the reaction of people in
the video. This, in itself, was a powerful hook. Two,
it tried to make readers visualize the state of a child
who is alone in the cold. Three, it made readers
empathize with the child by pointing out that he
was without a jacket.
# RULE 2
Words are not a limit
Web editors, unlike newspaper ones, are not lim-
ited by space. They are not cramped by the width
of columns. Web headlines often are long. At
times, they may look ungainly, but they are effec-
tive. The Huffington Post used 16 words to headline
a Dubai selfie that had a couple posing before an
apartment complex in flames. It said: “This Couple
Is Getting Internet Hate For Clicking A Selfie
While Flames Engulfed A Dubai Skyscraper”.
Web headlines often are long, they may look
ungainly, but are effective. The Huffington
Post used 16 words (above) to headline a
Dubai selfie that had a couple posing before
an apartment complex in flames.

uses a full stop. Here is a web heading using full
stops—“France figured out how to make its gro-
cery stores feed even more people.” This is some-
thing newspaper editors cannot contemplate. To
them, full stops are a waste of space; also, they look
ugly. That is why you will never see such headlines
in a newspaper.
# RULE 7
Use auxiliary verbs in the headline
Another headline rule that has taken a tumble is
the use of auxiliary verbs in headlines. Print edi-
tors have consciously avoided using is/are and
their past tense in headlines. But web editors use
them freely. Take this: “Warm Winter Weather Is
Bad News For Retailers, Great News For
Your Wallet”.
BACKLASH FROM READERS
As more and more websites and bloggers adopt
the Buzzfeed and Upworthy model of headline
writing, their excessive use has also triggered a
backlash. Many web readers find them pre-
dictable. The shine and novelty has worn off.
but they do not use headline moulds. They are re-
quired to come up with original ideas to earn their
living. But then Buzzfeed has found a formula that
works and uses it constantly. So far, it is delivering
and is even being copied by others. Here are two
samples: “58 Romantic Comedies you Need To See
Before You Die” and “19 Truly Charming Places To
See Before You Die”.
#RULE 5
Use question headlines freely
Newspaper editors frown when it comes to ques-
tions in headlines. They consider this lazy subbing.
Newspapers need to provide complete informa-
tion, not half-baked stories. But curiosity is what
kills the cat. Question marks populate the web. For
example, take this one—“What Happens If You
Text Your Parents Pretending To Be A Drug
Dealer?” And more—“What Kind Of Tattoo
Should You Get?”
#RULE 6
Write full sentences as headlines
This is hard to believe. Upworthy is a pioneer in
using full sentences in headlines. The website even
Upworthy is a
pioneer in
using full
sentences in
headlines
(right). The
website even
uses a full
stop. For
newspaper
editors full
stops are a
waste of space
and look ugly.
Social Media
Headlines

The second method that Facebook adopted
was “to look at the ratio of people clicking on the
content compared to people discussing and shar-
ing it with their friends. If a lot of people click on
the link, but relatively few people click “Like” or
comment on the story when they return to Face-
book, this also suggests that people didn’t click
through to something that was valuable to them”.
It is, therefore, important for bloggers and
new-age websites to use the clickable headlines
that they have pioneered sparingly. They must
also ensure that the headlines reflect the story ac-
curately. The reader should not end up feeling
cheated. If this is done, then clickable headlines
will thrive even more in the coming years.
Also, it is time that internet desks of main-
stream newspapers start writing clickable head-
lines. This is the only way they can make more
web visitors visit their newspaper stories.
Some have even been uncharitable enough to com-
pare these clickable headlines with what the web
derisively refers to as clickbaits.
It is important here to differentiate between
clickable and clickbait headlines. Clickbait head-
lines are written primarily to mislead. They are not
honest and do not reflect the content accurately.
They are used by those websites whose content is
skimpy and whose intentions are questionable.
According to Wikipedia: “Clickbait is a pejora-
tive term describing web content that is aimed at
generating online advertising revenue, especially
at the expense of quality or accuracy, relying on
sensationalist headlines to attract click-throughs
and to encourage forwarding of the material over
online social networks.” The Merriam-Webster dic-
tionary is equally harsh and describes Clickbaits as
“something (such as a headline) designed to make
readers want to click on a hyperlink especially
when the link leads to content of dubious value
or interest”.
Facebook was so upset with Clickbait headlines
that in 2014, it decided to penalize them. Facebook
wrote: “Posts like these (that is with Clickbait
headlines) tend to get a lot of clicks, which means
that these posts get shown to more people, and get
shown higher up in News Feed.” It, therefore, de-
cided to show less of such stories and explained
how it would identify such stories that promise so
much but deliver too little.
FACEBOOK ACTION
The first way, Facebook said “is to look at how long
people spend reading an article away from Face-
book. If people click on an article and spend time
reading it, it suggests they clicked through to
something valuable. If they click through to a link
and then come straight back to Facebook, it sug-
gests that they didn’t find something that
they wanted.”
Quite clearly, Facebook reasoned that these
people were victims of Clickbait headlines. Face-
book decided to downgrade such articles.
TEMPTEDTO CLICK?
(Above) The web
headlines are
descriptive, inject
color and try to
influence readers

Social Media
Time Spent
Wait a Minute
for Me!
2.78 million video download requests even as its
servers would have received 300 hours of fresh
video. Even more stunning is the way Facebookers
would have consumed YouTube video. Together,
they would have watched an equivalent of 323 days
of it.
Facebook: Users would have updated 2,93,000 sta-
tuses and uploaded 1,36,000 photographs. They
would have sent 31.5 million messages.
Googlesearches:Google would have processed 3.1
million searches worldwide in one minute.
Twitter: The 288 million active Twitter users
would have posted as many as 3,47,222 tweets.
LinkedIn:A total of 120 new accounts would have
been created.
Instagram: The photo-sharing site would have re-
ceived 48,611 new photographs.
Vine: As many as 1.04 million video loops would
have been watched; another 8,333 shared.
Skype: People would have used Skype apps to
make 1,18,200 calls using the web as the backbone.
E-mails: Spammers and genuine email senders
would have sent a staggering 864 million e-mails
Wordpress: Bloggers using the Wordpress plat-
form would have uploaded 986 posts.
Pinterest:Pinners would have pinned 1,388 prod-
uct rich pins and 9,722 article pins.
This is only a snapshot of what is happening in
the internet space every minute. If you consider that
the number of active websites crossed the one bil-
lion mark in September 2014, you can well imagine
how much time an individual is spending online.
The virtual world is sucking the real world into its
fold. The internet minute is getting longer.
S we enter 2016, it is time to stop,
and ponder. The internet is hijack-
ing our life, and how. The Cisco
Virtual Networking Index report
released in May 2015 forecast: “It
would take an individual more than 5 million years
to watch the amount of video that will cross global
IP networks each month in 2019. Every second,
nearly a million minutes of video content will cross
the network by 2019.”
Don’t be surprised. Just marvel. Till 2013, the
world had created four zettabytes of data. In 2016,
the global internet traffic will cross the threshold
of one zettabytes per year. (To get a sense of one
zettabyte, add 12 zeroes to a gigabyte).
If you are wondering where this traffic
will come from, you don’t have
to look far. It is not govern-
ments or large corporate
houses but you—the users
of social media—who will
drive this spurt.
In the next one minute
that you will take to read
this article, this is what will
happen:
YouTube: YouTube would have served
A
A minute can pass in a jiffy, but on social
media it sees immense activity, be it on FB,
YouTube or Skype. Has the virtual world taken
over the real?
BY SUNIL SAXENA
Lalit Khitoliya

