Putting together TMIA is not only an exercise in reporting what is happening within AID, but also a chance to look at the wider world and focus on the stories that the rest of the media is missing. So in the last three weeks when we started working on the April TMIA, Ashima Sood and I paid particular attention to the news media around us. What was being reported in the print media, the TV news channels, and the Internet outlets? Only the prettiest pictures. If I didn’t know otherwise, I could easily conclude that the biggest event in India last month was the Lakme Fashion Week (not to be confused with India Fashion Week also at the same time). And the most significant debate was on bodices that break and clothes that collapse. But crashing this party were two long forgotten issues – the peoples’ struggles in Bhopal and the Narmada valley that suddenly arrived in Delhi, demanded to be heard, and made it clear that they would not just go away. Slowly, grudgingly, media outlets were forced to carry their stories. Rediff had to make space for a FAQ on the Narmada valley. The Indian Express carried an editorial, even though it patronizingly lectured on the benefits of the Sardar Sarovar dam. The emerging news magazine Tehelka, of course, covered both issues from Day One. The online news journal India Together provided excellent coverage of the other contemporary crisis, distress suicides by 400 farmers in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra.

That incredibly brave journalist Amy Goodman often tells the story of how reporters can be shields for people, protecting them against the worst atrocities of the state. The Lakme India Fashion Week and the myriad other India Shining stories that dominate our news are like swords against the country. They not only represent issues that are mind-numbingly trivial, but also cut out the stories that matter from the media and hence the national consciousness. The peoples’ campaigns are the shields. When Medha fasts, not only does she demand rehabilitation for the displaced in the Narmada Valley, but she also jolts our society into paying attention to the most important issues of the day.

Sword or shield? As AIDers, our choice is obvious. But how do we touch the audiences that do not read Tehelka or sign petitions? And bring to them the dramas of non-violent resistance and peaceful protest, and the faces of solidarity, that are far more beautiful and interesting than any displayed on the ramps? The answer to this question may be the most significant challenge to our collective imagination.

-- Tarun Jain & Ashima Sood