Indian News Media Coverage of Environmental Issues: Research Paper

As a part of the international media conference Media Meet 2020, I presented my research titled Indian News Media Coverage of Environmental Issues: Online and Offline News.

Media has seen tremendous growth in India over the years, acquiring also into limitless dimensions as the internet. A rapid and constant swelling in news content also calls for attention if an extremely imperative topic like environment is receiving its due weightage. Since media has long been a driver of public discourse and policies, it becomes important to study coverage of environmental issues. For this, two widely read newspapers and two digital news publications were chosen and their environment related articles subjected to content analysis. While coverage of environmental happenings continued during the pandemic, there were consequential gaps in the reportage. Basics like structure, nature and contents were studied. It was seen that both print and digital media had their own categories where they fared better than the other so it will be unfair to declare one superior in environmental coverage. There must be substantial yet small reforms in the journalism sector so at the crossroads of environment and modern journalism, they stand fully equipped to sensitize the masses.

Keywords: environmental coverage, mass media, print media, digital media, journalism