A presentation by Dr. Sujata Mukhopadhyay Professor and Head Dept. of Journalism and Mass Communication HMM College for Women

1. This is the first time that Indian public opinion has gained such tremendous mileage 2. Instead of 3 main parties there are 4 main parties fighting elections independently. 3. First time where congress has been steeped in controversies and scams. 4. Importance of regional parties have gained supreme importance.. 5. Cityzen journalism along with mass media played a great role in social consciousness 6. Role of Social media.

CHARACTERISTICS OF SOCIAL MOVEMENTS In most cases, the relationship between parties and interest groups is not so direct. They often take positions that are opposed to each other. Yet they are in dialogue and negotiation. Movement groups have raised new issues that have been taken up by political parties. Most of the new leadership of political parties comes from interest or movement groups.

Sometimes political parties grow out of movement. For example, when the Assam movement led by strudents against the foreigners came to an end, it led to the formation of the Asom Gana Parishad. The roots of parties like the DMK and the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu can be traced to a long drawn social reformation movement during the 30s and the 40s

In some instances the pressure groups are either formed or led by the leaders of political parties. For example, most trade unions and student organizations are either established by or affiliated to one major political party and most of the leaders are either activists or leaders of party.

While internet groups and movements do not directly engage in party politics, they seek to exert influence on political parties. Most of the movement groups take a political stance without being a political party. They have political ideology on major issues. The relationship between political parties and pressure groups can take different forms direct or indirect.

Business groups often employ professional lobbyists. Some persons from pressure groups may participate in official bodies and communicatees that offer advice to the government. They often organise protest activity like strikes or disrupting govt. programes. Workers organisations etc. organise such movements to put pressure on the govt to fulfill their demands.

They try to gain public support and sympathy for their goals and their activity by carrying out information campaigns, organising meetings, etc. most of these groups try to influence the media into giving more attention to these issues

Has political background a long history before and after independence, played a great role in national consciousness. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been at the middle of many controversies. Rahul Gandhi portrayed as the new leader, young, charming, elite and sophisticated

Brand Mamata

THE AAM AADMI PARTY

CASE STUDIES 1. AAP 2.Nirbhaya Rape Case 3. Nido Taniam case 4. Saradha Scam 5. Narmada Bachao Andolan 6.Maoist movement in Chattisgarrhh 7.Lalgarh Movement 8. Tehelka Case 9. Asaram bapu case 10. Everyday molestations

As is well known, the Aam Aadmi party is the brainchild of Arvind kejriwal. The party was formed after Kejriwal split with team Anna regarding the question of forming a party The Jan Lokpal Bill was introduced and passed Arvind Kejriwal became the CM of Delhi beating the BJP Thus started a new movement, a social movement never seen before. Educated men and women, mostly from the IITs joined the movement, which gained heavy momentum in the different states.

NIRBHAYA RAPE CASE

The victims, a 23-year-old woman and a male friend, were on their way home on the night of 16 December 2012 after watching the film Life of Pi in Saket, South Delhi. They boarded an off-duty charter bus at Munirka for Dwarka that was being driven by joyriders at about 9:30 pm (IST). There were only six others on the bus, including the driver. One of the men, a minor, had called for passengers telling them that the bus was going towards their destination.The woman's friend became suspicious when the bus deviated from its normal route and its doors were shut. When he objected, the group of six men already on board, including the driver, taunted the couple, asking what they were doing alone at such a late hour. The partially clothed victims were found on the road by a passerby at around 11 pm (IST). The passerby phoned the Delhi Police, who took the couple to Safdarjung Hospital, where the female victim was given emergency treatment and placed on mechanical ventilation. She was found with injury marks, including numerous bite marks, all over her body. According to reports, one of the accused men admitted to having seen a rope-like object, assumed to be her intestines, being pulled out of the woman by the other assailants on the bus. Two blood-stained metal rods were retrieved from the bus and medical staff confirmed that "it was penetration by this that caused massive damage to her genitals, uterus and intestines".

When the woman's friend tried to intervene, he was beaten, gagged and knocked unconscious with an iron rod. The men then dragged the woman to the rear of the bus, beating her with the rod and raping her while the bus driver continued to drive. Medical reports later said that the woman suffered serious injuries to her abdomen, intestines and genitals due to the assault, and doctors said that the damage indicated that a blunt object (suspected to be the iron rod) may have been used.

That rod was later described by police as being a rusted, L- shaped implement of the type used as a wheel jack handle. According to police reports the woman attempted to fight off her assailants, biting three of the attackers and leaving bite marks on the accused men. After the beatings and rape ended, the attackers threw both victims from the moving bus. Then the bus driver allegedly tried to drive the bus over the woman, but she was pulled aside by her male friend. One of the perpetrators later cleaned the vehicle to remove evidence. Police impounded it the next day.