293,000
3.1
3,47,222
17,361
LinkedIn
Instagram
VineSkype
E-mails
Wordpress
Pinterest
Tinder
You Tube
TwitterGoogle
statuses
updated
31.5
million
msg
sent
profilesbrowsed
120
newaccounts
created
photographs
uploaded
1.73million
photographs
liked
million
videoloops
downloaded
calls made
shared
48,611
1.04
8,333
1,18,200
million
genuineand
spame-mails
transmitted
productrich
pinspinned
love
swipes
made
articlepinspinned
864
posts
uploaded
986
1,388
9,722
6,94,444 1,36,000
photographs
uploaded
2.78
300hoursoffreshvideouploaded
millionvideodownloads
million
searches
tweetsposted
Facebook
60seconds@action
A staggering minute on the information highway
Graphic: Lalit Khitoliya

Touch the
Sky with Color
Shutterbug
Trigger Happy
This varied collection of photos by JAIDEEP SAMARTH, the brother of actresses Nutan and
Tanuja, range from people, nature and animals to architecture. His interest in photography
began while he was studying at Mayo College in Ajmer. While he never formally learnt
photography, it is obvious he has an eye for it. In a compilation of photos aptly called Trigger
Happy, Jaideep says: “When I saw something I found interesting I’d just go ahead and shoot.
If it didn’t work I’d just not print it.” Jaideep hopes that these photos being exhibited at the
India Habitat Centre will attract the attention of ace photographers like Raghu Rai.

LEADERLY DISPOSITION
A villager from Narlai
in Rajasthan who looks
like a sarpanch
ROOMWITH AVIEW
A priest at a temple in
Gujarat takes a breather
from his work
PEACE & SOLITUDE
People meditating
at the Everest
base camp on the
Tibetan side

LITTLE BOXER
A playful kid
entertains
his caregiver
TECHWONDER
The Bandra-Worli
Sea Link, shot
from atop an
open crane
Shutterbug
Trigger Happy

A RIVER SUTRA
Farmers crossing the
Ganga in Ujhani, UP
TRIGGER HAPPY
JaideepSamarth
PICTURE PERFECT
Kumaon’s Abbott
Mount Village early
in the morning

2015:
Journos
under
Attack
2015 was a hugely eventful year for free speech in
India. There were legal, political and technologi-
cal developments that set the tone for these issues
to be debated all year round. And journalists were
at their most vulnerable, with deaths, attacks,
threats, sedition and defamation cases against
them at an all-time high.
We begin by listing those politicians and gov-
ernment organizations who deserve recognition
for the challenge they posed to media freedom in
this country.
The top ranks go to these four:
Chief minister J. Jayalalithaa and the Tamil
Nadu government
The Government and the Ministry of Informa-
tion and Broadcasting
The Central Board of Film Certification
The Chhattisgarh state government
CM Jayalalithaa and the Tamil Nadu
Government
When the Chennai floods brought journalists
from other parts of the country to Tamil Nadu,
they noticed that questions about fixing blame
Extracts from a report by The Hoot, a media
website, on Free Speech in India in 2015 and
how journalists were at the receiving end of
all kinds of violence and threats
Spotlight
Free Speech in Media
ALL-INDIA
SOLIDARITY
Journalists
stage a
dharna at
the Chennai
Press Club to
condemn the
killing of UP
journalist
Jagendra
Singh

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister because an article had
asked what Jayalalithaa had done so far.
In this report’s total count of 48 defamation
cases in 2015, the Tamil Nadu government ac-
counts for 11 of them and for two of the 14 sedi-
tion cases filed in the country. In December 2015
the Telegraph reported that the Jayalalithaa gov-
ernment has filed a total of 190 defamation cases
during its tenure.
The Government of India and the Ministry of
Information & Broadcasting
The I&B ministry under the Bharatiya Janata
Party government has become an image manager
for its leaders and a censor rather than a provider
of information. Its brief now is to safeguard the
PM’s image. Very recently, the Hindu
were neither asked by the press in Tamil Nadu,
nor answered by officials at press conferences. It
was an indicator of the defamation capital that
this city has become.
In 2015 the chief minister, her ministers, and
her government filed a large number of criminal
defamation cases against a range of magazines
and individuals, prompting the Supreme Court
to take note by the year end. The apex court said
that the bulk of defamation cases against political
leaders have been filed in Tamil Nadu, and
slammed the state government for granting sanc-
tion for prosecution in these cases.
In May the Supreme Court gave omnibus re-
lief to the magazine Nakkeeran in connection
with a set of 15 criminal defamation procee-
dings initiated against it by the chief minister,
ministers and senior IAS officers in Tamil Nadu.
These 15 complaints cited all its 20 reporters as
respondents.
In November, criticism of government inac-
tion led the City Public Prosecutor M.L. Jegan to
file a criminal defamation case against the weekly
magazine Ananda Vikatan for ‘maligning’ the
Astatisticalsummationof
freespeechviolations,2015
Number
of Cases
10 8 (Journalists)
2 (Intellectuals)
35 (people
charged with
sedition)
30
3
27
Category
Deaths
Attacks
Arrests
Threats
14Sedition
48Defamation
21Censorshipoffilm
4Censorshipof
broadcastmedia
3Censorshipof
printmedia
2CensorshipofMusic
13Censorshipof
CyberMedia
13Hatespeech
These figures are based on incidents reported in the press
and should be treated as conservative estimates. The figures
on attacks against journalists collected by the National
Crime Records Bureau are not available yet for 2015. The
figures for deaths include those cases in which investiga-
tions are not complete The Hoot
In the course
of the
year, the
government…
focused its
energies on
preventing
information
leaks to the
media and
defended its
curbs on
journalists.
IMAGE MANAGEMENT
(Left) The I&B
Ministry dropped
the student film
section at the
International Film
Festival of India
following students’
strike at FTII

