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Comrade Periyar was the one who started the fierce struggle with the domination of Brahmanism after a gap of many centuries in the history of Tamil Nadu. Although he was the leader of several movements such as the Self-Respect Movement, the Justice Party, and the Dravidar Kazhagam, the beginning of his annihilation of Brahmanical domination was through the ‘Republic’ journal. For Comrade Ambedkar, it was a magazine called ‘Mooknayak’ in the North. 

On the domination of Brahmin journals, from Comrade Ambedkar's speech on the 101st birthday of Mahadev Govind Ranade at Pune in 1943,

“People from abroad believe that Congress is the sole institution representing the people of India, including even the untouchables. The main reason behind this is that the untouchables have no medium of their own through which they can contest Congress’s claim. 

There are several other reasons for this weakness of the untouchables. They have no press of their own, and the doors of Congress press are shut for them. They have taken a vow not to give even an iota of publicity to the untouchables. The untouchables cannot establish a press of their own. It is crystal clear that no newspaper can survive without advertisements. Advertisement revenue can only be generated via commercial advertisements.  

All businessmen, big or small, are associated with the Congress, and they cannot side with a non-Congress institution. The staff of Associated Press of India, which is India’s news agency, is full of Tamil Brahmins. In reality, India’s entire press is caught in their stranglehold, and they are completely loyal to the Congress. They can never publish any news against Congress.” 

The status of the Indian media during British rule has not yet changed. Those days’ media did not oppose Congress. Today the change has taken place to the extent that media cannot oppose the BJP. The Oxfam’s Representation of Marginalized Caste Groups in the Indian Newsroom survey in 2019 confirms that no matter who rules the Congress or the BJP, the rigid Brahmanism dominance in the media has not diminished yet.

Before we look at the Oxfam Survey Report, let's examine the Indian and multinationals companies because we know that these are the ones that run the media industry.

1000 leading corporate companies in India under the management of Brahmin dominance 

Total : 9052

Source: EPW August 2012

Owners of Indian national businesses and agents of multinationals are Banias, 100 percent. The Brahmins keep the commercial plunder of these Banias and multinational companies within their dominance. This is the condition in India, even in 2012. This is what Periyar said in 1947, “Indian liberation was a makeover by the British to the Brahmins-Banias in India.”

Brahmins are dominating Indian society. Its natural tendency is that Brahmins are ruling the nation’s economy and business. As a result, Brahmins’ dominance in the Indian media is rampant.

In 2006, the Center for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in New Delhi conducted a study in the Indian media industry. The senior journalists are the ones who decide what news we have and what's going to be covered on television today. The study was conducted in all disciplines, such as print, digital, and websites, published in English and Hindi. 

Source: CSDS, The Hindu 05.06.2006

As per this study, Brahmins, who constitute only 5 percent of the population in India, occupy 49 percent in the media. While including the dominant Upper Castes like the Rajputs and the Kayastha, it is about 88 percent. Especially in the English media, only 1 percent are BC. There is absolutely no representation from SC.

Oxfam Report 2019

On October 2, 2019, Oxfam International published a comprehensive report in the Indian media. The report exposed the domination of Brahmins in the Indian media.

- Brahmins and upper castes hold 106 of the 121 leadership positions in Indian journalism, including newspapers, news channels, websites, daily, weekly and monthly magazines, with key responsibilities as Editor-in-Chief, Managing Editor, Executive Editor, Bureau Chief, Editors. The SC/ST people do not have any of these responsibilities.

- Three out of 4 anchors of the flagship debate news channels are Brahmin Upper castes.

- For over 70 percent of panelists of the various political parties, organizations and movements appear in the flagship debates are Brahmin upper caste.

- 72% of the major English print media's leading columnists belong to dominant upper castes. SC is not even 5%.

- The Brahmin upper castes dominate 89.3 percent of the leadership of the English news channels like CNN-News18, India Today, NDTV 24X7, Rajya Sabha, Republic TV, and TimesNow.

