India, a major power with a population of 1.2 billion (the world’s second largest). According to the forecast by the IMF (International Monetary Fund), its GDP is expected to rank fifth in the world in 2020, following the United States, China, Japan, and Germany. With both such population and economic scale, this country will likely have an ever-growing impact on the world.

So how does India appear in Japanese news coverage? Let’s examine the volume and content of reporting on India in Japan.

A view of the Indian city of Mumbai (Photo: Premshree Pillai /Flicker [CC BY-SA 2.0])

Basic information on India

A federal republic located in South Asia. Its history traces back to the Indus civilization around 2600 BCE; in the medieval period, it flourished under Muslim dynasties and the Mughal Empire established by Babur, who had Mongol lineage. After a colonial era under Western powers in the 19th century, it gained independence from Britain in 1947. Today it has a population of 1.2 billion and is composed of a great diversity of ethnicities, languages, and religions. Although the federal official language is Hindi, in addition to English, 23 languages—including Bengali, Punjabi, and Tamil—are recognized by the constitution.

In terms of religion, Hindus make up 79.8%, the largest share, and Muslims account for 14.2% of the country. In addition, there is a wide range of religions practiced by the population, including Brahmanism, Sikhism, Jainism, and Zoroastrianism.

Wedding attire in India (Photo: Adam Cohn /Flicker [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0])

Poverty in India

Among the many facets of India, the caste system, a system of social stratification, is very well known. Although it is prohibited by the constitution, its influence remains deeply rooted in rural areas. Poverty and inequality have been slow to be corrected, and opportunities for children’s education, in particular, are especially susceptible to the effects of caste (occupation and income).

According to the “Global Hunger Index(Global Hunger Index)” released by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in October 2017, India ranked 100th among the 119 countries surveyed, seven places below North Korea. According to a survey by the World Bank in 2016, the poverty rate fell from 45.3% in 1993 to 20% by 2017, but even with this decrease, the country still has an enormous poor population of 270 million. In this way, India is a country with severe inequality problems.

Scenes of the poor in India (Photo: Sean Ellis /Flicker [CC BY 2.0])

India as seen through the “volume” of coverage

As noted above, while it is an economic and demographic giant, it also faces severe poverty and inequality, making it a diverse society in many senses. But how much of this is conveyed in Japanese reporting? Let’s first look at the volume of coverage. We analyzed reporting in the Asahi, Yomiuri, and Mainichi newspapers.

The study revealed that India accounted for only 0.8% of total coverage. Compared with the United States, with which Japan has close political and economic ties, China, the world’s largest trading nation, and neighboring South Korea and North Korea, the difference in volume is striking.

We further analyzed the relationship between GDP and coverage volume. The chart below compares the 2017 GDP rankings with the number of articles about the top GDP countries.

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As the chart above shows, aside from the United States and China, European countries such as France, Germany, and the United Kingdom receive very heavy coverage. Although India’s GDP is on par with that of the UK and France, its coverage is less than half of theirs. It is also vastly outstripped in the number of articles by Russia, whose GDP it far exceeds. India’s presence in the international community is growing, yet it still attracts little attention from the Japanese media. This is not to argue that coverage should vary strictly in proportion to GDP. However, given its poverty issues and sheer scale in many respects, the paucity of reporting on India should be a matter of concern.

India as seen through the “content” of coverage

On the other hand, what kinds of “content” are most common in articles about India? First, in the chart below showing monthly coverage volume (number of articles from 2015 to 2017), there are three months with conspicuous spikes: December 2015, November 2016, and September 2017.

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Among the events that occurred at those times, here are those with especially high numbers of reports.

・Events in December 2015: Over three days from December 11 to 13, Japan’s Prime Minister Abe visited India, and a Japan–India summit meeting was held with Prime Minister Modi. After the talks, the two leaders signed a joint statement serving as a roadmap for a “new era of Japan–India relations,” titled “Japan and India Vision 2025: Special Strategic and Global Partnership, Working Together for Peace and Prosperity of the Indo-Pacific Region and the World.”

・Events in November 2016: A military clash between India and Pakistan over the Kashmir region occurred, heightening tensions. The clash resulted in deaths among Pakistani troops who responded to India’s “cross-border strikes.” Tensions between the two nuclear-armed countries cast a shadow over security and the economy in the South Asian region.

・Events in September 2017: Japan’s Defense Minister Onodera held talks at the Ministry of Defense with India’s Defence Minister Jaitley. They affirmed the importance of strengthening pressure across the international community against North Korea’s nuclear and missile development. They also agreed to expand joint training and promote cooperation on equipment development. India, which had ranked third by country in trade volume with North Korea, virtually halted its trade with North Korea in April 2017.

What these events that drove increases in coverage have in common is that matters directly involving the Japanese government, or relating to the North Korea issue deemed important to Japan, received extensive attention. Cross-border clashes between India and Pakistan were also widely covered. However, developments within India itself did not see similarly prominent coverage.

Next, let’s compare the volume of coverage by genre.

This graph shows that themes such as “economy” and “society/life” account for more than half. With rapid GDP growth and the entry of the Japanese government and companies into the Indian economy, attention to India’s economy has risen in particular—for example, Prime Minister Modi’s interest-rate policy and the IT reforms the government has emphasized in recent years. As for “society/life” articles, they are mainly short columns by correspondents, reporting on living conditions and festivals that differ from those in Japan. The issue here is that, while there are many articles highlighting positive aspects overall, there is little reporting that focuses on negative aspects such as poverty. In 2016, across Asahi, Yomiuri, and Mainichi, articles on poverty and inequality made up only about 2% of all India-related pieces. While there is coverage evaluating Prime Minister Modi’s economic policies, the media rarely report on the inequalities that lie behind them.

Prime Minister Modi (Photo: Realpolitic / President of the Russian Federation [CC BY 4.0])

As this analysis has shown, despite India’s growing presence in the world, coverage of the country in Japan is inadequate. In particular, it is hard to say that the severe poverty and inequality occurring within India are sufficiently portrayed. “Economic growth” sounds positive, but in its shadow lies the issue of “inequality.” Skewed reporting can calcify public perspectives and make it harder to see the multiple facets of events and issues—an outcome that should be avoided. Information providers should recognize the need to convey this fully. India, with a population of 1.2 billion and a diversity of people leading diverse social lives—improvements by Japan’s major media are hoped for to reflect its reality objectively.

Writer: Motoki Muto

Graphics: Motoki Muto

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