SHOOTINGTHE
MESSENGER
BBC logo being
burnt in Lucknow
during a protest
against India’s
Daughter, based on
the Nirbhaya case
reported that the Ministry will also monitor
footage showing the I&B minister and the
minister for I&B (state), in what is an unprece-
dented move.
In 2015 Sathiyam TV, a Chennai-based Tamil
language news and current affairs channel, re-
ceived a show cause notice alleging that two of
their broadcasts had portrayed Narendra Modi in
a poor light. In the course of the year, the govern-
ment issued an advisory to news channels not to
telecast the Nirbhaya documentary and served a
legal notice to the BBC for airing the Nirbhaya
film ‘India’s Daughter’. It also focused its energies
on preventing information leaks to the media and
defended its curbs on journalists.
January
Jan 14: TamilwriterPe-
rumalMurugan(above)
announceshis ‘death’asa
writeronhisFBpage,after
beinghoundedbycaste-
basedgroupsandHindutva
forcesinTiruchengode,
TN,forhisnovel
Madhorubhagan
Jan 28:ShirinDalvi,
editorofMumbai-based
newspaperAvadhnama,
arrestedforreproducing
thecoverofCharlieHebdo
February
Feb 11: PenguinIndia
agreestowithdrawand
pulpallunsoldcopiesof
AmericanscholarWendy
Doniger’s‘TheHindus:An
AlternativeHistory’aftera
protractedlegalbattle
withaHindutva
organizationendsina
settlement
Feb 21: SeniorCom-
munistleaderand
rationalistGovindPansare
shotbytwopersonson
February16
March
March 5: Blanketban
onscreeningofacontro-
versialdocumentary
‘India’sDaughter’onthe
Delhigangrapeincident
asitcarriedaninterview
ofoneoftheconvicted
persons
March 24: Inaland-
markjudgment,the
SupremeCourtstrikes
downSec66Aofthe
amendedInformation
TechnologyAct,2000as
‘unconstitutional’
Calender of Attacks April
April 13: Morethan
onelakhpeoplesendin
theirrecommendationsto
savetheprincipleofnet
neutrality
May
May 14: TheSupreme
Courtupholdstheframing
ofobscenitycharges
againstpoetVasantDatta-
treyaGurjar(below)forhis
poemonGandhi
June
June 6: BilalBahadur,
photoeditorofKashmir
Life,isattackedand
severelybeatenby
amobinSrinagar,
incensedatcoverageof
theirFridayprotestsin
theNowhattaarea
June 8: Shajahanpur-
basedjournalistJagendra
Singh(above)diesofburnin-
juries,eightdaysafterheal-
legedinavideothathewas
setonfirebyagroupofpolice
andsupportersofUttarPra-
deshMinisterforDairyDevel-
opment,RamMurtiVerma
July5
July 5: AkshaySingh
(below),areporterwithAaj
Takchannel,whowascover-
ingtheVyapamscaminMad-
hyaPradesh,diesin
mysteriouscircumstancesin
MeghnagarnearJhabua
Spotlight
Free Speech in Media

in the year, Pahlaj Nihalani, who remained in the
news all year round. The body he headed cen-
sored some 21 films in the course of the year, one
of which came in for 218 cuts. The CBFC made
the most news at the end of the year for shorten-
ing the duration of a James Bond kiss. Conse-
quently, on the first day of 2016 the government
announced a 6-member panel to review the func-
tioning of the CBFC.
The Chhattisgarh Government
It jailed two journalists and presided over the
state harassment of journalists in the Bastar re-
gion, which led them to hold a protest in Jag-
dalpur at the end of the year.
In the course of the year, three channels were
issued show cause notices on why they should not
face action for Yakub Memon’s execution cover-
age. Among other actions, the I&B ministry
banned a documentary on beef and issued a no-
tice to a Gujarat channel for “sullying” the image
of the prime minister. Following the extended re-
sistance of the students of the Film and Television
Institute of India to the appointment of a director
at the International Film Festival of India later in
the year, the Ministry decided to drop the student
film section at the festival.
The Central Board of Film Certification
This government body acquired a new head early
August
Aug 27: A`250-crore
defamationcaseisfiledby
EssarSteelagainstCaravan
magazine
Aug 30:FormerVice
ChancellorofHampi
University,rationalistand
wellknownKannada
writerMMKalburgi,shot
dead
September
Sept 4: Hindugroups
forceliterarycriticMM
Basheer(above) tostop
writingaregular
columnontheRamayana
fortheMalayalamdaily
Mathrubhumi
Sept 30: Freelance
journalistAjayVidrohiis
shotdeadinSitamarhi,
daysbeforetheBihar
stateelections
October
Oct 10:
SudheendraKulkarni
(below),whoheadsthe
ObserverResearchFoun-
dation,isattackedbyShiv
Senapartymembersand
hisfaceblackenedwithink
fororganizingabook
launchofformerPakistan
foreignministerKhurshid
MahmudKasuri
Oct 7:Twoconcertsof
Pakistanighazalsinger
GhulamAliinMumbaiand
PuneinMaharashtraare
cancelledfollowing
protestsbytheShivSena
whichisopposedtoall
‘culturalties’withPakistan
November
Nov 20: TheCBFCcuts
fourscenesfrom ‘Spectre’,
theJamesBondfilm,two
forallegedprofanityand
twofor‘excessivekissing’
December
Dec 1:Severaloffices
oftheMarathidaily
Lokmatattacked
forpublishingan
allegedlyblasphemous
cartoondepictingISIS
fundinginanarticle
titled'ISISchaPaisa'
(ISIS'money)
Dec 16: Ravi
ShankarPrasad,Minister
ofCommunications,
Dec 31:
DesiyaMurpokkuDravida
Kazhagam(DMDK)chief
andTamilfilmactor
Vijayakanth(below)spitsat
journalistsanddaresthem
toaskChiefMinister
J.Jayalalithaasimilarques-
tionsabouttheupcoming
assemblyelections
informsParliamentthatthe
Governmenthasblocked
844socialmediapages
tillNovemberunderthe
ITAct

Book Excerpt
ROM a small village in
Punjab to a jail in faraway
Portugal, Bollywood star-
let and Abu Salem’s para-
mor Monica Bedi has tra-
velled a long way. A pro-
verbial small-town girl with stars in her eyes, Bedi
never rose to be a star to reckon with even in her
prime. She gained fame only after her romance
with gangster Salem became public knowledge and
she became known for being an internationally
wanted criminal.
In September 2002, Bedi was arrested along
with Salem by the Lisbon Police for entering Por-
tugal with forged documents. They served two
years in jail before being deported to India on No-
vember 11, 2005, after India promised Portugal
that Salem would not get a death sentence.
The CBI had filed a case against Bedi under
F
STAIRWAYTO FAME?
Monica Bedi’s
relationship with
gangster Abu
Salem had become
the talk of the town
Sheela Raval has been a hard-nosed
print and TV journalist who
extensively covered the Mumbai
underworld in a career spanning three
decades. She is now editor
investigations with ABP News. Sheela
has traversed the globe to track down
notorious criminals and has managed
rare interviews with some of them. In
this excerpt from Godfathers Of Crime:
Face to Face With India’s Most Wanted,
she recounts her interaction with
Monica Bedi, the Bollywood starlet,
who courted controversy for her
romantic links with gangster Abu
Salem. Bedi was arrested with her lover
in Lisbon in 2002 for entering Portugal
with forged travel documents. The two
were deported to India in 2005.
The Gangster’s Moll
Godfathers Of Crime: Face to Face With India’s Most Wanted

