Chapter IV

Profile of news
Newspapers not only supply information but also play a vital role in

the formation of public opinion affecting public participation in the

political processes of the country. Even if people get first hand

information, media coverage exerts an influence on public opinion on

many topics (Combs and Slovic,1979; Behr & Iyengar 1985).

Specifically, newspapers influence the decision making of the

individuals, politicians and government in order to strengthen

democracy in a country. The de facto effects of media have been

documented for numerous topics-concerning opinions on politicians

(Kepplinger, Donsbach, Brosius and Staab, 1989). Keeping this in

view, the differential coverage of political news in the newspapers is

analyzed to examine the role of newspapers in a democracy. In order

to ascertain the extent of political coverage in the newspapers, the

present study analyzed sample editions of four dailies: The Times of

India, Hindustan Times, Amar Ujala and Dainik Jagran, published

during the calendar year i.e., January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2014. A

total number of 42 issues of each newspaper came up for analysis

after adopting a two-stage sampling: continuous week and

constructed week. The units of analysis consisted of news items,

editorials and letters-to-the editor.

The objective of the present chapter is to provide a profile of news

covered under different subject categories in terms of frequency and

132
space, region-wise allocation and location of news. As 2014 was the

election year for the 16th Lok Sabha General Elections, therefore the

year was divided into three phases consisting of four months each.

The first phase from January to April 2014 was termed as the

Campaign Phase. The second phase from May to August 2014 was

termed as Election Phase and the last four months from September to

December 2014 was the Governance phase.

Characteristics
A total of 21713 news items covering a space of 229086 Col

centimeters, 245 editorials and 466 letters to the editor with a space

allocation of 1743.2 Col centimeters have been analyzed during the

study period. Among the four dailies, Amar Ujala published the

maximum news items (9284) followed by Dainik Jagran (5511).

Amongst the English dailies, Hindustan Times, published more number

of news items (3952) by allocating more space, followed by Times of

India which published less number of news item (2966) as compared

to all the other three dailies. Amar Ujala has more number of news

items, but less space as compared to Dainik Jagran (Table4). In

relation to editorials, Dainik Jagran published 79 editorials the highest

among the four samples followed by Hindustan Times (65) while the

other Hindi daily Amar Ujala published less number of editorials (47).

In case of letters-to-the editor, Dainik Jagran published the highest

number of letters (200) followed by Hindustan Times (152).

133
Table 4

Unit of analysis
Daily Letter to
News item Editorial
the editor
fr Space fr fr Space
Times of
2966 49052.4 54 60 249.7
India
Hindustan
3952 58169.7 65 152 412.3
Times
Amar Ujala 9284 60873.7 47 54 200.9
Dainik
5511 60990.3 79 200 880.3
Jagran
Total 21713 229086 245 466 1743.2
a
N = 42 editions for each daily; Space in column centimeters

Political theme
Table 5 shows the percentage allocation of frequency of news items,

editorials and letters-to-the editor to political theme. With regard to

frequency of news items, Times of India (18.8%) allocated the

maximum number of the news items to the theme, followed by Dainik

Jagran (17.7%) Hindustan Times (12.8%), and Amar Ujala (7.2%). In

the publication of editorials, Times of India (37%) followed by Dainik

Jagran (34.2%) Hindustan Times (33.8%) and Amar Ujala (31.9%)

came in the descending order. Moreover, Times of India (41.7%)

dedicated more percentage to political theme in the letters-to-the

editor while Dainik Jagran (30.5%), followed by Amar Ujala (27.8%)

and Hindustan Times (25.7%), in the descending order. However,

Times of India and Amar Ujala have higher percentage of political

news 18.9% and 17.7% respectively in terms of allocation of space to

134
 the political theme (Table 6).

Table 5
Percentage distribution of units of analyses for politics and other
subject categories
D A I L I E S
Unit of analysis Hindustan Amar Dainik
Times of India
Times Ujala Jagran
News items
Others 2408 3447 8617 4535
Politics 558 505 667 976
Politics (%) 18.8 12.8 7.2 17.7
Editorials
Others 34 43 32 52
Politics 20 22 15 27
Politics (%) 37 33.8 31.9 34.2
Letters-to-the editor
Others 35 113 39 139
Politics 25 39 15 61
Politics (%) 41.7 25.7 27.8 30.5

Table 6
Dailies
Unit of
Times of Hindustan Amar Dainik
analysis
India Times Ujala Jagran
News items
Other 40005.8 48989.4 50239.1 53037.7
Politics 9296.3 9592.6 10835.5 8832.9

Politics (%) 18.9 16.4 17.7 14.3

Regional focus

The study analyzed the frequency of news items in terms of the

coverage given to the state (Uttar Pradesh) and the nation. The

135
purpose of this analysis is to ascertain to what extent the four select

dailies have covered the themes in relation to their regional relevance.

