NL Hafta

In this episode of Hafta, Abhinandan Sekhri, Madhu Trehan, Manisha Pande and Mehraj D Lone of Newslaundry are joined by Suhasini Haidar, national and diplomatic affairs editor of The Hindu. The panel discusses a range of issues that made news this week.They start with the controversial visit of a delegation of the European Members of Parliament to Kashmir earlier this week. “I think it was a case of misplaced priorities as far as the government is concerned,” Suhasini says. She questions why the government used an obscure think tank rather than one of its own agencies to invite the delegation. Could it be that Prime Minister Narendra Modi doesn’t care about what the international press says about him? Suhasini disagrees, “I don’t think that is true. I definitely think they were tracking very closely what happened in the international media, particularly before Modi went to the US because they were worried about the kind of coverage that was coming out.”They move on to discuss the WhatsApp snooping row. Mehraj is of the view that Ravi Shankar Prasad, who said the government has sought a response from WhatsApp, is “passing the buck” when the messaging platform itself is a victim in this instance. Suhasini says, “I think WhatsApp has been passing the buck as well. Why do they have a software that is so easy to hack?” Speaking about the deteriorating air quality in Delhi and its coverage in the media, Manisha says, “When journalists are only going to talk about this as an issue around Diwali, then you are just minimising the scope of the problem.” Suhasini and Mehraj point towards the systemic causes of the problem that are rarely talked about. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Newslaundry Hafta, host Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan and Mehraj Lone are joined by Diksha Madhok, Editor and Director of Quartz India. They discuss the recently concluded assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana, the release of National Crime Records Bureau data, the epidemic of protests all across the globe, and other issues.On the missing details of lynching, religious killings in the latest NCRB data, Abhinandan says, “I am not entirely of the view that these have been left out because of malicious intent. I do genuinely believe it’s too subjective.” However, Manisha argues, “I think for the police collating lynching data should be easy.”Apart from the assembly election results, the panel also discusses the local Block Development Council elections in J&K. Mehraj says, “The way they have been represented in the media is misleading because these are indirect elections as people don’t vote, only panchs and sarpanchs vote in them.” They also discuss the exit polls in the run-up to the assembly elections. Madhu argues that the way channels were carrying how their exit poll got the results right, it is “non-journalistic”. “Nobody cares whether you got it right or wrong”, she adds.Speaking on the epidemic of protests that have broken out in Hong Kong, Lebanon, Chile, etc., Madhu says, “No matter what hardships people are going through in India, our people have a spirit that is generally a fighting, joyous spirit.” Abhinandan’s remark, “We, Indians are aggressive” sparks a debate on the panel with Mehraj responding, “Isn’t that a bit of generalization? If you see there are small stories, small acts of kindness everywhere.” On the other hand, Diksha reasons that we are overworked and stressed that probably manifests itself in some of the ways as aggressiveness. Tune in, There’s more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week’s Hafta features host Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan, Mehraj Lone and Raman Kirpal. Kumar Sambhav Shrivastava, Contributing Editor with Business Standard joins in as a special guest.Manisha kicks off the discussion by asking Sambhav why we don’t hear as many land conflict cases now. Sambhav reasons that we only hear of the long-pending cases because the economy, construction sector, infrastructure have slowed down in recent years. “A lot of big projects are not coming up because of the shape of the economy that we are in right now and have been in the past few years”, he adds. They move on to discuss the manner in which the top courts are responding to cases in recent times. Madhu says, “I think one should address that the country is facing huge cynicism of every institution whether it’s CBI, RBI, educational institutions or the Supreme Court.”Speaking on media’s coverage of the Ayodhya dispute’s final hearing, Manisha talks about how media houses painted the common practice of shredding papers in the court as blasphemy against the Hindu religion. Raman was quick to point out how the CJI himself said that the evidence provided (map) was not relevant to the bench so he himself asked Rajeev Dhavan to tear it up if he wanted to. The panel also discussed the outright violation of News Broadcast Standards Authority’ s guidelines by TV channels on the very day it was published. They also discuss the “vendetta politics” that has been doing the rounds in the current political scenario as opposition leaders are being questioned for their involvement in multi-crore scams, and much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hafta is back! The gang reunites with host Abhinandan Sekhri along with Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan and Anand Vardhan. Joining us this week is the newest addition to the Newslaundry team, Mehraj Lone. This week’s podcast begins with the panel discussing Mohan Bhagwat’s recent speech at a Vijayadashami function. They scrutinise his comments on lynching being a "Western construct" while trying to come up with a Hindi word for "lynching". Mehraj questions the accuracy of Bhagwat's claims that lynching is a subject in all other religious texts except Hinduism.The conversation shifts to the big news of the week: the murder of an RSS worker and his family in West Bengal, the serial murders by a Kerala woman, and the Modi-Xi meet in Tamil Nadu. Madhu has a lot to say about the state of present-day journalism. She says, "Journalism is going behind the incident and finding out what really happened." Abhinandan argues that journalism can be "positive or negative". But, he adds, it has to be unexpected. The panel discusses the paradigm shift in journalism and the significance of present-day reporting.Listen up! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