case was pending against her in the Bhopal court,
for which she had not got bail, and so would have
to be taken to Bhopal to be tried the following
month. She knew that this judgment would influ-
ence the Bhopal case trial as well.
A
lso present in the court was Pallavi Ashar,
Abu Salem’s legal counsel. After the judg-
ment had been pronounced, while Mon-
ica was waiting for the paperwork formalities to be
done with, I went along with Pallavi to meet her.
My conversation with Monica started with a re-
quest to clarify the criminal charges that had led to
her conviction. She accused the media of being
Section 420 (cheating), 120B (criminal conspiracy)
and Section 12 of the Passport Act for procuring a
passport on a fictitious name, and on September
29, 2006, a special CBI court convicted her on
charges of passport forgery.
Just before the CBI Court announced its judg-
ment on her, I had travelled to Hyderabad with the
brief to find out who Monica Bedi really was. I was
to meet her on the day the judgment was delivered
and had spoken to her advocate about meeting her
privately for 15 minutes on the premises of the
court. That day, the special court at the Namapally
Court Complex was packed with journalists. Mon-
ica finally came in wearing a cotton salwar-kameez.
Her hair was neatly clipped. She sat on a bench, her
eyes lowered to the ground. I found that jail had
mellowed her. I had heard that while imprisoned
she had turned to yoga and spirituality for solace.
When the judgment was pronounced by Judge
CV Subrahmanyam and she was sentenced to five
years’ rigorous imprisonment, she looked sad but
remained composed. Another passport forgery
“I was never married to Abu Salem, I
only lived with him for a year,” Monica
clarified. She didn’t deny her
relationship, but said she had not been
in touch with him after their arrest.
CHASING STORIES
Dawood Ibrahim in Sharjah,
UAE. Raval, the author, has a
wide experience in reporting
on criminals and the
underworld
Getty Images

biased in portraying only the dark side of her life.
I told her that it might be because she had shunned
the media and there had been no access to her for
anyone to clarify or portray her side of the story. I
tried to convince her that she could use the channel
I worked for to clear her stand that she “was an am-
bitious but not a bad girl”. She said she was some-
one who took time to open up, and it was not
possible to do so in 15-20 minutes. But she asserted
that she really needed people to know that the real
Monica Bedi was not a “bad girl”, and certainly not
a criminal.
I asked her if she felt she had paid a heavy price
for a few mistakes. Did she marry the wrong man?
“I was never married to Abu Salem, I only lived
with him for a year,” she clarified. She didn’t deny
her relationship with Salem, but said she had not
TIME FOR POLITICS
Monika Bedi campaigning
for Congress during
elections 2014 in Sambhal
been in touch with him since they were arrested.
“I loved him but it isn’t the same anymore. I last
spoke to him on September 18, 2002, the day we
were arrested. I haven’t been in touch with him
since then. I am not with him anymore and have
got nothing to do with him at all.”
M
onica said she was not aware of
Salem’s identity when she met him
first, but conceded that his feelings for
her were genuine. “He tried really hard to change
and made a lot of effort for my sake. I should get
credit for it. He tried his best but his past kept
catching up with him.”
When I asked her why she had introduced
Salem as Sanjay to her family in Lisbon and said
that he was a businessman, and what had com-
pelled her to travel under false names on forged
passports, she stared at the floor before saying that
she had been forced to flee India out of fear that
the police would trap Salem through her. “He
feared that the cops would catch me and torture
me to find out his whereabouts,” she said. “He told
me he wanted time to change, so I went with him.”
Monica said her relationship with Salem had
started falling apart once they left India and that
she tried to escape at least three times. “When we
used to meet for two or three days, he was always
on his best behaviour. But we were very different,
and our way of thinking was totally apart. He was
very possessive of me. And I found this out only
after I started living with him.”
Monica expressed her desire to start life afresh
without Salem. Perhaps she knew that it would
take very long for Salem to walk out of an Indian
jail. She told me, “I want to leave my painful past
behind and want to marry one day and settle
down, but only after I find the right guy.”
What Monica did not know was that I was in
Lisbon soon after their arrest, and was aware that
Salem and she wrote love letters to each other
while in jail. CBI documents also suggest that
Salem was madly in love with Monica and that the
In his legal notice, Salem claimed that the
duo had married in a Los Angeles mosque
in November 2000. In November 2008,
Salem announced, “Monica Bedi is my
wife”, while coming out of a Delhi court.
Book Excerpt
Godfathers Of Crime: Face to Face With India’s Most Wanted

GODFATHERS OF CRIME:
FACE-TO-FACE WITH
INDIA’S MOST WANTED
BySheelaRaval
Publisher:HachetteIndia
Price:`399; Pages:276
Chabbewal, a small village in Punjab, where Mon-
ica was born in 1975. He was a registered medical
practitioner but migrated to Norway to run a gar-
ment store business. He also told me that his
daughter had written a letter to then PM Manmo-
han Singh pleading for bail and denying she had
anything to do with Salem’s criminal activities.... he
lamented his daughter’s entry into Bollywood. He
said that when Monica first moved to Delhi to try
her hand at modelling, she was young and naïve.
But when she did not find much work there, she
decided to move to Mumbai and enter the world of
films. Her bad luck started from there on, and the
rest of her story is familiar to anyone. He (Monica’s
father) wanted to know how soon she would be out
of jail and whether the Supreme Court would grant
her bail…
The stars finally favored Monica in 2007, when
the Supreme Court granted her bail in the passport
forgery case, in which she had been sentenced to
five years in prison by the sessions court. This was
later commuted to three years by the Andhra
Pradesh High Court. In November 2010, the apex
court upheld her conviction but it also reduced her
sentence to the period of imprisonment she had
already undergone. The Bhopal Court later acquit-
ted her. She returned to the entertainment business
and is now back in various shows on television.
two had admitted they could not
imagine their lives without each oth-
er. Monica used to call him “Babu”
and he called her “Gudiya”, and she
used to get desperate if there was a
delay in receiving Salem’s letter.
“My love where are you...no letter
from you...are you angry with your
Gudiya...I know you are angry with
your baby,” Monica wrote to him in
one such letter, obviously referring to
a rough patch in their relationship. “I
want only you, and I can sacrifice
anything for a life with you,” another
of her letters read, “only you are my
life and identity. I will always be associated with
you. Till the time I die, I will be your Gudiya.”
In yet another letter, she threatened to commit
suicide: “After showering so much love on me,
don’t go away from me. Your wife can’t go any-
where. At best I can commit suicide here. If I real-
ize you have changed, I swear, I will die here.”
B
ut after being extradited to India, Monica
changed her stance completely. She cut
herself off from Salem, at least in public.
He became a thing of the past for her, and she con-
tinues to maintain this stand today.
Later, Pallavi told me that Salem was upset that
she had not recognized their relationship in public
and he had made it clear that he still cared deeply
about Monica. Salem had, in fact, served her a legal
notice saying he was deeply hurt and distressed by
her statements denying their marriage. In his no-
tice, he claimed that the duo had married in a Los
Angeles mosque in November 2000. In November
2008, Salem announced, “Monica Bedi is my wife”,
while coming out of a Delhi court.
While Bedi tried hard to get out of jail on bail,
top-notch legal counsel KTS Tulsi was represent-
ing her in the Supreme Court. I met Prem Bedi,
her father, at Tulsi’s home-cum-office in Delhi.
Bedi spoke about his humble origins in
CHASING A MIRAGE?
Monica’s Bollywood dreams
landed her in trouble

