What Is The Caste of Indian Media? No Surprises!

Ever wondered why Indian Media is so casteist and is so poor at reporting and presenting reality to people? Who owns Indian media houses? Who run these propaganda houses? Can Dalits trust Indian Media?

There are no surprises as I said in the article title. Indian media is controlled by Brahmins, Banias and Jains as almost everything in India.

One of the biggest English newspapers, The Times of India is run by Jains and another Hindustan Times is run by Birla, belonging to Bania community, Indian Express newspaper is also run by Banias, Danik Jagran and Danik Bhaskar Newspapers also run by Bania, Hindustan and Amar Ujala newspapers also owned by Banias. Zee TV owned by Banias. The Hindu newspaper is owned by Brahmins (Kasturi Iyengar family)

According to 2006 research report, Indian media lacks social diversity and it doesn’t reflect the social profile of country. Mainly Hindu so called upper caste men dominate in the media houses. They constitute around 8 % of India’s population but among the key decision makers of the national media, their share is as high as 71 %.

According to 2016 report, India ranks abysmally low at 133 among 180 countries in the latest annual World Press Freedom Index, which is another worrying point for Dalits and minority communities.

“Are you still wondering why don’t they talk about social justice and equality? They won’t.”

‘Twice-born’ Hindus (dwijas comprising Brahmins, Kayasthas, Rajputs, Vaishyas and Khatris) are about 16 % of India’s population, but they are about 86 % among the key media decision makers according to the 2006 survey. Brahmins (including Bhumihars and Tyagis) alone constitute 49% of the key media personnel.

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Dalits and Adivasis are conspicuous by their absence among the decision makers.

Not even one of the 315 key decision makers belonged to the Scheduled Castes or the Scheduled Tribes. Is there any surprise why Manuwadi media didn’t cover atrocities on Dalits?

The situation for OBCs in media is equally shameful, despite being around 40% of the total population, in Indian national media, they are only 4%.

Muslims despite being around 15% of the total population of India, their share in key decision making in media posts is only 3%.

Only in electronic English media the population of Sikhs is equivalent to its population in India.

One more data, if added to this would add some interesting value i.e. the ownership of these mediums by Dalits and Minority communities? It can be safely assumed numbers would be negligible.

The caste of Indian media is upper caste hence they ignore lower castes and speak the language of Manu of Manusmriti. Can we trust such a media which speaks the language of Manu? Media that worries more about the cows and Ganga artis can do no good for the society. Dalits and minorities should set up their own media houses and present the truth as the truth is! Since ages, so called upper castes have controlled the flow of information hence kept tight control over the so-called lower castes, history of media in India is filled with lies and propaganda to keep so-called lower castes at an edge.

These findings are based on a survey of the social background of 315 key decision makers from 37 ‘national’ media organisations (up to 10 key decision makers from each organisation) based in Delhi. The survey was carried out by volunteers of Media Study Group between 30 May and 3 June 2006.

The survey was designed and executed by Anil Chamaria, Freelance Journalist, and Jitendra Kumar, Independent Researcher, from Media Study Group and Yogendra Yadav, Senior Fellow, CSDS.

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Summary Tables –

Gender Profile

	Men	Women
Print Hindi	86 %	14 %
Print English	84 %	16 %
Electronic Hindi	89 %	11 %
Electronic English	68 %	32 %
All	83 %	17 %

Religious profile

	Hindu	Muslim	Christian	Sikh
Share in India’s population	81 %	13 %	2 %	2 %
Print Hindi	97 %	2 %	0 %	0
Print English	90 %	3 %	4 %	0
Electronic Hindi	90 %	6 %	1 %	0
Electronic English	85 %	0 %	13 %	2 %
All	90 %	3 %	4 %	1 %

Caste-community profile

	Brahmin	Kayastha	Vaishya/Jain	Rajput	Khatri	Non dwija upper caste	OBC
Print Hindi	59 %	9 %	11 %	8 %	5 %	0 %	8 %
Print English	44 %	18 %	5 %	1 %	17 %	5 %	1 %
Electronic Hindi	49 %	13 %	8 %	14 %	4 %	0%	4 %
Electronic English	52 %	13 %	2 %	4 %	4 %	4 %	4 %
All	49 %	14 %	7 %	7 %	9 %	2 %	4 %

Caste-Community profile compared to population share

Caste/community group	Share in India’s population	Share in key media personnel

‘Twice born’ Hindus (Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, others)	16 %	85 %
‘Intermediary’ Hindu castes (Jat, Reddy, Maratha, Patel, etc.)	8 %	3 %
Hindu OBC	34 %	4 %
Muslim	13 %	4 %
Christian	2 %	3 %
Sikhs	2 %	1 %
SC	16 %	0 %
ST	8 %	0 %