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The mass media across the world and in India as well are converging and consolidating. Creators of content are coming closer to distributors and disseminators. Erstwhile competitors are becoming collaborators. The dividing line between broadcasting and telecommunications is getting increasingly blurred. While these phenomena restrict consumer choice by reducing content diversity, the technological advantages of integration make these processes inevitable and inexorable. It has, therefore, become...

What should one say about a feature film where there is superlative acting, which has outstanding production qualities, is incredibly realistic in terms of style and treatment and is, above all, an avant garde work which seeks to depart from typical formulae that are supposed to ensure a movie is not just commercially viable, but also enables the producer to laugh all the way to the bank and back? What should one say about a film that makes waves in the south of France as a shining paradigm of...

For the diminutive, bespectacled, dhoti-clad Bengali babu, the short distance on Raisina Hill between North Block and Rashtrapati Bhavan represents the final lap in a long journey that began more than four decades ago. Pranab Mukherjee has successfully reached the pinnacle of his career. But his movement away from the hurly-burly of active politics can only weaken the already-beleaguered second United Progressive Alliance government in Delhi. That’s one paradox. As Pranab babu enjoys his walks...

Who owns the mass media in India? That is a rather difficult question to answer. There are many media organisations in the country that are owned and controlled by a wide variety of entities including corporate bodies, societies and trusts, and individuals. Information about such organisations and people is scattered, incomplete, and dated, thereby making it rather difficult to collate such information leave alone analyse it. Nevertheless, a few salient aspects about media ownership stand out...

A report prepared by an independent institution recommending imposition of cross-media ownership restrictions recently entered the public domain nearly three years after it was submitted, following a rebuke to the government by a panel of lawmakers. The report, running into nearly 200 pages, was prepared by the Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) at the instance of the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (I&B). Though this report was submitted in July 2009, it was placed on the...

IT MAY sound funny, but is meant to be deadly serious. A White Paper on Black Money! Well, that is exactly what was tabled in Parliament on 21 May by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. The document, running into just under 100 pages, prepared by the Central Board of direct Taxes in the department of Revenue in the Ministry of Finance, is significant — not for what it states, but what it does not. The document goes into some length about how ‘black money’ should be defined, the various factors...

The crisis in Europe is not merely an economic one; it has profound political and social dimensions as well. The impact of the double-dip recession in that continent is being felt across the globe and also in India. The European crisis has contributed to the sharp and sudden fall in the value of the Indian rupee vis-à-vis the American dollar, but the parallels do not stop there. On the political front, the weakening of centrist and conservative political parties in Europe mirrors the weakening...

PURNO AGITOK SANGMA is an unusual politician whose rise through the ranks is remarkable. He became Speaker of the Lok Sabha in 1996. He was the first tribal, that too from the Northeast, the first MP belonging to the Opposition and the youngest person elected unanimously to head the lower house of Parliament. He was elected to the Lok Sabha no less than nine consecutive times between 1977 and 2006 and has also been the CM of Meghalaya. This publication is essentially a collection of speeches...

The word “anarchy” means different things to different people. It is believed that the word originated from the ancient Greek word anarchia which literally means “absence of a leader”. As a political expression, anarchy can imply two diametrically opposite points of view, one positive and the other negative. Many American political scientists and philosophers suggest that anarchy is a state of society without publicly-enforced rule of law in the form of a government that has a mandate to govern...