NL Hafta has gone behind the paywall, but we love our listeners. So here's a little sneak peek into the complete episode.In this episode of Newslaundry Hafta, host Abhinandan Sekhri, Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan and Mehraj Lone are joined by Diksha Madhok, Editor and Director of Quartz India. They discuss the recently concluded assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana, the release of National Crime Records Bureau data, the epidemic of protests all across the globe, and other issues.Listen to the complete episode here: https://www.newslaundry.com/2019/10/26/hafta-247-maharashtra-and-haryana-elections-national-crime-records-data-and-more Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Newslaundry Hafta is back with Abhinandan, Raman, Manisha are joined by Joyjeet Das who is a Consulting Editor a Down to Earth magazine. The podcast kicks off with the panel discussing the climate crisis and the Global Climate Strike that was held around the world this week. Talking about Greta Thunberg’s commitment towards the cause, Joyjeet says, “What if she was not there and this was just another United Nations communication”. He questions, “How much shit would people have given?” He says her contribution has been a major source for drawing public attention towards the cause.The panel also talks about the tragic death of two Dalit children who were beaten up for open defecation. In Abhinandan’s words, “It is one of the most ghastly stories I have read in a very long time.” Apart from all this, Howdy Modi continues to be in the limelight as the panel discusses media coverage of the event all over the world.For more, listen to the whole episode. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Journalist Maya Mirchandani, senior fellow at ORF and an assistant professor at Ashoka University joins Manisha Pande, Raman Kirpal and Meghnad in this week’s episode of Newslaundry Hafta. Maya, who recently visited Kashmir, begins by shedding light on the ostensible state of normalcy in the Valley. She has much to say about the hopelessness and dejection Kashmiris are experiencing right now. The mainstream media’s unchecked and relentless narrative of the so-called normalcy in Kashmir seems to have birthed a crisis of real reportage from the Valley. Maya narrates how Kashmiris who feel let down by mainstream media are in a state of ‘civil-disobedience’ where they’re even avoiding talking to the media.The discussion moves to the government’s recent ban on e-cigarettes and how it is being executed. The panel simply does not buy the reasons provided by the government for the same, and everyone tries to read between the lines. They move on to discuss Modi’s birthday and the unprecedented importance it was given by some TV news channels. Apart from talking about present trends in broadcast media and its future prospects, the panel also discusses the violence at Jadavpur University and the death of protest culture. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

NL Hafta has gone behind the paywall, but we love our listeners. So here's a little sneak peek into the complete episode. This week’s Hafta features host Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan, Mehraj Lone and Raman Kirpal. Kumar Sambhav Shrivastava, Contributing Editor with Business Standard joins in as a special guest.Manisha kicks off the discussion by asking Sambhav why we don’t hear as many land conflict cases now. Sambhav responds saying, “A lot of big projects are not coming up because of the shape of the economy that we are in right now and have been in the past few years.”. The panel also discusses the Ayodhya dispute’s final hearing, Manisha talks about how media houses painted the common practice of shredding papers in the court as blasphemy against the Hindu religion. The panel also talked about the outright violation of News Broadcast Standards Authority’ s guidelines by TV channels on the very day it was published. Apart from this, they also discussed the decline of institutions such as the CBI, RBI and Supreme Court, and much more. For more, listen up to the complete episode here: https://www.newslaundry.com/2019/10/19/hafta-246-land-acquisition-act-ayodhya-and-more Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Besides Manisha Pande and host Abhinandan Sekhri, this episode of Hafta includes Jaskirat Singh Bawa, Senior Editor at The Quint and Vivek Kaul, author and a columnist for Newslaundry.The episode begins with Manisha briefing the panel with the week’s headlines, including Faye D’Souza stepping down as Mirror Now’s executive editor, recent arrests of journalists, and Tabrez Ansari’s case, amongst others.Abhinandan talks about Modi’s speech on the prevention of livestock diseases in Mathura and the follow up it received on primetime debates. “ I am dumbstruck at how far we have come,” says Abhinandan wondering if the speech was a ‘dog whistle’ by Modi. Vivek Kaul is of the view that these are regular deviations. He says, “They have all these distractions planted regularly at different points of time to deviate attention from what should essentially be the issue we should be talking about.” Manisha too thinks these prime-time debates are completely ‘made-up’.The discussion moves to Piyush Goyal’s statements on Maths, Einstein, and Gravity. Manisha says these incidents “demonstrate how these guys are so not used to being questioned.”The panel also talks about the series of arrests of journalists. On being asked if he worries about the safety of his journalists now, Jaskirat says, “Not just now; some sort of a layer or feeling of insecurity has been there.”The podcast includes conversations on a series of other issues including the rise in traffic fines, news coverage of Chandrayaan 2, Pallav Baghla and Ram Jethmalani’s death.For more, listen up to the whole podcast! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

NL Hafta returns with host Abhinandan Sekhri along with Manisha Pande, Madhu Trehan and Anand Vardhan. Joining us this week is the newest addition to the Newslaundry team, Mehraj Lone.This week’s podcast begins with the panel discussing Mohan Bhagwat’s recent speech at a Vijayadashami function. They scrutinise his comments on lynching being a "Western construct" while trying to come up with a Hindi word for "lynching". The conversation then shifts to the big news of the week: the murder of an RSS worker and his family in West Bengal, the serial murders by a Kerala woman, and the Modi-Xi meet in Tamil Nadu. The panel also has a lot to say about the state of present-day journalism.Vote in the Asia Podcast Awards here: https://asiapodcastawards.com/Listen to the full episode here: https://www.newslaundry.com/2019/10/12/hafta-245-mohan-bhagwat-on-lynching-modi-xi-meet-the-state-of-journalism-and-more Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.