Print Media and Secularism: A Case Study from South Assam, India

Abstract

The word Secularism is understood in many different ways since it became a much used word at different points of time in history and place. In India, usually, Secularism is understood as neither connected to any religious community, nor hostile to any religion. It is basically impartiality with respect to different communities and their life practices. It is expected that the State as well as the Fourth Estate, i.e. the Media will remain neutral with respect to such different communities and their life practices. However, one may always argue that depending on the background of the target readers and the media owners there can be exceptions to such neutrality and the policy of gate-keeping may be affected by a bias. In this small study, it is explored how far this possibility could be true through a case study of testing gate-keeping policies through a study of reader’s perception and ownership of the Newspapers. The results are surprising!