Adani is back in the news this week – unsurprisingly, not on NDTV. I’m more interested in the timing of this scam. In the US, the White House has significant influence over foreign affairs. I suspect the indictment’s release aligns with the recent election. The Biden administration may have delayed or leveraged it for negotiations, but with power shifting to Trump, the DOJ likely acted before the handover. It’s fascinating how term limits and a functional bureaucracy can still allow democracy to thrive amid corruption and lobbying, here in India too.
After the West Wing and succession, the government’s predictable spin shifting blame from Modiji to all parties feels routine. Sure, many politicians are corrupt, as we know. But not everyone is involved in Adani’s policymaking, like Modiji or Trump with Elon Musk. Unlike during the Hindenburg accusation, this time the news cannot be managed with Godi media. Let's see if JP Naddaji will answer for this.
Nithin
Big hello to the NL Team,
I recently read an article based on an investigation by NYT on Delhi pollution. It exposed the power nexus and lackadaisical attitude of the government and the administration in checking pollution. I’m surprised that it didn’t find any mention in NL Hata while discussing the Delhi AQI.
Consider it my “recommendation for the week” ;-)
I find the TNM WhatsApp channel quite engaging. Does NL have something like that running?
One of the subscribers had written about the opinion of Anand being pro-government and being made just for the sake of a differing opinion. I too agree with him. Earlier, Anand used to add substance with his knowledge and justify his views, but of late it has not been so. Anyway, I love to see alternative views. NL should not become an echo chamber.
Keep doing the good work. Looking forward to more good journalism.
Regards,
Rafa
In the last podcast, one subscriber said that Gen Z is bigoted, and Manisha and the rest of the panel seemed to disagree. I just want to share my experience. I’m a Gen-Z, born in 2001, and lived in four different cities across two different states. I believe Gen Zs are very much casteist, bigoted, sexist, and homophobes. it’s as if your generation’s few people are good and the rest are sh*t. Just because we are Gen Z doesn’t mean that we are any different. It’s the same segregated society.
Rohit
I enjoy NL Hafta, Newsance, and Let Me Explain by the TNM.
Recently, I saw an interesting thing — a fairness meter at the end of articles on Newsweek. Please consider having something similar in your content.
Amrita Deshmukh
Hello all. Wanted to add something from my time living as a 24-year-old man from Delhi in Chennai between 2012 and 2014. Not speaking Tamil made things difficult, but learning some basic phrases, words, and numbers eventually helped a lot, and people respected that. Also, local Tamil speakers who had gone to CBSE schools could speak Hindi and were really happy to speak in Hindi. Also, I met some young engineers who were doing odd jobs and regretted that they never had the chance to learn Hindi, saying that it limits job opportunities for them outside of Tamil Nadu. I am also against the imposition of Hindi, but these grey areas are also important to note between the black and white.
Somsubhro
Hi NL team, can you do a subscriber meet in Hyderabad, please. And where are you with the South Hafta podcast, please?
Loads of admiration,
Arthi
Hi Hafta,
Thanks for reading my email in Hafta 512 on Manipur. We know that both the centre and state are not doing anything concrete to resolve the issue. Leaving this fact aside, my email was on the biasness of media coverage, and it still holds true. An example of this was reading out my email itself; very conveniently/accidentally, you did not read out who committed the latest killings of six. However, on numerous occasions, there is no hesitation in saying xyz violence was done by the Meitei-armed militia. I am not saying reports should be one versus another. But it is amazing to see how a community is seemingly given a free pass like this, simply by not mentioning them as perpetrators too. Also, I know that my email was uploaded as is. Thanks for that, but really, who is going to read it? Thanks.
Taps
After seeing the Maharashtra election results, I feel the Congress leaders should defect like the Shinde Sena did from the original Shiv Sena. How long should the country suffer due to the incompetence of the Gandhis?
Also, I wanted to know your views on increasing the reservation limit beyond 50 percent as said by Congress. Shouldn’t there be a detailed public policy study regarding this? There should be an optimal percentage of reservation such that it maximizes equity and minimizes the loss of efficiency... something like the optimal percentage of imposition of taxes. "
Pushkar
Reference to Hafta 510: Retired CJI is giving out interviews. Can we please reach out to his team? It would be great to see Abhinandan interview him.
Neil Sabnis
I’ve heard numerous claims about the rigging of EVMs in Maharashtra and the apparent carelessness involved. Do you think there is any credible evidence to support these allegations?
Supriya Sule and The Boss
In the previous Hafta, a subscriber letter put British newspaper the Guardian in the same league as NYT when it comes to Gaza coverage. I found this very ill-informed. Their coverage has been the fairest of all ajor Euro-American press. Just read the long essay by Omer Bartov published in the Guardian (August 2024) along with their podcasts/YouTube content regarding Gaza to see the stark difference between them and others. Also, the Guardian is not owned by billionaires and maintains better editorial independence.