RA PE!RAPE!

Protests at Raisina Hill, Rajpath, New Delhi Public protests took place in New Delhi on 21 December 2012 at India Gate and Raisina Hill, the latter being the location of both the Parliament of India and Rashtrapati Bhavan, the official residence of the President of India. Thousands of protesters clashed with police and battled Rapid Action Force units. Demonstrators were lathi charged, shot with water cannon and tear gas shells, and arrested.

Similar protests occurred throughout the country. More than 600 women belonging to various organisations demonstrated in Bangalore. Thousands of people silently marched in Kolkata.Protests occurred online as well on the social networking sites Facebook and WhatsApp, with users replacing their profile images with a black dot symbol.Tens of thousands signed an online petition protesting the incident. Yoga guru Baba Ramdev and former Army chief General Vijay Kumar Singh were among the demonstrators who clashed with Delhi Police at Jantar Mantar. On 24 December, activist Rajesh Gangwar started a hunger strike, saying about the accused men, "If my death shakes the system and gets them hanged, I am ready to die".Gangwar ended his fast after 14 days, saying, "My fight to demand a strict law against rape will be continued in the future... I have dedicated myself for this cause".

Nido Taniam, a student from Arunachal Pradesh was beaten up mercilessly near Lajpat nagar in Delhi on January 29th , 2014. He had gone there with his friends to a sweet shop, when the shopkeeper started mocking him for his hairstyle. Nido responded by breaking the glass door of the shop, and the incident escalated. This incident started a movement against racism, where other students from the north east came together and unitedly fought for cause. However, the severity of the incident proves how the government had so long neglected the north eastern part of the country. Moreover, severe state repression was unleashed and racism was promoted in a covert way. The movement gained momentum, as students of the north east vented out their grievances against the government. This as not an isolated crime, but a pattern of discrimination was there all through, especially regarding th people from the north east.

Operation Lalgarh was an armed operation in India against the Maoists who have been active in organising a tribal movement alongside a group called the People's Committee Against Police Atrocities (PCAPA). The operation was organised by the police and security forces in Lalgarh, Paschim Medinipur, West Bengal to restore law and order in the area and flush out the Maoists.The area of operation is said to be expanded to 18 police stations in the three Maoist affected districts of Paschim Medinipur, Bankura and Purulia

The incident has its root in an incident on 2 November 2008. On the way back from laying the foundation stone of Jindal steel plant at Shalboni, the convoy of the chief minister of West Bengal Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and then central ministers Ram Vilas Paswan and Jitin Prasada came under a landmine attack by the Maoists. Though the ministers were unharmed, it hit a police jeep in the convoy and six policemen were grievously injured. The CPI(Maoist) in a press release accepted the responsibility of the explosion and stated clearly that they were opposed to the steel plant on tribal land and that the target of the explosion was Buddhadeb Bhattacharya. In the aftermath of the assassination attempt, the West Bengal Police carried out raids across the Lalgarh area. Due to the influence by ruling party [ [CPI (Marxist)] ], the police atrocities, indiscriminate raids and brutal beatings, resulting in serious injuries to many people, mainly women. People have been subjected to beatings, torture, molestation of women and false cases.

The police quickly understood the extent of mobilization that the adivasis have made and started making false promises about the imminent release of those arrested including the 3 school students. The police thought of buying some time with these lies, hoping that the mass will disperse with time. But the adivasi crowd around the Police Station only got thicker. Support and solidarity from surrounding and far off adivasi villages started pouring in. The otherwise omnipresent leaders of political parties were not allowed to negotiate. The adivasis were rather happy about this as in the past the interference of these leaders in any mass protests have always resulted in confusion and withdrawing of the protests with unknown negotiations behind closed door meetings. This time the adivasis chose their representatives from amongst themselves who were communicators rather than leaders and took no decision on behalf of the mass but only communicated them. Soon the police understood that the adivasis were in no mood to return without a result and they disclosed that nothing was in their hands because the ones arrested had already been transferred to Midnapore jail the previous day.

The road to Lalgarh from Medinipur and Jhargram had been blocked at several places with large felled trees. The repeated liesby the Lalgarh police infuriated the mass who decided not to depend on the police for any results and to build up a movement to force the release of those illegally detained. They decided to prevent the deployment of reinforcement of police and paramilitary as previously many adivasi movements have been brutally crushed using paramilitary force. Thus roads were dug up and blocked at several places by felled trees. This has uncanny resemblance to the Nandigram movement remained at the headlines throughout 2007 March to December. The Lalgarh village is connected with Jhargram and Medinipur towns by roads which are bordered on both sides by sparse to moderate forests. the roads have been dug up or blocked by trees at least in 25 places.

