This monograph investigates the expression of anti-media populist sentiments by right-wing news media in India and the socio-technological, historical, economic, legal, and political factors that aid right-wing efforts to delegitimize professional journalism. Thematic analysis of 545 articles from Swarajya.com and OpIndia.com, a qualitative content analysis of Republic TV debates, and interviews with 24 Hindu nationalists on Twitter reveal the discursive strategies they use to discredit journalism. Themes in media criticism include claims that the mainstream media are corrupt and partisan, suppress Hindu voices, favor Muslim and Christian minorities, undermine national interests, and spread false narratives. These expressions aim to undermine journalists’ credibility and position right-wing actors as challengers to the established media’s hegemony. Meanwhile, the Modi government employs coercive measures to co-opt the media into providing favorable coverage to the BJP. These endeavors cause journalists to self-censor to safeguard personal safety and livelihood. Consequently, mainstream news content is increasingly homogeneous, eroding diverse perspectives. This shift weakens the media’s watchdog role and shrinks the space for open debate and public deliberation in India.
AndersonE.LongkumerA. (2018). “Neo-Hindutva”: Evolving forms, spaces, and expressions of Hindu nationalism. Contemporary South Asia, 26(4), 371–377. https://doi.org/10.1080/09584935.2018.1548576
ArnettJ. J. (1995). Adolescents’ uses of media for self-socialization. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 24(5), 519–533. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01537054
10.
AtkinsonJ. D.BergS. V. L. (2012). Narrowmobilization and tea party activism: A study of right-leaning alternative media. Communication Studies, 63(5), 519–535. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2011.649442
BeilerM.KieslerJ. (2018). “Lügenpresse! Lying press!” is the press lying? In OttoK.KöhlerA. (Eds.), Trust in media and journalism: Empirical perspectives on ethics, norms, impacts and populism in Europe (pp. 155–179). Springer.
BhatP.ChadhaK. (2020). Anti-media populism: Expressions of media distrust by right-wing media in India. Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, 13(2), 166–182. https://doi.org/10.1080/17513057.2020.1739320
24.
BhatP.ChadhaK. (2023). Expanding public debate? Examining the impact of India’s top English language political talk shows. Media Asia, 50(2), 244–263. https://doi.org/10.1080/01296612.2022.2140953
BlumenthalS. (2008). The rise of the counter-establishment: The conservative ascent to political power. Union Square Press.
30.
BosL.van der BrugW.de VreeseC. (2011). How the media shape perceptions of right-wing populist leaders. Political Communication, 28(2), 182–206. https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2011.564605
BrockD. (2005). The republican noise machine: Right-wing media and how it corrupts democracy. Three Rivers Press.
34.
BrosiusC. (2005). Empowering visions: The politics of representation in Hindu nationalism. Anthem Press.
35.
ChadhaK. (2012). Twitter as media watch-dog? Lessons from India’s Radia tapes scandal. Global Media and Communication, 8(2), 171–176. https://doi.org/10.1177/1742766512444347
ChadhaK.BhatP. (2022). Alternative news media and critique of mainstream journalism in India: The case of OpIndia. Digital Journalism, 10(8), 1283–1301. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2022.2118143
38.
ChadhaK.GuhaP. (2016). The Bharatiya Janata Party’s online campaign and citizen involvement in India’s 2014 election. International Journal of Communication, 10, 4389–4406.
39.
ChakravarttyP.RoyS. (2015). Mr. Modi goes to Delhi: Mediated populism and the 2014 Indian elections. Television & New Media, 16(4), 311–322. https://doi.org/10.1177/1527476415573957
40.
ChaturvediS. (2016). I am a troll: Inside the secret world of the BJP’s digital army. Juggernaut Books.
ColleoniE.RozzaA.ArvidssonA. (2014). Echo chamber or public sphere? Predicting political orientation and measuring political homophily in twitter using Big Data. Journal of Communication, 64(2), 317–332. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcom.12084
CrabtreeJ. (2019). The billionaire raj: A journey through India’s new gilded age. Crown Publishing Group.
46.
CreswellJ. W.CreswellJ. D. (2017). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Sage.
47.