Indeed, the two dailies Amar Ujala and Dainik Jagran are regional

dailies published in Uttar Pradesh while The Times of India and

Hindustan Times are chain editions published in the state. Amar Ujala

has five editions from Uttar Pradesh while Dainik Jagran has eleven

editions in the state. The present study has found that Amar Ujala

(39.9%) has allocated maximum percentage of news items to the state

followed by Dainik Jagran (32.8%) Hindustan Times (16.7%) and

Times of India (10.6%). In terms of space, maximum space of 33.1% is

allocated to state news by Dainik Jagran followed by Amar Ujala

(30.9%), Hindustan Times (19.4%) and Times of India (16.6%). This

shows that in terms of frequency of news related to state, Amar Ujala

allocates the highest frequency while in terms of space allocated to

state, Dainik Jagran is the highest among the four dailies .

In the category of national news, Amar Ujala covered maximum

frequency (45.9%) of news items to national news with 15.7% of its

space. The Dainik Jagran gives minimum frequency (17%) of news

items and space (16.7%) to national news in the paper. Therefore, it is

evident that the two Hindi dailies, give differential coverage to

national issues while the two English dailies have given more coverage

to national news than state news. The Hindustan Times gives higher

frequency (19.9%) as well as space (27.1%) to national news as

compared to Times of India (Table 7).

136
Table 7
Percentage distribution of frequencies of news items and space by regional focus
in the sample dailies
Region

Daily
State Nation
fr % Space % fr % Space %

Times of
1222 10.6 20002.6 16.6 1744 17.2 29049.8 40.5
India
Hindustan
1923 16.7 23352.4 19.4 2029 19.9 34817.3 27.1
Times
Amar Ujala 4605 39.9 37139.5 30.9 4679 45.9 23734.2 15.7
Dainik
3780 32.8 39651.4 33.1 1731 17 21338.9 16.7
Jagran

Total 11530 100 120145.9 100 10183 100 108940.2 100

Location

The location of news items in the front page and inside pages is

presented in Table 8. Among the four dailies, Times of India (30.7%)

published the highest number of news items in terms of frequency

639 news items while allocating maximum space of 34.9% among the

four dailies on the front page. Further, Hindustan Times (27.8%),

followed by Dainik Jagran (24.2%)came in descending order next to

the Times of India. The less number of news items on front page are

given by Amar Ujala (17.2%) with 19.3 % space. In the inside pages,

Amar Ujala gave maximum percentage of news (45.4%) and allocated

28.8% of its space to news among the four newspapers (Table 8).

137
 Table 8
Distribution of news items by frequencies and spacea in the sample dailies by location

Location
Daily
Front page Inside pages
fr % Space % fr % Space %

Times of
639 30.8 18455.3 34.9 2327 11.8 30597.1 17.4
India

Hindustan
578 27.8 14204.8 26.9 3374 17.2 43964.8 24.9
Times

Amar Ujala 358 17.2 10212.6 19.3 8926 45.5 50661.1 28.8

Dainik Jagran 502 24.2 9981.5 18.9 5009 25.5 51008.7 28.9

Total 2077 100 52854.2 100 19636 100 176232 100

Subject categories
The allocation of frequency of news items for the 12 subject categories

by the four newspapers is shown in Table 9. The analysis shows that

political news obtained the second rank in Times of India (19.6%) and

Dainik Jagran (18.4%) among the four dailies. Three newspapers

accorded first rank to Law and order category. The Times of India

(22.6%) accorded the highest percentage to Law and order while the

Hindustan Times gave 20.8% to Law and order category. Dainik Jagran

allocated the highest (28.5%) space to law and order. But in case of

Amar Ujala, the paper allocated the highest percentage to economic

news (20.4%). Times of India allocated third rank with 12.1% to

138
governance and Hindustan Times allocated 20.8% to development

news. In case of Amar Ujala the general human interest category with

19.1% occupied second rank followed by sports. In the Hindi daily

Amar Ujala ranked the sports category (16.2%) in the third place

whereas in Dainik Jagran gave development (14.5%) followed by

governance (14%) third and fourth place respectively. Hindustan

Times (13.7%) gave politics a third rank in terms of frequency of news

followed by economic activity. Finally the lowest news frequency

amongst the four dailies was given by Amar Ujala to politics (7.4%),

placing it as the sixth category after economic activity, general human

interest, sports, law and order, governance and politics followed by

development. Consistently, the four newspapers gave negligible

percentage to SC/ST category. More over, Table 10 shows the correlation

of newspapers in the coverage of subject categories. Two newspapers –

Times of India and Dainik Jagran were closely correlated (r=.92) while the

Hindi dailies Amar Ujala and Dainik Jagran had weak correlation(r=.38).