Karthik
Hi team,
Thanks for your good work, and I feel proud to be a subscriber of Newslaundry. Inclusion of superstar journalists like Sreenivasan Jain has increased your reach, more so after his interviews with Pawars. My small suggestion is to include a similar well-known journalist like Ravish (no disrespect to anyone in Newslaundry) in Hindi, which will increase your reach much more.
I am sure you must be discussing Maharashtra elections this Hafta, with a lot of talks, especially from prominent people like Prakala Prabhakar, regarding the change in voting percentage after 5 pm. It’s better to bring someone who is well-versed in these things (like Dr SY Qureshi) to discuss these anomalies. Anand sir, I don’t know what your obsession is with defending every wrong of the government. May be legally you are right when you are defending, but sometimes legally something is correct but morally it’s not.
Finally, Manisha and Atul thank you for being awesome.
Ujjwal
Letters through e-mail:
Dear Mr Sekhri,
Ex-politician Gautam Gambhir recently told an up-and-coming young Indian cricketer that facing bouncers from tall Australian bowlers is like taking a bullet for your country. I am not sure who the ex-politician was denigrating (the cricketer or the security personnel), but it’s considered inspiring. We need something similar for football as well, but I cannot come up with anything good. The best I could say is: “Every tackle you make is like bringing down an enemy soldier on the border.” Please come up with something awe-inspiring for us football fans.
Just wanted to say something light during these sad and stressful times.
Anuni Nonymos
Apologies for the long letter. This is written in reference to the recent discussion on democratic governments and its non-democratic geopolitical approaches abroad.
For starters, one needs to differentiate between international relations and its politics, commonly referred to as geopolitics, from the form of government in the home country (democracy, autocracy, monarchy, republic, etc). The form of government at home has no bearings on the geopolitical interests within the field of global politics in which all countries indulge.
On the contrary, the strategies and tactics of geopolitics generally rebound back to home countries, “de-democratising” the domestic politics. One experiences the same across the world, whether it’s through surveillance systems, which, as a part of foreign policy apparatus, is used to gain geopolitical advantages, rebounds back in the domestic country in the guise of safeguarding and protecting citizens of a country (this is Abhinandan’s, “America listens to everything and everyone”). One also experiences this phenomenon through how states respond to organised protests in democratic countries; campus protests against the Vietnam War in the ’60s, the Black Lives Matter protests, and student campus protests on Gaza are good examples of it. It’s a generally accepted norm now in the United States where local law enforcement agencies buy military-grade hardware directly from the department of defense, which is then used to disperse voices and control protests.
Under these conditions, domestic politics is itself de-democratised through geopolitics. Generally speaking, it turns itself more towards the principle of isolationism (America first) and populism and in search for authoritarian leaders because the citizens feel themselves to be absolutely powerless in this field of global geopolitics and this lack of power is further compounded by the fact that citizens have to bear the consequences of geopolitical decisions through geographic dislocation, as during wartimes, economic dislocation, economic recession, inflation and budgetary allocations are not directed toward domestic issues but generally used for purposes of global politics.
Abhinandan’s notion that decisions of war are democratised in democratic countries is not right. The decisions with regard to national security and geopolitical strategies are taken by experts and bureaucrats who are not democratically elected (the decision on the timing of statehood of Jammu and Kashmir, for instance, is a good example of experts taking the call, that Anand rightly pointed out will be based on the advisory of the national security apparatus). The expertise of such bureaucrats lies precisely in focusing on efficiency and optimisation of outcomes that are targeted and detached from the democratic interests of the citizens themselves. And although people can and have voted out leaders who, for example, have gotten their countries into war, the structure in itself remains the same. Israel will continue to do what it has been doing in Gaza and Lebanon, and irrespective of the election of either Trump or Harris, United States foreign policy will remain the same in relation to Israel, irrespective of whether a temporary ceasefire is negotiated (Anand has pointed out this as a continuity of foreign policy regardless of party in power).
Anonymous
Hi,
I wanted to participate in the discussion about democracy and international relations. I want to suggest that democracy – people’s power – does not equate to elections, which is how it seems everyone is referring to it. Elections can be a feature of democracies, but the equivalence is not true. Someone wrote in claiming that wars aren’t carried out by democracies. The Korean War? The Iraq War? The Vietnam War? These are a small subset of the actions of just one democracy. Not to speak of the various assassinations, coups, and toppling of democracies they’ve carried out. I think it’s ridiculous to suggest that elected representatives get together and decide to go to war. The Iraq War of 2003 would never have happened if this was the case. Another listener clarified that Israel has elections but is by no means a democracy because no theocracy can be.