CurranJ. (2005). What democracy requires of the media. In G. Overholser & K. Jamieson (Eds). The press (pp. 120–140). Oxford University Press.
48.
DahlgrenP. (2005). The internet, public spheres, and political communication: Dispersion and deliberation. Political Communication, 22(2), 147–162. https://doi.org/10.1080/10584600590933160
49.
DavisM. (2019). A new, online culture war? The communication world of Breitbart.com. Communication Research and Practice, 5(3), 241–254. https://doi.org/10.1080/22041451.2018.1558790
DeuzeM. (2005). What is journalism? Professional identity and ideology of journalists reconsidered. Journalism, 6(4), 442–464. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884905056815
EllinasA. A. (2010). The media and the far right in Western Europe: Playing the nationalist card. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511676017
57.
EngesserS.ErnstN.EsserF.BüchelF. (2017). Populism and social media: How politicians spread a fragmented ideology. Information, Communication & Society, 20(8), 1109–1126. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2016.1207697
58.
EntmanR. M. (1990). Democracy without citizens: Media and the decay of American politics. Oxford University Press.
59.
EsserF.StrömbäckJ. (Eds.). (2014). Mediatization of politics: Understanding the transformation of western democracies. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137275844
60.
FawziN. (2019). Untrustworthy news and the media as “enemy of the people?” How a populist worldview shapes recipients’ attitudes toward the media. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 24(2), 146–164. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161218811981
61.
FentonJ. Y.HeinN.ReynoldsF. E.MillerA. L.NielsenN. C.BurfordG. G. (1993). Hinduism. In FentonJ. Y. (Ed.), Religions of Asia (pp. 1–23). Bedford/St. Martin’s.
62.
FieldsE. E. (1988). Qualitative content analysis of television news: Systematic techniques. Qualitative Sociology, 11(3), 183–193. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00988954
FigenschouT. U.IhlebækK. A. (2019b). Media criticism from the far-right: Attacking from many angles. Journalism Practice, 13(8), 901–905. https://doi.org/10.1080/17512786.2019.1647112
65.
FraserN. (1990). Rethinking the public sphere: A contribution to the critique of actually existing democracy. Social Text, 25/26, 56–80. https://doi.org/10.2307/466240
66.
GeorgeC. (2017). Hate spin: The twin political strategies of religious incitement and offense-taking. Communication Theory, 27(2), 156–175. https://doi.org/10.1111/comt.12111
GottfriedJ.BarthelM.ShearerE.MitchellA. (2016). The 2016 presidential campaign—A news event that’s hard to miss. Pew Research Center.
73.
GovilN.BaishyaA. K. (2018). The bully in the pulpit: Autocracy, digital social media, and right-wing populist technoculture. Communication, Culture and Critique, 11(1), 67–84. https://doi.org/10.1093/ccc/tcx001
HallS. (1975). Introduction. In SmithA. C. H. (Ed.), Paper voices: The popular press and societal change 1935–1965 (pp. 1–24). Chatto & Windus.
78.
HallerA.HoltK. (2019). Paradoxical populism: How PEGIDA relates to mainstream and alternative media. Information, Communication & Society, 22(12), 1665–1680. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2018.1449882
79.
HameleersM. (2018). A typology of populism: Toward a revised theoretical framework on the sender side and receiver side of communication. International Journal of Communication, 12, 2171–2190.
80.
HameleersM.BosL.de VreeseC. H. (2017). The appeal of media populism: The media preferences of citizens with populist attitudes. Mass Communication and Society, 20(4), 481–504. https://doi.org/10.1080/15205436.2017.1291817
HoltK. (2015). Populism, metapolitics and media criticism: An analysis of identitarian construals of mainstream media. In New perspectives on populist political communication. COST Early stage researchers Think Tank. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:lnu:diva-40144
86.
HoltK. (2018). Alternative media and the notion of anti-systemness: Towards an analytical framework. Media and Communication, 6(4), 49–57. https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v6i4.1467
87.
HoltK. (2019). Right-wing alternative media. Routledge.
JaffrelotC. (1999). The Hindu nationalist movement and Indian politics: 1925 to the 1990s: Strategies of identity-building, implantation and mobilisation (with special reference to Central India). Penguin Books India.