139
Table 9
Percentage distribution of frequencies of news items by subject categories in the sample dailies

D A I L I E S
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagaran
Categories
Rank Rank Rank
% % % % Rank Order
Order Order Order
Politics 603 19.6 2 566 13.7 3 697 7.4 6 1064 18.4 2
Development 302 9.8 6 867 20.7 2 596 6.4 7 838 14.5 3
Governance and official
374 12.1 3 492 11.8 5 790 8.4 5 813 14 4
work
Law and order etc. 696 22.6 1 868 20.8 1 1351 14.4 4 1653 28.5 1
Accidents and disasters 60 1.9 8 71 1.7 9 88 0.9 10 174 3 9
Science and technology 16 0.5 11 41 1 10 37 0.4 11 24 0.4 12
Arts, films and amusements 19 0.6 10 38 0.9 11 378 4 8 50 0.9 10
Sports 338 11 4 272 6.5 7 1518 16.2 3 213 3.7 7

General human interest 299 9.7 7 301 7.2 6 1790 19.1 2 488 8.4 5

SC/ST 5 0.2 12 6 0.2 12 11 0.1 12 26 0.5 11

Women 58 1.9 9 92 2.2 8 214 2.3 9 112 1.9 8

Economic activity 310 10.1 5 555 13.3 4 1915 20.4 1 335 5.8 6

Total 3080 100 4169 100 9385 100 5790 100

140
Table 10
Correlation of coefficients of frequencies of news items by subject
categories among the four dailies
Times of Dainik Amar
India Hindustan Times Jagran Ujala
Times of India
Hindustan Times
0.84
Amar Ujala
0.61 0.52 0.38
Dainik Jagaran
0.92 0.88

Further analysis of space of subject categories is shown in Table 11. In

relation to the allocation of space, the four newspapers Times of India,

Hindustan Times, Amar Ujala and Dainik Jagran accorded the first rank

to law and order theme. Therefore, Law and order news was given

immense importance by all the four dailies. In case of Times of India,

political news was ranked second with 18.8%, and development news

was given a second rank (17.9%) by Dainik Jagran while Hindustan

Times gave politics (16.5) a second place. The governance category

was ranked at number two (18%) by Amar Ujala, and Hindustan Times

accorded the third place to governance (12.7%) and fourth (12.6%) to

development news respectively. Third rank was accorded to

development news (11.4%) by Times of India. However, all the four

newspapers have closely correlated for allocating space to subject

categories ( Table 12).

141
Table 11
Percentage distribution of space by subject categories in the sample dailies
D A I L I E S
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagaran
Categories
Rank Rank Rank Rank
Space % Space % Space % Space %
Order Order Order Order
Politics 9296.4 18.8 2 9592.5 16.5 2 10835.6 17.8 3 8832.8 14.3 3
Development 5599 11.4 3 7380.7 12.6 4 8212.4 13.4 4 11071.6 17.9 2
Governance and
5195 10.5 7 7451.7 12.7 3 10992.5 18 2 8824.2 14.2 4
official work
Law and order
10244 20.8 1 13008 22.2 1 15098.7 24.7 1 17712.5 28.6 1
etc.
Accidents and
1426 2.8 8 731.1 1.2 11 1138.4 1.9 9 2627.9 4.3 7
disasters
Science and
174.8 0.4 11 784.3 1.3 10 661.2 1.1 10 593.4 1 10
technology

Arts, films and

220.6 0.5 10 1128.7 1.9 9 197.2 0.3 11 424.9 0.7 11
amusements
Sports 5492 11.1 5 5673.5 9.7 6 4803.2 7.9 5 2284.3 3.7 8
General human
5572 11.3 4 4711.1 8 7 4281.4 7 6 4663.5 7.5 5
interest
SC/ST 100.1 0.2 12 46.1 0.1 12 74.5 0.1 12 152.6 0.3 12
Women 772.6 1.6 9 1337.8 2.3 8 1406.9 2.3 8 989.6 1.6 9
Economic
5210 10.6 6 6736.4 11.5 5 3372.9 5.5 7 3693.1 5.9 6
activity
N= 49302.5 100 58581.9 100 61074.9 100 61870.4 100

