In this episode of South Central, hosts Dhanya Rajendran and Anisha Seth are joined by activist-psephologist Yogendra Yadav and former lawyer and journalist Sukanya Shaji.
They first discuss the Special Intensive Revision of voter rolls exercise and controversies surrounding it. Yogendra says the EC is “no longer acting as a neutral, constitutional body” and that many of its press conferences now come off as “PR exercises”.
“The ECI has not learnt that a large-scale exercise like the SIR mandates the question of whether this was the right move at all,” he adds. “ECI decided that SIR is the medicine and started looking for a disease to fit that.”
In part two of the discussion, the panel discusses two high court orders – one from Kerala, another from Karnataka. In Kerala, a Bengali woman actor had accused director Ranjith of sexual harassment; the incident took place in 2009 but she complained in 2024 in the aftermath of the Hema Committee report. In Karnataka, a woman complained of sexual assault from a man she met on a dating app.
In both cases, the high courts quashed the FIRs, which Sukanya says is “not a good precedent”. “The court, especially in the Karnataka case, makes a blanket assumption that a woman having agency to meet a man she met online would have the agency to walk out also. But what is not factored here is how social agency does not negate gender power imbalance,” she says.
Tune in!
Listen & follow on Apple.
Listen & follow on Spotify.
Listen & follow on YouTube.
Once a month, we will invite one TNM subscriber to the show. Write to us on what you would like to speak about to southcentral@thenewsminute.com. Send your thoughts, suggestions, and criticism as well. You can also let us know what you think by filling out our quick feedback form. Your suggestions help shape future episodes of South Central.
Audio Timecodes
00:00:00- Introduction
00:01:44 - CCTV Series
00:02:47 - Headlines
00:08:45 - Support Newslaundry
00:09:45 - Headlines
00:15:12 - Yogendra Yadav on SIR
00:54:55- Bumble & Ranjith Cases
01:15:38- Recommendations
References
Vijay’s Karur visit challenges and DMK’s mixed numbers | Powertrip #123
Opinion: The SIR in Bihar was a futile bureaucratic exercise
Exclusive: Bihar SIR rolls reveal 2,92,048 voters with house number ‘0’
Second phase of SIR to begin in 12 states, including TN and Kerala
Karnataka HC quashes FIR against man accused of raping Bumble match
‘Delay in complaint’: Kerala HC quashes case by Bengali woman actor against director Ranjith
Recommendations
Yogendra Yadav
Sukanya Shaji
Anisha Sheth
Dhanya Rajedran
A Teen in Love With a Chatbot Killed Himself
Become a subscriber. Click here.
Contribute to our reporting fund. Click here.
To check out our other shows, click here.
To not miss any updates, join TNM's WhatsApp Channel! Click here
Produced by Bhuvan Malik, edited by Jaseem Ali, written by Sukanya Shaji.
For now, South Central is free to listen. Before it goes behind a paywall, why not subscribe? Click here and get access to all our paywall content, from videos to investigations, ground reports to podcasts.
Newslaundry is a reader-supported, ad-free, independent news outlet based out of New Delhi. Support their journalism, here.