94.
JagersJ.WalgraveS. (2007). Populism as political communication style: An empirical study of political parties’ discourse in Belgium. European Journal of Political Research, 46(3), 319–345. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-6765.2006.00690.x
KauferD.Al-MalkiA. M. (2009). The war on terror through Arab-American Eyes: The Arab-American Press as a rhetorical counterpublic. Rhetoric Review, 28(1), 47–65. https://doi.org/10.1080/07350190802540724
102.
KemmersR.AupersS.HoutmanD.van der WaalJ. (2015). State of disgrace: Popular political discontents about the Dutch State in the 2000s. Parliamentary Affairs, 68(3), 476–493. https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gst036
KovachB.RosenstielT. (2001). Are watchdogs an endangered species?Columbia Journalism Review, 40(1), 50–50.
105.
KrämerB. (2017). Populist online practices: The function of the Internet in right-wing populism. Information, Communication & Society, 20(9), 1293–1309. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2017.1328520
106.
KrämerB. (2018a). How journalism responds to right-wing populist criticism. In OttoK.KöhlerA. (Eds.), Trust in media and journalism: Empirical perspectives on ethics, norms, impacts and populism in Europe (pp. 137–154). Springer Fachmedien. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-20765-6_8
LeungD. K. K.LeeF. L. F. (2014). Cultivating an active online counterpublic: Examining usage and political impact of internet alternative media. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 19(3), 340–359. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161214530787
MaheshwariS.SparksC. (2021). Political elites and journalistic practices in India: A case of institutionalized heteronomy. Journalism, 22(1), 231–247. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884918761630
120.
MajorM. (2012). Objective but not impartial: Human events, Barry Goldwater, and the development of the “liberal media” in the conservative counter-sphere. New Political Science, 34(4), 455–468. https://doi.org/10.1080/07393148.2012.729737
121.
MajorM. (2015). Conservative consciousness and the press: The institutional contribution to the idea of the “liberal media” in right-wing discourse. Critical Sociology, 41(3), 483–491. https://doi.org/10.1177/0896920514528816
122.
ManchandaR. (2002). Militarised Hindu nationalism and the mass media: Shaping a Hindutva public discourse. South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 25(3), 301–320. https://doi.org/10.1080/00856400208723504
123.
ManucciL. (2017). Populism and the media. In KaltwasserC. R.TaggartP.EspejoP. O.OstiguyP. (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of populism (pp. 468–488). Oxford University Press.
124.
MarcuseH. (1965). Repressive tolerance. In WolffR. P.MooreB.MarcuseH. (Eds.), A critique of pure tolerance (pp. 95–137).Beacon Press.
125.
MazzoleniG. (2008). Populism and the media. In AlbertazziD.McDonnellD. (Eds.), Twenty-first century populism: The spectre of Western European democracy (pp. 49–64). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230592100_4
126.
MazzoleniG.StewartJ.HorsfieldB. (2003). The media and neo-populism: A contemporary comparative analysis. Praeger.
127.
McLaneJ. R. (2010). Hindu victimhood and India’s Muslim minority. In StrozierC. B.TermanD. M.JonesJ. W.BoydK. A. (Eds.), The fundamentalist mindset: Psychological perspectives on religion, violence, and history (pp. 195–215). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195379655.003.0015
128.
McQuailD. (1992). Media performance: Mass communication and the public interest. Sage.
MoffittB. (2016). The global rise of populism: Performance, political style, and representation. Stanford University Press.
132.
MohanS. (2015). Locating the “internet Hindu”: Political speech and performance in Indian cyberspace. Television & New Media, 16(4), 339–345. https://doi.org/10.1177/1527476415575491
MuddeC.KaltwasserC. R. (2013). Exclusionary vs. inclusionary populism: Comparing contemporary Europe and Latin America. Government and Opposition, 48(2), 147–174. https://doi.org/10.1017/gov.2012.11
137.
MuddeC.KaltwasserC. R. (2017). Populism: A very short introduction. Oxford University Press.
