INTRODUCTION:

Print Media - A historical perspective:

Previously done research studies spoke about the evolution and history of newspapers in India. The evolution of Newspapers in India started with the introduction of ‘Bengal Gazette’ started by James Augustus Hickey in 1780 from Calcutta as a weekly two sheet paper. This newspaper paved the way for Indian freedom struggle and the fight against the social evils in India by the way of revolutionary and enlightening writings. Other newspapers such as Calcutta Chronicle, Madras Courier, and Bombay Herald, Bombay Courier, Bombay Gazette entered into the scene and the newspapers in Hindi and other regional languages also started flourishing in the various parts of the nation.

Bengal was the birth place of Journalism in India and the language press. ‘SamacharDarpan’ was the first Indian language newspaper which was a Bengali weekly newspaper introduced in 1818 and the first periodical of India in Indian language was ‘Dig Darshan’ in Bangla language started in the same year. ‘Eenadu’ was a Telugu daily which was started by Ramoji Rao, the first Gujarati Newspaper was ‘Bombay Samachar’ which still exists and is considered as the oldest living Indian newspaper of India. Raja Rammohan Roy, who is considered as the founder of revolutionary Indian Press, recognized the power of Newspapers and used it as a vehicle for propagating his liberal ideas and eradicating the social evils prevailing in the Indian society. He introduced ‘SambadKaumudi’ in Bengali in 1821 and published the articles promoting women education, social betterment and awakening and development of scientific outlook. His other publications include ‘Mirat-ul-Akhbar’ in Persian and ‘Brahmanical Magazine’ in English. (Aggarwal, V.B. and Gupta, V.S. (2002) Pp.92-97 Introduction).

Another article titled “Media Coverage of Violence against Women in India” by (Philips et.al 2014) speaks about the horrific Nirbhaya rape case that occurred in the year 2012 in India. On December 16th, 2012 a 23-year-old female student was the victim of a gang-rape on a moving bus in Munirka, South Delhi. The victim and her boyfriend had boarded the bus around 9:15 PM, where the six men on the bus, including the driver, attacked them. The boyfriend was physically assaulted while the female student was gang-raped (i.e. the female was raped by several males) before being thrown out of the moving bus approximately 45 minutes later in Mahipalpur- a neighbourhood in New Delhi. The accused then attempted to run over the woman and her boyfriend as they fled in the bus. On December 26th, 2012, the woman was transferred from Safdarjung Hospital via aircraft to Mount Elizabeth Hospital in Singapore, where her health status was deemed to be deteriorating due to severe organ failure. Her major injuries included lung and abdomen infection as well as brain injury. The woman eventually succumbed to her injuries and died of multiple organ failure on December 29th, 2012. There are many more instances of such news and incidents of sexual assault against women that happened after this incident in New Delhi.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE:

Women representation:

The representation of women in India was a matter of concern even after independence. Previous research studies drew the attention of the researchers to various issues present at that time (Epstein, 1978a; Tuchman, 1987b; Molotch 1978). Women despite accounting for half of the world populace, happen to be the marginalised section of a society in spite of the country in which they reside happening to be a developed or a developing nation. Women are seen less newsworthy and more as entertainment objects. Gaye Tuchman (1978) in her book ‘Hearth and Home: Images of women in Mass media’ spoke about the stereotyping of women within media outlets and the absence of women from news pages. She terms it as ‘symbolic annihilation - a combination of condemnation, trivialization and erasure.’

Women portrayal:

Bamburac, Isanonoc and Jusic (2006), in their research analysed old and new modes of gender representation in newspapers and whether there was a balanced portrayal of women in their dynamic lives and the realities of the politics of representation. It was revealed that even in developed countries like Europe, male dominance in newspapers is prevalent and women are marginalised into cornering to private and entertainment and news. Female voices are often silenced and kept in background which is passive or pacified in comparison to their male counterparts. The study showed the systematic constructs of social identities. It constructs the male domain with the infusion of symbolic inequality which is prevalent throughout the world. A study on women issues in print media in Tanzania by Eva Solomon (2006) revealed that women’s issues are covered more in tabloids than in broadsheets. One of the major finding of the study was that women’s representation is objectified to increase the sale of the newspapers which endorses the the theory of social construction where media coverage is integral to shape the construction of reality. Gallaghar (2005) in his research questioned the visibility of women that ‘But do we see them or hear their voices frequently in the news media? News acts as a mirror of the world, but the question arises that whether we are presented with a clear unambiguous reality of the distorted reality?’ The study suggested the targeted intervention of media that distorts reality and construction of reality and flattening the importance of certain groups, while pushing others to the margin.

Feminist Perspectives:

The chronicles of historical evidences shows origin and development of feminism. It is related to the historical process encompassing the multifaceted ideas and thoughts, common issues and particularly the fight for women’s rights. Mary Vollstonecrafts “Vindication of a Right of Women (1971) argued for higher education, economic independence for women and also attacked the patriarchy supremacy in the society. The feminist critiques categorized these changes into different genres rather than cumulative assumptions. The different disciplines of categorization were inclusion, separation and re-conceptualization. The first kind is the inclusion of women in various cognitive structures leaving the mainstream unchallenged. The second kind of response is from the women’s standpoint that there is marginalization, exploitation and deprivation in a patriarchal society. The third kind of response is the inclusion of women in dichotomies like public vs. private but are with the attitude of taken for granted. The main finding of the study was that patriarchal society was the reason for structural inequality in women’s representation.

