This is the third research note from Smarika Kumar, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. In previous posts, I have…

This is the second research note from Smarika Kumar, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme.   The life of law…

This is the second research note from Charu Maithani, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. Net.art is associated with certain…

This is the second research note from Pallavi Paul, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. In truth the subtle web…

This is the second research note from Silpa Mukherjee, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. Dances have remained an integral…

This is the second research note from Abhija Ghosh, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. The reactivation of nineties Hindi…

This is the second research note from Mrinalika Roy, one of the short-term social media research fellows at The Sarai Programme. In 2014, when Khabar Lahariya bagged the Global Media Forum Award hosted by Deutsche Welle [1], it was a watershed moment for the rural newspaper that had ventured online only in 2013. It showed first-hand how internet can help an NGO reach a wider audience. “Online votes played a big part in our victory. It helped us get noticed by the judges. We were surprised by the level of support we received,” said Poorvi Bhargava, editorial coordinator for Khabar Lahariya. To say that technology has been a boon for the rural newspaper would not be unwarranted.

The arrival of video ushered in a new logistics of access, circulation and production of audio-visual forms. Analog video introduced new infrastructures and legal contests for…

In this post, Mrinalika Roy, one of the researchers who received the Social Media Research grant for 2015, introduces her proposed work. When a New Delhi-based NGO ‘Nirantar’ began India’s first-of-its’s-kind, rural newspaper ‘Khabar Lahariya’ in May 2002 from Bundelkhand district – a semi-arid region where 60% of the population depends on agriculture for sustenance — their aim was to bring rural women into the sphere of journalism, information and technology.