The biggest problem in life is a gap between reality perception and
self-assessment.The second biggest is contradictory desires in the
mind.Let me explain the second one first.Many youngsters want to
be rich and honest.Many young boys want to marry a smart
homely girl.Where have these notions come from?
VON brings in each issue,the best
written commentary on any subject.
The following write-up from
BW Businessworld has been picked by
our team of editors and reproduced for
our readers as the best in the fortnight.
not want to pursue a career in engineering, hotel man-
agement graduates do not want to continue in the hospi-
tality sector—they all want to be managers. Somewhere,
the dream merchants have been able to brand the MBA
degree as an assurance of a good job, defined as a high
CTC (cost to company) and little work. In the good old
days, it meant an air-conditioned office, Wi-Fi enabled
system, company car and good looking secretary. Some-
time ago, we added ESOPs to the mix,
and more recently—music to the ears—
work from home. Does an MBA give
you all that a gullible youngster believes
it gives? No, certainly not in India.
The first major review of the MBA
program was carried out at the Univer-
sity of Michigan in 1931. The Michigan
review, and numerous subsequent ones
pointed out that the MBA program
needs to be more skill oriented and that
it needs to develop its own body of
knowledge. The first MBA was offered
in India by the University of Madras in
1951, and little has changed since then.
With a huge overkill by the government
of India, the first three IIMs (popularly
called ABC) were set up and the sheer
number of applicant to seats availability
ratio ensured that good (smart, intelli-
HE biggest problem in life is a gap be-
tween reality perception and self-as-
sessment. The second biggest is
contradictory desires in the mind. Let
me explain the second one first. Many
youngsters want to smart homely girl. Where have these
notions come from? Clearly from the dream merchants
who are creating unrealistic expectations. Engineers do
T
Editors’ Pick
Harish Chaudhry
HowMBAHas
WreakedHavocInIndia
WITHER FUTURE?
Ratan Tata
presenting degree
certificate to a
student at a
convocation of
Great Lakes
Institute of
Management in
Chennai

gent, hardworking!) students got selected and these IIMs
gold-plated gold. The numbers were small. With no ref-
erence to the curricula and pedagogy, no concern for the
skill set required for managerial tasks little or no availabil-
ity of faculty and a poor research base, the universities
(government and non-government) and autonomous in-
stitutes recognized by the All India Council for Technical
Education (AICTE) have sprung up in every nook and
corner of India. The number had crossed 3000, and has
now come down with the shutting down of some due to
financial constraints.
The average MBA in India is unemployed, nay, un-
employable. The reasons are many. First and foremost is
the curriculum design. The MBA program was designed
for executives with substantial (8 to 10 years) work expe-
rience and domain knowledge. It rests on a belief that you
cannot manage that what you cannot do yourself. Also,
managerial decision making calls for a certain level of
maturity, which is usually lacking in a young adult
straight out of college. However, most students in India
come for an MBA without any work experience (and sur-
prisingly so do the teachers). How does one teach indus-
trial relations to a student who has no idea of industry or
relations, leave aside strategic management? Second, the
pedagogy of a management subject is different from com-
merce or maths.
M
anagement is not a subset of social psychol-
ogy or operations research, although it bor-
rows from these areas. Management is an
applied discipline, and calls for a combination of teaching
and training. It then calls for teacher preparation, and the
average PhD is not adequate training for teaching a man-
agement course or training for a managerial role. While
subject experts can deliver the curricula, teaching and
training are different aspects, and need to be treated dif-
ferently. Third, every discipline requires a degree of prior
knowledge and competencies, and so does management.
That graduation in any discipline from any university col-
lege with any marks is good enough is an absurdity. Not
even the best institutions can transform every child in two
years, much less the average B-school.
Fourth, most B-schools ignore industry requirements
and employability drivers. I hear a very large number of
management graduates stating that management is the
art of getting work done (and adding, with tongue in
cheek, not doing it yourself). Someone must be teaching
that in the classroom. Such an attitude is a guarantee of
unemployability. Clearly, industry wants people who are
willing and capable of hard work.
Last but not the least, the promotion campaigns car-
ried out by the B-schools tend to lead applicants believe
that the starting CTC is somewhat below what IIM-A or
ISB claims, and in any case nothing less than `12-15 lakh
a year—often off the mark by a multiple of 10. They are
heartbroken when reality strikes.
With the supply hugely outstripping the demand for
managerial jobs, we are doing a great deal of damage to
the future of our children as well as to the social fabric of
the country. By pursuing policies that convert the uned-
ucated unemployed into degree-holding unemployable
citizens, we are causing great harm to the psyche of the
individual as well as robbing professions of available tal-
ent. We are short of teachers, nurses, electricians, and
plumbers, and flooded with jobless MBAs. Can we intro-
spect on our policy framework?
—The author is a professor of
management studies at IIT-Delhi
FALSE HOPES?
In India, an
MBA does not
give all that a
gullible
youngster
dreams of