NowellL. S.NorrisJ. M.WhiteD. E.MoulesN. J. (2017). Thematic analysis: Striving to meet the trustworthiness criteria. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406917733847
OhmB. (2015). Organizing Popular Discourse with and against the Media: Notes on the Making of Narendra Modi and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as Leaders-without- Alternative. Television & New Media, 16(4), 370–377. https://doi.org/10.1177/1527476415575906
PanievskyA. (2021). Covering populist media criticism: When journalists’ professional norms turn against them. International Journal of Communication, 15, 20.
154.
PariserE. (2011). The filter bubble: How the new personalized web is changing what we read and how we think. Penguin.
155.
PelinkaA. (2013). Right-wing populism: Concept and typology. In WodakR.KhosraviNikM.MralB. (Eds.), Right-wing populism in Europe: Politics and discourse (pp. 3–22). Bloomsbury.
156.
PenneyJ.DadasC. (2014). (Re)Tweeting in the service of protest: Digital composition and circulation in the Occupy Wall Street movement. New Media & Society, 16(1), 74–90. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444813479593
RajagopalA. (2001). Politics after television: Hindu nationalism and the reshaping of the public in India. Cambridge University Press.
161.
RaoS. (2008). Accountability, democracy, and globalization: A study of broadcast journalism in India. Asian Journal of Communication, 18(3), 193–206. https://doi.org/10.1080/01292980802207041
162.
RaoS. (2018). Making of selfie nationalism: Narendra Modi, the paradigm shift to social media governance, and crisis of democracy. Journal of Communication Inquiry, 42(2), 166–183. https://doi.org/10.1177/0196859917754053
163.
RauchJ. (2019). Comparing progressive and conservative audiences for alternative media and their attitudes towards journalism. In AtkinsonJ. D.KenixL. J. (Eds.), Alternative media meets mainstream politics (pp. 19–38). Lexington Books.
SharmaA. (2018). Modi’s strange relationship with the truth: The Indian prime minister only likes news that flatters him. Plus John Lloyd on why we should be more concerned about threats to Indian media than US media. Index on Censorship, 47(3), 74–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306422018800406
SinhaS. (2017). Mediatized populisms| fragile hegemony: Social media and competitive electoral populism in India. International Journal of Communication, 11, 4158–4180.
180.
SmithG. R. (2010). Politicians and the news media: How elite attacks influence perceptions of media bias. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 15(3), 319–343. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161210367430
181.
StewartJ.MazzoleniG.HorsfieldB. (2003). Conclusion: Power to the media managers. In MazzoleniG.StewartJ.HorsfieldB. (Eds.) The media and neo-populism: A contemporary comparative analysis (pp. 217–236). Praeger.
182.
StraussA.CorbinJ. M. (1990). Basics of qualitative research. Sage.
ToepflF.PiwoniE. (2015). Public spheres in interaction: Comment sections of news websites as counterpublic spaces. Journal of Communication, 65(3), 465–488. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcom.12156
191.
ToffB.BadrinathanS.Mont’AlverneC.ArguedasA. R.FletcherR.NielsenR. (2021). Overcoming indifference: What attitudes towards news tell us about building trust. Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism.
192.
UdupaS. (2015). Internet Hindus. In van der VeerP. (Ed.), Handbook of religion and the Asian City: Aspiration and urbanization in the twenty-first century (pp. 432–450). University of California Press.
193.
UdupaS. (2016). Archiving as history-making: Religious politics of social media in India. Communication, Culture and Critique, 9(2), 212–230. https://doi.org/10.1111/cccr.12114
UdupaS. (2019). Nationalism in the digital age: Fun as a metapractice of extreme speech. International Journal of Communication, 13, 3143–3163. https://doi.org/10.5282/ubm/epub.69633
196.
Van AelstP.StrömbäckJ.AalbergT.EsserF.de VreeseC.MatthesJ.StanyerJ. (2017). Political communication in a high-choice media environment: A challenge for democracy?Annals of the International Communication Association, 41(1), 3–27. https://doi.org/10.1080/23808985.2017.1288551
WeylandK. (2001). Clarifying a contested concept: Populism in the study of Latin American politics. Comparative Politics, 34(1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.2307/422412
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