Jaggar (1983) in his study revealed that the feminist scholars agreed on difference in gender is socially constructed and fundamentally used to categorize the analysis of social life. Susan Faludi (1991)’s research work challenges the equality of status of American women of the twentieth century. She spoke about the myths regarding status of women and the press reports stating career women are more subject to depression than other women, that professional women quit jobs under pressure to stay back over home, over thirty years women have little chance of getting married. The author mentions that the same reasons which elevated women’s status also led to their downfall. The author concludes by saying that in the post-modern society the postmodern feminists suggests that women’s movement are the main cause of women’s unhappiness. Gallagher (1992) in another study on feminist media research and criticism focussed on the understanding of the cultural dimensions of power and equality. She argued from a feminist point of view on the importance of micro level work within the political and economic context of media development and to examine the macro-level forces impinging on media to formulate relevant policies and strategies. Urvashi Buthalia (1993) in her study said that it was no longer possible for women to be ignored with regards to preparing documents, policy decisions, electoral policies and so forth, the question of specific needs of women hasto be addressed. Her study also said that it was not possible to overlook women’s issues totally in today’s contemporary society. Martha A. Fineman and Martha McClusky in their book ‘Feminism, Media and Law (1997) discussed how media power influences the popular opinion. Deborah L. Rhodes puts up a significant analysis begins with the absence or less women in media, their under representation in the important decision making body, sensationalize the various feminist movements and struggle. The writer further says that realities of the feminist objectives could be better apprehended by understanding how media construct and constrain the issues. The feminist movements heightened the awareness on the burning issues and how the press reflects or refracts the feminist issues / feminism. MaithryeeChaudhari (2000) ‘Feminism in Print Media’ laid emphasis on two important aspects of the social process in Indian popular media and feminism which augmented women’s movement and the process of economic liberalization and how the economic liberalization effects the media. The writer criticized the intellectual paradigm has replaced the traditional system of identifying the middle class and this shift has also introduced the politics of representation.

Previously there were research studies conducted that spoke on the change of representation of women in the Indian press since 1988 (Balasubhramanyan 1988, Prasad 1992, Joseph and Sharma, 1991). Their studies spoke on the increase of space given to women’s issues. One of the major findings of the study by Joseph and Sharma (1991) was that the hierarchy of news and news values and serious articles on women are covered less in comparison with the overall coverage. Newspapers also gave only selective coverage to the women’s issues and often presents distorted feminist views (Balasubhramanyan 1988). Sonia Bhathla (1996) study showed that women’s issues are predominantly event oriented in print media. Major percentage of new stories focused on violence and crime. One of the major findings of the story was that such stories are not carried because of the sensitivity towards women; rather they fit neatly into the media’s routinisation as it is easy to obtain from regular sources. The study concluded that the government supports patriarchy but gives up to rhetoric of being liberal and accessible and that women’s movements are used by the governments as instruments in political constituency. RashmiLuthra (1987) studies a general portrayal of women’s issues in the print media. The study observed that the stories related to an event or an issue was considered news worthy. It pointed out the tactics adopted by the reporters to present women’s news and story with a feminist perspective to gain prominence. The study concluded that the patriarchal system of society is responsible for less visibility of women’s issues on movements and attributes it to symbolic annihilation of women in news.

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY:

· To educe the kind of portrayal given to women based issues.

· To examine the kind of reportage given provided by Tamil dailies to the case study that has been undertaken for the study.

METHODOLOGY:

The research study adopts Qualitative Content Analysis method to examine the kind of portrayal and reportage given to women based issues specially with respect to the specific case study that has been taken up for the research study. The period of study is one month February 2017 among three newspapers viz. Dina Thanthi, Dina Karan and Dina Malar.

Table 1: Total No. of Articles

Category/ Newspapers	Dina Thanthi	Dina Karan	Dina Malar	Total
No. of articles	8	12	10	30

FINDINGS:

· When observing the total number of articles, women based articles and articles were more in Dina Karan in comparison with Dina Thanthi and Dina Malar. There were 66 articles in total across three dailies.

· When enquired about the type of news story, news and letters to the editor were more in comparison with editorials and features across the dailies.

· Regarding articles by length, articles 400-799 words in length were the maximum followed by those which were less than 100 words over other categories. Dina Karan had more 800 word articles but the other dailies were marginally behind.

· As Regards with Tone of Headline, it was revealed from the study that Dina Karan had more exaggerated headlines and Dina Thanthi had more sensational headlines when compared with other dailies.

· Concerning the Tone of Lead, it was found that Dina Karan had more sensational leads. Titillating leads were higher in Dina Karan yet again over other dailies. Victimising leads in Dina Malar over other dailies.

CONCLUSION:

The primary objective of the research undertaken had been to know about the crime portrayal and reportage of news given to women based news. Dina Karan had given more coverage to the death of 17 year-old Nandini who was gang-raped and murdered by her estranged boyfriend and her friends and found in a decomposed state at a well in Ariyalur when compared with other dailies. The amount of coverage given to the murder of the teenage girl across the three dailies evoked very less coverage and reportage as all or most of the media attention was grabbed by the widespread protests over Jallikattu and its subsequent success in reversal of the ban for conducting Jallikattu. However, it has to be noted that this gruesome gang rape and murder of this Dalit girl was as serious as Nirbhaya’s case in New Delhi but the coverage and protests are almost minimal and non-existent in this case. We could argue that there was lethargy on the part of media outlets in the portrayal of the crime as well as the coverage and reportage it garnered.

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