Track II: Media
Shows the Way
attack. In the latest derailment, terrorists from
Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) struck at Pathankot air-
base just a week after Prime Minister Narendra
Modi’s surprise stopover at Lahore enroute from
Kabul to Delhi. As expected, the casualty was the
foreign secretary talks, now scheduled sometime
this month.
Even as these hiccups happen, an Indian and a
Pakistani TV channel staged a novel initiative of
HERE’S a set template in
Indo-Pak dialogue—one
step forward, two steps
backward. Each time the
two countries seemed to
draw closer, the painstaking
efforts of the political and diplomatic establishment
were sabotaged by terrorists hell-bent on derailing
the process. Think Kargil and the Mumbai terror
T
Two channels have shown how to handle India-Pak relations
maturely and open the way for continuous dialogue
BY MEHA MATHUR
TV Review
CNN-IBN-Capital TV show

petrators of the Pathankot attack. Dogra said he was
“taken aback” by the statement from the Pakistani
side that Masood Azhar had not been arrested.
“Does that mean that while his lieutenants have
been taken into detention, he has not been?” he
asked. Pakistani anchor Rafique clarified that Ma-
sood had been taken into “protective custody”. And
Zamir added that protective custody was a term
used because at the moment, there was no evidence
to charge him for his involvement in the act.
Suhasini expressed anguish at Pakistan re-
fraining from officially announcing whether
Azhar had been arrested. She also criticized
India’s policy of now-we-will-talk-now-we-won’t.
“The on-now, off-now policy has run its course,”
she said, adding it was short-sighted on India’s
part to make talks conditional on one individ-
holding a parallel dialogue of their own. India’s
CNN-IBN and Pakistan’s Capital TV jointly hosted
a simulcast, demonstrating an eagerness on both
sides to come forward for talks and not let terrorists
dictate the agenda. It was akin to Track II diplo-
macy on TV.
From India, Suhasini Haider, CNN-IBN’s diplo-
matic editor, and Rajiv Dogra, former Consul-Gen-
eral of India to Karachi fielded questions, and from
Pakistan, Zamir Akram, diplomat and former am-
bassador to India, and Ejaz Haider, editor, national
security affairs, Capital TV, were present. The show
was co-hosted by Zakka Jacob of CNN-IBN and
Waqas Rafique of Capital TV.
MATURE DISCUSSION
The panelists were in sync with the government
stand in solving problems more “maturely”. They
were thankful that the talks had not been cancelled
or deferred indefinitely and that the Ministry of Ex-
ternal Affairs had welcomed Pakistan’s crackdown
on JeM as a step in the right direction. This, despite
MEA spokesman Vikas Swaroop’s counterpart in
Pakistan, foreign office spokesperson Qazi
Khalilullah, claiming that he was not aware of JeM
chief Masood Azhar’s arrest.
Swaroop, in a press conference, assured that the
talks would take place “in the very near future”.
Dogra, in fact, joked that the way Swaroop de-
fended Pakistan’s stand, the Pakistani spokesperson
might soon lose his job.
On the Pakistani front, Zamir, while expressing
dissatisfaction with talks’ postponement, said the
good thing was that it would not be cancelled. Ejaz,
saying he would go for glass-half-full approach, ap-
plauded Modi for moving forward vis-à-vis Pak-
istan, as his earlier hard stand had not worked. In
his assessment, Modi was trying to project himself
as a strong PM and at the same time, allowing Pak-
istan space where things could move forward.
A key talking point was the status of Masood
Azhar’s arrest and whether future talks should be
made conditional on Pakistan’s arresting the per-
Rajiv Dogra,
former
Consul-General of
India to Karachi,
pointed out that
India did not let
the Pathankot
attack affect
Indo-Pak talks.
Zamir Akram,
former
ambassador to
India, said
that the term
“protective
custody” used for
Masood Azhar
was pertinent.

ual, forgetting other perpetrators like Hafiz Saeed
for the moment. And Zakka Jacob, the anchor,
added it was bad policy to hinge the future of
India-Pak relations on one person.
This was, of course, music to the ears of Pak-
istani panelists. Zamir said: “Whatever happens to
him (Masood Azhar) should not be the basis for us
to move forward. To get the process underway is
more important.”
PATH AHEAD
Ejaz cautioned that each time there was an initia-
tive, spoilers would be there. But it was for both
sides to decide whether to upset the process be-
cause of non-state actors. He added that while talks
wouldn’t resolve disputes in the way either side
wants, “what you will gain is that if and when there
is a crisis, you are in a mode where you can try and
prevent it from escalating”.
Dogra outlined the shift in the Indian stand at
two levels. One, he said, that in India, the opposi-
tion was united with Modi in applauding him for
hisunusual, courteousstepof goingto Lahore.Two,
post Pathankot, the leadership has managed the
outrage to such an extent that it did not affect rela-
tions negatively and talks were not derailed.
On the question of whether communication be-
tween the national security advisers of both coun-
tries was a welcome signal, the Pakistani panelists
differed. While Pak diplomat Zamir said: “I don’t
care as long as we have a channel open”, Ejaz said
that would be a narrow approach indicating crisis
mode. He said there was lot more to India-Pak re-
lations, including trade and investments.
It was a brilliant media-to-media contact al-
though one could sense an element of unease
among some panelists. Summing up the show,
Zakka Jacob said that if the media of the two coun-
tries could put a show together, “we don’t have to
shout at each other”. Unfortunately, the tickers dis-
played all through the show said a different story.
Pak Betrayal I… Pak Betrayal II…III…IV… and so
on it went, in a jarring note even as panelists talked
of the need to change the script.
Isn’t it time the media changed the script and
moved forward?
TV review
CNN-IBN-Capital TV show
A key talking
point was
the status of
Masood
Azhar’s arrest
and whether
future talks
should be
made
conditional on
Pakistan
arresting the
perpetrators
of the
Pathankot
attack.

Ethical Triumph
ture of India if not addressed. Commercial inter-
ests today call the shots in almost every educa-
tional institution and that will spiral into
long-term damage.
All the actors do a pretty good job, be it Sha-
bana Azmi, Girish Karnad, Juhi Chawla, Zarina
Wahab, Jackie Shroff, Rishi Kapoor or Divya Datta.
However, the characters of Zarina Wahab who is a
school principal and Jackie Shroff, the owner of a
popular school, could have been better sculpted.
They are wasted on the film. Ditto for Richa
Chadda, who is a television reporter, and could
have been made to perform better had there been
a better script.
The film raises many questions and leaves one
introspecting about the sorry state of affairs in our
schools run by power-hungry and cash-chewing
managements. In the end, it is knowledge and
sincerity that can triumph. Not cheap tricks.
Worth a watch.
An innovative film on the
shortcomings of today’s
education system which
thrives on profits rather
than inculcating genuine
knowledge in children
BY RAMESH MENON
Film Review
Chalk N Duster
OW much do we care
about our teachers? Why
are convoluted illiterates
who do not understand
the nuances of education
dictating terms in our institutions? Why is busi-
ness seen as more important than imparting edu-
cation? Why are good innovative teachers, who
are committed and passionate, being sidelined to
make way for inexperienced teachers who have no
spirit or acumen? This and many other questions
will spring to your mind as you watch Chalk N
Duster, directed by Jayant Gilatar.
The film revolves around two teachers who are
loved by their students because of their involve-
ment and innovative methods of teaching and how
the system rejects them as the stress is on making
profits by increasing fees and getting younger
teachers who are paid less. Conditions are created
to force elderly teachers to leave like removing
chairs from their classrooms, taking away their
subjects and making them teach physical exercise.
The idea is to humiliate them and not assist them
in ensuring better education for children. The goal
is to have a spanking new building, air-condi-
tioned classrooms, swanky canteens and indoor fa-
cilities like a swimming pool. Education can go out
of the window.
The film tackles a subject that will mar the fu-
H
CHALK N DUSTER
Director:JayantGilatar
Cast: ShabanaAzmi,Juhi
Chawla,ZarinaWahab,Arya
Babbar,DivyaDutta,Rishi
Kapoor,RichaChadda
Rating:***outof*****

DESIGNSTHATMADE
IMAGINATIVEUSEOF
PHOTOGRAPHS,
FONTS,COLORAND
WHITESPACES
TOLEAVEAN
IMPRESSION
By ANTHONY
LAWRENCE
Design
Amid all the problems
that afflict the world, why
is the clutter depicted by
The Economist a happy
one? And is the bright
smiling sun a happy
portent of things to
come?
Would you, in your right
senses, throw your price-
less collection out of the
window? Well, this is
what this art installation
in Madrid—titled
Pouring Book—
by Spanish artist Alicia
Martin seems to convey.
Decluttering taken to its
limits.
A case of wishful
thinking—Cameron
leading the race—as
depicted on the cover
of Britain in 2016,
published by The
Economic and Social
Research Council.