One doesn’t have to take Chinese elections seriously, and I don’t have to tell a room of journalists their record on freedom of speech. But institutionally, in terms of social and economic equity, education, access to resources, and in terms of the millions they have lifted out of poverty, one has to admit that in these things there is – people’s power. Abhinandan conceded that the nations we typically understand as democracies are not perfect. We ought to be able to look at some other nations in the same way. Instead of elections being the single qualifying metric for something to be called a democracy.
Keep up the good work.
Raghav Pandey
Hi Hafta team,
The recent US election results, with Trump winning comfortably, have got me reflecting on the role of mainstream media and its impact on elections. It’s interesting to compare the US election coverage with India’s.
The mainstream US media largely supports the Democrats, yet Republicans won. In India, the media backed Modi, and while he did win, the outcome wasn’t as decisive as predicted. No media outlet can be fully objective – personal biases inevitably shape coverage.
These biases have become more apparent in recent years. Is this due to societal polarisation, with news coverage reflecting this divide? The concentration of mainstream media in cities contributes to an urban-centric perspective, often missing the pulse of “heartland” areas, as seen in recent election results.
The mainstream media’s narratives are increasingly disconnected from the broader public sentiment, potentially undermining its credibility. I generally enjoy your work. However, the recent US election coverage was disappointing. It didn’t go beyond what mainstream outlets reported.
I would like to recommend the Romanian documentary Collective by Alexander Nanau – it’s a compelling exploration of media and accountability. Also, a shout-out to fellow Chennai resident Jayashree, whose candid, refreshing, and honest views capture the spirit of our city perfectly.
Ankit Nahar
Dear Hafta team,
I wanted to write in to offer you (Abhinandan) a possible reason for the limp response to the election coverage fund top-up. I am a student and, as such, cannot contribute more than the subscription.
But I have to say I have been disappointed by what seems to be the more indulgent, ego-stroking nature of some of NL’s recent coverage, namely Sreenivasan Jain’s foreign trips to Palestine and the United States. To me, the coverage was unnecessary and not very helpful – providing an ‘Indian’ POV on these global conflicts could easily have happened from the studio. The short duration of the trips meant the coverage could not extend beyond the limits of a foreign journalist in a place unfamiliar to them.
S Jain’s work and interviews in the Maharashtra election, however, point to the power such a senior and well-known face can bring to NL, putting the money we contribute to the best use, speaking truth to power in a toxic media ecosystem.
I would put the same charge against Abhinandan’s interview with Shalini Passi. Honestly, I am not interested in that sort of distraction, and if Abhinandan must indulge himself, I plead he restrict it to Awful and Awesome. I say this only out of my massive respect and admiration for the work you guys do.
Joseph
Hi everyone,
Abhinandan complains about NL Senas not being topped up, but I don’t really feel a compulsion to pay. I like to support your work but don’t have strong feelings for a particular election, for example. And I know that despite Abhinandan’s threats, he will pay up for train tickets back.
I don’t think this is what NL Sena was meant to accomplish. Wasn’t it a way for people to push you to pursue additional stories they cared about? Perhaps you can allow people to vote on which projects they would want to support. Or perhaps send a survey to previous contributors asking why they didn’t want to support a low-popularity project and what you can do to interest them.
I would have supported the US project if you had offered a deep focus on the Indian American perspective, which is something US news obviously wasn’t focusing on. Good idea to do international news stories, but no point if you just do a copy of all others. Anyone can watch a Trump rally experience online, anyone can interview people on the road and get some ridiculous views. It felt like something you wanted to do for your satisfaction rather than something you felt would provide value. Please find stories that can do both.
Best,
Manjari
Hi, my suggestion in a NL meetup was that covering elections may not be the best usage of the resources. You may want to take up 2/3 perspectives and do stories on those across the country: pollution, education, health, jobs, gender, justice, policing, caste, panchayats, municipalities, state bar councils, legal aid through DLSA, policy, and status of courts… India hai, issues ki kami thode hi hai.
Agar elections karna hi hai, democracy does not start and end with MP/MLA elections. In how many municipalities, state bar councils, universities, and panchayats have elections been conducted? Who did they throw up as candidates? What were the promises and what was delivered? What issues were resolved?
The things that get covered as news most often is - he said this, they said this, my reaction to his tweet and his reaction to that, 500 years ago this happened, so we need to kill them now, et all. The only way to deal with this madness is what the person in power is going to do for the important issues now. We have reached here. Ab aage badhne ke liye, what are you going to do?
Love Hafta, Charcha, and South Central. And I am with Abhinandan on the cats issue. I don’t like cats, but neither do I like dogs.
Regards,
Renu Jha
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