- 100 out of 100 percent of the top posts in Hindi news channels such as Aaj Tak, News 18, India TV, NTTV, Zee News, Republic, etc., are dominated only by the Brahmin upper castes.

- Brahmin upper castes dominate 91.7 percent of the top posts in the English newspapers such as The Economic Times, Hindustan Times, The Hindu, The Indian Express, The Times of India and The Telegraph.

- The Brahmin upper castes dominate 87.5 percent of the leadership responsibilities of the leading newspapers in Hindi.

- 84.2% of the management of top digital media such as Scroll.in, The Print, NewsLaundry, The Quint, Wire, Satyhgraha, The Ken and The News Minute are occupied by the Brahmin upper castes.

- 72.7 percent of the top executives in the print magazines as such India Today, Business Today, Caravan, Femina, Outlook, Tehelka, Sports Star, Frontline and Hindi Magazines, which are published on political, cultural, business and sports platforms are dominated by the Brahmin upper castes.

Alike before mentioned that Brahmin’s media dominance is the primary reason why Madhuvanthis’ and Marithas’ have become an all-India trend, and such reports go unnoticed in the media.

Even in the United States, a world-dominated country and the country that continues to victimize African Americans to the point of apartheid, African Americans have the reservation rights in media. As such representation of USA journals, Wall Street 17.10%, USA Today 18.70%, New York Times 16.20, Washington Post 19.50%, Los Angeles Times18.70% 

-       Source: Tehelka June 19.2004

But the Brahmin’s frenzy domination has not ended since the emergence of the field of journalism in India.

In our country, the parliament, the administration, the court, and the press are being considered the four pillars of democracy. Among these pillars, non-Brahmins to an extend are representing in both the parliament and the administration. Work is in progress to eradicate that also. But in the judiciary and the media, there is a terrible situation where no one can question the dominance of Brahmins, Baniyas, Kayasthas, Bhumihars, and Rajputs.

To put an end to this, we are forced to agitate and propagate the slogan for the mandatory implementation of the communal reservation – caste-based reservation in the media.

Against the all-India level situation, the Aryans are screaming that only in Tamil Nadu the Gunasekarans’ and the Jeeva Sagaapthans’ are growing in the media. It has a historical background.

We know that the first phase of the Dravidian movement was the Justice Party. Even before the party was founded, in 1916, a Joint Stock Company, under the name of the South Indian People’s Association (SIPA), was set up for the liberation of the non-Brahmins. On behalf of the company, it was decided to launch magazines in English, Tamil, and Telugu. That's how the ‘Justice’ magazine was launched. Only then did the Justice Party was established.

In 1927, Comrade Periyar began to speak about the dominance of Brahmins in journalism...

“For thousands of years, Brahmin’s in our country have been establishing their dominance in the name of religion, scripture, God, and heaven, and by elevating themselves as superiors not only to humiliate us and loot us for bread and butter. But also in the name of politics, Swaraj, nationalism, national journal, and service to the nation (desh seva) - they have created various movements and magazines and thereby advertised that they are patriotic and that their newspapers are national newspapers with our own money and have trampled on us in many ways in search of dominance to grow their stomach.                              

Out of the entire above-mentioned acts, the greatest threat to us is the Brahmins press. The influence of such journals is besieging our country. If the people of Tamil Nadu are to escape the siege of this propaganda and the tyranny of foreign rule, we are in a situation where it is absolutely impossible to get rid of these journals' deception and enslavement.”

-Comrade Periyar, Kudiyarasu - 30.01.1927

The Dravidian movement’s and our leader’s media revolution, which started against Brahmins's domination, is not only for the growth of non-Brahmins in the Tamil Nadu media but also for the liberation of non- Brahmins on all platforms as a whole.

The growing representation of non-Brahmins in the Tamil Nadu media must be saved. For that, we have to start All India level agitation to save our non-Brahmin’s representation. The rampage Brahmin’s dominance must be destroyed in all-India media - let's start an agitation to demand the implementation of the Communal Representation in the media!

Written by AThi Asuran, published in Keetru.com on 11-July-2020

Translated by: J Kayalvizhi

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