The movement had no conventional leadership and often entire village population sat together and discussed for hours as to the steps to be taken in the movement. Men, women, youth, students all took part in these grand meetings. The traditional leaders were not stripped of the respect that they usually received but were given no more weight than anyone else at the meetings. A forum was thus launched which had no conventional political color and which united the entire adivasi society for a common cause after a long time. It gained immense popularity and most mainstream parties and their mass bases vanished altogether. Village committees Each Village formed a committee of 10 representatives who would with committees of other villages to communicate the decision of the masses of one village to another. Each committee further had two persons who had to be available at all times in case of urgent meetings at short notices

Adivasi women have come forward in a big way to carry forth this movement. Each 10 persons committee has 5 women members. This involvement of women came naturally to the adivasis who have a more equal society when it comes to gender. The participation of women in meetings and rallies are also remarkable. The atrocities over the women of Lalgarh have been excessive, and the women since then never attend rallies unarmed. They bring along whatever is at hand. Bows, arrows, knives, swords, scythes, axes, sticks, brooms and so on. The attack on the dawn of 5 November has been most brutal on the women[9] with one of them losing her sight, as the butt of a police rifle landed on it. Another woman of Lalgarh was manhandled and left unconscious in broad daylight as she tried preventing the police who dragged away her husband who happens to be a local Jharkhand Party leader while they were buying medicines. All this adding to the severe torture and repression of women have led to the present consolidation of the adivasi women, or so they claim.

The Saradha Group financial scandal is a financial scam that was caused by the collapse of a Ponzi scheme run by Saradha Group, a consortium of Indian companies that was believed to be running a wide variety of collective investment schemes (popularly but incorrectly referred to as chit fund). The relatively prosperous rural economy of West Bengal had previously relied on small savings schemes run by Indian Postal Service. However, low rates of interest in the 1980s and '90s encouraged the rise of several Ponzi schemes in speculative ventures such as Sanchayita Investments, Overland Investment Company, Verona Credit and Commercial Investment Company. Together, these scams eliminated close to 10 billion INR in investor wealth. Saradha Group changed its methods of raising capital. In West Bengal, Jharkhand, Assam and Chattisgarh, it now ran variations of collective investment schemes (CIS), such as tourism packages, forward travel and hotel booking timeshare credit transfer, real estate, infrastructure finance, and motorcycle manufacturing.The investors were rarely informed about the true nature of the investments. Instead, many investors were told only that they would get high returns after a fixed period.

Saradha Group also recruited Kunal Ghosh, another Trinamool Congress Member of parliament, to act as the CEO of the media group.[40] Under Kunal Ghosh, the group went on a spree of buying and establishing local television channels and newspapers. By 2013 it employed over 1500 journalists and owned eight newspapers in five languages: Bengal Post, Seven Sisters Post (English dailies), Kalom (Bengali daily), Prabhat Varta (Hindi daily),[41] Ajir Dainik Baturi (Assamese daily),[42] Sakalbela, Azad Hind[43] and Parama (Bengali dailies). It also owned two Bengali news channels (Tara Newz and Channel 10), two Bengali general entertainment channels (Tara Muzic and Tara Bangla) and one FM radio station. In January 2013, the cash inflow of Saradha Group was less than its cash payouts for the first time. This outcome is inevitable in a Ponzi scheme that is allowed to run full course. Although Sudipta Sen tried to calm uneasy depositors and agents,the tide had irrevocably turned. In a letter dated 6 April 2013, Sudipto Sen wrote a 18-page confessional letter to the Central Bureau of Investigation, in which he admitted that he had paid large sums of money to several politicians.He also stated that TMC leader Kunal Ghosh had forced him to enter into money-losing media ventures and blackmailed him into selling one of his channels at below market price.

Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) is a social movement consisting of adivasis, farmers, environmentalists, and human rights activists against a number of large dams being built across the Narmada river. The river flows through the states of Gujarat, and Madhya Pradesh in India. Sardar Sarovar Dam in Gujarat is one of the biggest dams on the river and was one of the first focal points of the movement. Friends of River Narmada is the unofficial website of the NBA. Their mode of campaign includes hunger strikes and garnering support from film and art personalities (notably Bollywood actor Aamir Khan). Narmada Bachao Andolan, with its leading spokespersons Medha Patkar and Baba Amte, received the Right Livelihood Award in 1991. Post-1947, investigations were carried out to evaluate mechanisms for using water from the Narmada River,[1] which flows into the Arabian Sea after passing through the states of Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat. Due to inter-state differences in implementing schemes and sharing of water, the Narmada Water Disputes Tribunal was constituted by the Government of India on 6 October 1969 to adjudicate over the disputes

Medha Patkar noticed was that the people who were going to be affected were given no information but for the offer for rehabilitation. Due to this, the villagers had many questions from why their permission was not taken to whether a good assessment on the ensuing destruction was taken. Furthermore, the officials related to the project had no answers to their questions. While World Bank, the financing agency for this project, came into the picture, Patkar approached the Ministry of Environment to seek clarifications. She realized, after seeking answers from the ministry, that the project was not sanctioned at all and wondered as to how funds were even sanctioned by the World Bank. After several studies, they realized that the officials had overlooked the post-project problems. Thereafter, she organized a 36-day solidarity march among the neighboring states of the Narmada valley from Madhya Pradesh to the Sardar Sarovar dam site. She said that the march was "a path symbolizing the long path of struggle (both immediate and long-term) that [they] really had". The march was resisted by the police, who according to Patkar were "caning the marchers and arresting them and tearing the clothes off women activists"

While Medha Patkar established Narmada Bachao Andolan in 1989, all these groups joined this national coalition of environmental and human rights activists, scientists, academics and project-affected people with a non-violent approach. Using the right to fasting, she undertook a 22-day fast that almost took her life. [9] In 1991, Patkar's actions led to an unprecedented independent review by the World Bank.[9] The Morse Commission, appointed in June 1991 at the recommendation of World Bank President Barber Conable, conducted its first independent review of a World Bank project. She undertook a similar fast in 1993 and resisted evacuation from the dam site. [9] In 1994, the Bachao Andolan office was attacked reportedly by a couple of political parties, where Patkar and other activists were physically assaulted and verbally abused. In protest, a few NBA activists and she began a fast; 20 days later, they were arrested and forcibly fed intravenously. Amongst the major celebrities who have shown their support for Narmada Bachao Andolan are Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy and Aamir Khan. 1994 saw the launch of Narmada: A Valley Rises, by filmmaker Ali Kazimi. It documents the five-week Sangharsh Yatra of 1991. The film went on to win several awards and is considered by many to be a classic on the issue. In 1996, veteran documentary filmmaker, Anand Patwardhan, made an award-winning documentary: A Narmada Diary.

Tehelka means sensationalism. It was started in 2000 by Tarun Tejpal and Bahal. First came out as a newspaper and then as a magazine from 2003. Gained im portance after the Sting operation of different cricketers in the match fixing scandal. The again the operation West End where a fake arms deal was unearthed. In 2013 December Tejpal resigned from editorship for a period of 6 months due to a sexual harrassment allegation against him by an intern. THiNK Fest" was started in 2011 as an annual literary festival and promoted as an event of Telekha. This program is run by an organisation called Thinkworks Pvt Ltd, a company owned by Tejpal, his sister Neena and Chaudhury. The organisers said that it was "India's most thought-provoking platform for ideas from across the globe" which brought together brilliant, cutting-edge minds from across all the key disciplines that impact human affairs.It features Bollywood actors, global thinkers, sessions on new technology.

In 2007, they released footage, which was filmed over six months, showing several BJP politicians admitting they had a role in attacking the Muslim community during the 2002 Gujarat violence. In the video, the right-wing organisation Bajrang Dal convener Babu Bajrangi, said that a mob which he had led, killed 91 Muslim men and women at Naroda Patiya; they then raped a pregnant women, slit open her womb and threw both the foetus and her into a fire. On 23 July 2009, when police in Manipur claimed they had killed a suspected militant who had shot at them, Tehelka released 12 photographs which proved that it was a fake encounter. Those showed the police pushing an unarmed person, who was their suspect, into a pharmacy and later carried him out dead. In 2010, they captured on camera, right-wing organisation Sri Ram Sena leader Pramod Muthalik and other members, where Muthalik agreed vandalise an art exhibition in exchange for money. The organisation was seen accepting INR10000 (US$160) as a donation from a Tehelka reporter, who posed as the artist wanting publicity.

The sexual assault allegations against Tejpal in November 2013, received intense public attention and media scrutiny because Tehelka had previously been involved in highlighting the issue of sexual violence in India, including in a special issue on the topic in February 2013.There were protests against Tejpal by supporters of the BJP and its allies.Shoma Chaudhury's handling of this case was also criticised