This headline
for a sports
item on
Pinterest finds
mention in
MHS Sparta
Yearbook. The
striking point is
that basketballs
have been
blown up to
enhance the
effect of the
headline.
Exhibition art attains
new heights. The Indi-
anapolis Museum of
Art has unveiled
renowned sculptor
Richard Wentworth’s
gigantic site-specific
installation in North
America. Here, books
collected over a
two-month drive have
been used to convey
the impression of a
false ceiling which looks
more like a canopy
though.

NEWSDATE NEWS CHANNEL TIME
7/1/6
8/1/16
9/1/16
10/1/16
11/1/16
11/1/16
ScufflebetweenFTIIstudents,
policeoverGajendraChauhan’s
arrivalatthecampus.
Asaramchargedwithsexualharassment;
Jodhpursessionscourtrejectsbailplea.
Tiff between NSUI activists and police
in Delhi University over lectures on
Rama. BJP leader Subramanian
Swamy calls protestors intolerant.
CarmowsdownsixinAndheriareaof
Mumbai;sixinjured.Thecarwasbeing
drivenbya74-year-oldman.
11/1/16
2:34 PM2:33 PM2:30 PM
10:15 AM10:15 AM
7:48 AM 7:48 AM
10:15 AM
7:50 AM 7:50 AM
10:40 AM
2:34 PM
10:36 AM 10:41 AM 10:43 AM
7/1/6
J&KCMMuftiMohammadSayeedpasses
away,aged79.Hadbeenadmittedto
AIIMSonDecember22. 8:32 AM8:30 AM 8:32 AM 8:32 AM
Odd-evenformulatocontinueinDelhi
tillJanuary15.DelhiHighCourt
supportsthedrive.
11:00 AM 11:00 AM 11:00 AM 11:01 AM
NIAtointerrogateSalvinderSingh;
doubtsoverhisstatements.
11:30 AM11:28 AM 11:58 AM 11:58 AM
Twelveabscondingfromjuvenile
home;youngstersjumpedacross
thewalltoescape.
11:40 AM 12:04 PM11:33 AM 11:35 AM

Here are some of the major news items aired on television
channels, recorded by our unique 24x7 dedicated media
monitoring unit that scrutinizes more than 130 TV channels in
different Indian languages and looks at who breaks the news first.
DATE NEWS CHANNEL TIME
NEWS
11/1/16
12/1/16
12/1/16
17/1/17
Pakgovttoconstituteacommitteeto
probePathankotattack;PakIBchief
directedtoconductjointprobe.Many
arrestedinconnectionwiththeattack. 1:03 PM 1:04 PM 1:05 PM 1:05 PM
10:25 AM 10:30 AM
SchoolbusfallsintoacanalinGurdaspur;
3childrendead,30injured.
10:40 AM 10:53 AM
TerrorattackatSultanAhmetSquarein
Istanbul.Tendead,15injured;mostof
themtourists. 3:21 PM 3:21 PM 3:21 PM3:20 PM
10:00 AM 10:00 AM 10:00 AM 10:00 AM
4:44 PM
Indialosesseries;losesMelbourneODI
by3wickets.
14/1/16 BlastrocksJakarta;threepeoplediein
attackonIndonesiancapital;firingstillon.
13/1/16
ComedianKikuShardaarrestedformim-
ickingDeraSachaSaudachiefGurmeet
RamRahimonComedyNightswithKapil.
Sentto14daysofjudicialcustody.
4:44 PM4:43 PM 4:43 PM
13/1/16
Maggicase:SCdirectsMysoreLabtocon-
ductteststoascertainleadcontent;report
tobesubmittedin4weeks.
1.42PM1.41PM1.41PM
13/1/16
Onimportantinternationalissues,
peopleoftheworlddonotlooktoBeijing
orMoscowtolead-theycallus:USPresi-
dentBarackObama. 9.00AM8.21AM 8.23AM8.20AM
1.40 PM
8.21AM
1.39 PM
12.04AM11.52AM 12.03AM 2.23PM11.53AM

UMBERS, perhaps, have
never acquired such a fasci-
nation and pre-eminent
position in the life of the
average Delhi resident as
now. The city government’s decision to introduce
the odd-even formula to restrict cars on Delhi’s
roads and stem rising air pollution levels has had
a drastic impact on the lifestyles of most residents
—quite apart from the effect it has had on pollu-
tion itself.
While the odd-even car
scheme has been
hailed by many,
pollution levels still
remain high. Unless
there is a long-term
strategy, Delhi’s toxicity
will continue to kill
BY PAPIA SAMAJDAR
Environment
N
TheOdd-Even
Delhi Toxicity
Anil Shakya
overnanceG

day odd-even formula was to take 50 percent of
private car owners off Delhi roads and curb
further toxicity. The government also proposed
to shut down six thermal power plants in Delhi,
responsible for approximately 10 percent of the
city’s air pollution during winters.
The Supreme Court, a crusader for the envi-
ronment, even ordered a ban on the purchase of
diesel cars with more than 2000 cc. The plea by
the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers
and automobile giants against this was duly re-
jected by it. Trucks entering Delhi would need to
cough up twice the amount of environment com-
pensation charge and those more than 10 years
old were barred from entering the city. The
Mallika Mendiratta, 25, a Supreme
Court lawyer and a regular user of the
Metro, has begun commuting in her
own car ever since the odd-even for-
mula was initiated. She is fearful of the
surging crowds in the Metro, which she
believes has been a fall-out of this car
rationing. As a single woman, she is ex-
empted from the odd-even formula and
chooses her car over public transport as
she does not have enough faith that the
current state of infrastructure can pro-
vide a smooth and safe trip. “I need to
see the extra buses promised and then
I will switch back to public transport,”
she said.
Reena S, 62, travels from her home
in Sheikh Sarai in south Delhi to
Vikaspuri in the west where she runs a
boutique. She has to cross the notorious BRT
stretch to change buses and is delighted by the
odd-even formula. “The BRT—a 5km road—is
now a joy ride of 15 minutes as compared to the
nightmarish one-and-a-half hours earlier,” she
said. Reena wants the Delhi government to make
this measure permanent.
NEW MEASURES
Delhi, one of the most polluted cities in the world
and with the tag of “gas-chamber”, has finally
woken up to the dangers of bad air quality. The
Kejriwal government announced various emer-
gency measures in early December to restrain air
pollutants during winter. The idea behind the 15-
SUCCESSFULTRIAL?
The city saw a significant
fall in both pollution and
traffic burden during the
odd-even project
GasChamber

Trucks entering Delhi would need to cough
up twice the environment compensation
charge and those more than 10 years old
were barred from entering the city.
ANUMITA ROYCHOWDHURY, executive director and Clean Air
campaign head of Centre for Science and Environment, maintains
that while there was a sharper decline in pollutant levels due to
the odd-even scheme, air quality remains hazardous or at best,
very harmful
“Bring in long-term policies”
Supreme Court also blocked four major entry
points in the recent judgment.
But what is this clean air we are aiming for?
The World Health Organization (WHO), which
has laid down the standards in this issue, defined
it as the proportion of particulate matter (PM2.5
and PM 10), nitrous dioxide, ozone, and dust
present in the air. In 2005, the WHO updated its
air quality guidelines, applicable globally.
In Delhi, particulate levels have been increas-
ing drastically. In 2014, the annual average ambi-
ent PM10 levels reached five times the Indian
standard of 60 micrograms per cubic meter
(μg/m3). Throughout winter in 2015, PM2.5 has
remained 4-7 times the standard. Ozone and ni-
trogen oxides also go way beyond the targets.
This has made Delhi’s air a cocktail of toxic gases.
KILLER CITY
Why should this be such a crisis? According to
WHO’s Global Burden of Disease report of 2013,
air pollution is the fifth largest killer in India, put-
ting it in competition with high blood pressure,
indoor pollution, tobacco smoking and poor
nutrition. Outdoor air pollution also causes the
loss of 18 million healthy years of life due to ill-
ness. Premature deaths triggered by it can be
caused by a range of cardio-respiratory ailments.
What do you think of the Delhi
government’s move to reduce
pollution?
The AAP government has proved that if
there is a political will, much can be
done for public health. Their appeal to
Delhi citizens seems to have worked to
a large extent, even after the initial
scepticism. Media and judiciary are also
to be lauded as they supported the gov-
ernment initiative. The odd-even
scheme has reduced traffic congestion
and increased the efficiency of the pub-
lic transport system. Buses now can run
to their capacity as their scheduled trips
can be completed, thanks to the
reduced traffic.
This is, however, a small step, and
much needs to be done to bring Delhi's
air to breathable standards. Other coun-
tries calibrate more long-term actions
along with emergency measures to en-
sure clean air all the year round. For
Delhi, air quality remained in the severe
category even after five days of imple-
mentation of the odd-even rules. Janu-
ary 4 and 5 showed a spike in pollution
levels, due to no wind conditions. For
example, the Delhi government can
consider bringing in 2-wheelers within
the ambit of the rationing.
What more needs to be done?
The government needs to analyze the
data after a fortnight of the odd-even
rule and decide if it should continue
with it after seeing the weather condi-
tions. It also needs to bring in other
measures such as a parking policy, better
public transport, stricter monitoring of
garbage burning, shutting down the
Badarpur plant, etc.
Environment
Delhi Toxicity
overnanceG

Hence, the Delhi government had to act im-
mediately, and from the initial response, odd and
even might work. Kejriwal chose to appeal to the
public to make this step implementable, high-
lighting that participatory governance is some-
thing the government truly values.
Gaurav Kumar, 26, has two cars, both with
even number plates. He, however, does not mind
taking the Metro to and from Uttam Nagar to
Gurgaon where he works. “The ride has been a
breeze so far, and I have almost finished reading
a novel for which I hadn’t had the time so far,”
Kumar says. Though he is taking the Metro on
odd days, not taking his car on even days also
does not cross his mind.
Post the initial scepticism of the media, it
seems to have joined the bandwagon in ensuring
its success. Before launching the pilot, the gov-
ernment ensured computerization of number
plates. Now car buyers cannot choose their num-
ber plates and there is no way dealers can bypass
this system.
However, as Anumita Roychowdhury of the
Centre for Science and Environment emphasizes,
this is just a baby step to make sure that the toxic air
doesnotgetfurtherpoisonous.Thismeasurewould
not bring down pollution levels to a great deal as it
needs to be combined with long-term policies with
strict implementation and enforcement.
Is there more waiting for Delhiites?
SafeLevels
Pollutant
Particulate 1 year
1 year
1 year
8 hrs, daily
maximum
10
matter PM2.5
Particulate
matter PM10 20
Ozone 100
40
Nitrogen
dioxide
24 hr 20Sulfur dioxide
Average
Exposure
Time
Aqg
Value
(μg/m3)
Source: World Health Organization
According to
WHO, air
pollution is the
fifth largest
killer in India.
Outdoor air
pollution also
causes the loss
of 18 million
healthy years
of life.
CLAMPDOWN A MUST
Garbage burning is a
common occurence in the
capital and it hugely
contributes to air pollution
WHO laid down a minimum criterion for pollution
which was permissible in order that health does not
get affected adversely

Environment
Rising Temperatures
OW that the world has been
through one of the warmest
winters on record, thanks to a
strong El Niňo event, along with
a spate of extreme weather con-
ditions, we know for sure that all is not well with
our beautiful blue planet.
El Niňo is a weather phenomenon that occurs
irregularly in the eastern tropical Pacific every two
to seven years. When the trade winds that usually
blow from East to West weaken, sea surface tem-
peratures rise, impacting the atmosphere. The cur-
rent El Niňo event is a relatively strong one and is
likely to have its impact through much of 2016.
For long, climate change was a controversy, with
skeptics (mostly from the US) rubbishing the man-
made climate change premise. But there is enough
data to prove that global surface temperatures have
increased in recent decades. And over time, a con-
sensus has emerged on how human-induced emis-
sions of greenhouse gases (such as carbon dioxide,
methane, nitrous oxide and ozone) are responsible
for the rise in temperatures.
For the last few decades, we have heard of the
world’s fast-depleting carbon budget and the need
to adopt greener technologies to mitigate climate
change. But global warming could also be happen-
ing due to other reasons, not discussed at the cli-
Scorched
EarthWhile scientists have been blaming carbon and other greenhouse
gases for the El Niňo effect and climate change, the Earth’s axis,
satellites and antennas too are being held responsible
BY SWATI PRASAD
ONTHE EDGE
El Niňo has
shown that
climate change’s
worst effects
are here to stay
N
overnanceG

Views On News 07 February 2016

Views On News 07 February 2016

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