142
Table 12

Correlation of coefficients of frequencies of news items by subject

categories among the four dailies

Times of Hindustan Amar Dainik

India Times Ujala Jagran
Times of
India
Hindustan
0.97
Times
Amar Ujala 0.93 0.98
Dainik Jagran 0.89 0.95 0.96

Front page
The front page in a newspaper is the most significant page, a

newspaper displays news items with high magnitude on the front

page. The selection of news items on the front page is done keeping in

view the various factors of selection. Mostly, the determinants of these

factors depend on the editorial policy and newspaper agenda and

more recent phenomenon is the agenda cutting. Each newspaper has

its agenda because of its political alignments, vested interests, day’s

political events and so on.

The analysis shows that the English newspapers- Times of India and

Hindustan Times gave the highest percentage to political news of

35.3% and 25.1% respectively whereas the Hindi dailies- Amar Ujala

and Dainik Jagran gave law and order the highest coverage of 27.7%

and 26.1% respectively. The second rank was given to law and order

by the English newspapers while the Hindi dailies gave second rank to

politics. The governance and official category occupied third rank in

143
Hindustan Times (19.2%), Amar Ujala(22.6%) and Dainik

Jagran(19.9%). Times of India dedicated the highest percentage of

news items to politics category on the front page during the election

year. Indeed the four newspapers did not cover any issues related to

science and technology and SC/ST category during the study period.

Table 14 shows the percentage distribution of space to 12 different

themes in the front page. It is seen that law and order news received

the highest coverage in the Hindi dailies in terms of space on the front

page. The political theme occupied first rank in the English dailies -

Times of India (32.4%) and Hindustan Times (25.1%) followed by law

and order news the second place by obtaining 26% and 23.4%

respectively in these two dailies. In Amar Ujala, law and order (28%)

followed by governance (24.8%) occupied the second rank whereas in

Dainik Jagran law and order(27.4%) politics (22.7%)occupied the

second space. All the four dailies gave considerable coverage to

general human interest theme. Nevertheless, governance and official

work received more coverage in all the newspapers as compared to

development as the seat of governance on the front page located in

Lucknow.

144
Table 13
Percentage distribution of frequency of news items by subject categories on front page in the sample dailies

D A I L I E S

Categories
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagaran

fr % fr % fr % fr %
Politics 225 35.3 145 25.1 62 17.3 112 22.3
Development 22 3.4 36 6.2 20 5.6 49 9.8
Governance and
94 14.7 111 19.2 81 22.6 100 19.9
official work
Law and order, etc. 146 22.8 140 24.2 99 27.7 131 26.1
Accidents and
13 2 23 4 19 5.3 15 3
disasters
Science and
3 0.5 10 1.7 5 1.4 6 1.2
technology
Arts, films and
1 0.2 1 0.2 0 0 5 1
amusements
Sports 14 2.2 9 1.6 3 0.8 13 2.6
General human
54 8.4 62 10.7 38 10.6 36 7.2
interest
SC/ST 0 0 2 0.4 1 0.3 0 0
Women 18 2.7 10 1.7 13 3.6 7 1.3
Economic activity 49 7.8 29 5 17 4.8 28 5.6
N= 639 100 578 100 358 100 502 100

145
Table 14
Percentage distribution of space by subject categories on front page in the sampledailies

D A I L I E S
Categories
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagaran
Space % Space % Space % Space %
Politics 5981.3 32.4 3565.3 25.1 2198.6 21.5 2260.2 22.7
Development 679.6 3.7 836 5.9 319.9 3.2 884.6 8.9
Governance and
2192.9 11.9 2741.9 19.3 2530.5 24.8 2041 20.4
official work
Law and order,
4801.9 26 3328.8 23.4 2860 28 2740 27.4
etc.
Accidents and
694.1 3.8 357.3 2.5 479.3 4.7 429.6 4.3
disasters
Science and
46.9 0.3 204.4 1.4 102.5 1 259.1 2.6
technology
Arts, films
38.5 0.2 5.8 0.1 0.4 0 23 0.2
andAmusements
Sports 664.6 3.6 220.2 1.5 70.9 0.7 223.5 2.2
General human
1700.4 9.2 1599.7 11.3 1012.2 9.9 617.1 6.2
interest
SC/ST 0 0 38.7 0.3 13.4 0.1 0 0
Women 313.1 1.7 468.2 3.3 263.5 2.6 81.6 0.8
Economic
1342.2 7.2 838.7 5.9 361.5 3.5 422.2 4.3
activity
N= 18455.5 100 14205 100 10212.7 100 9981.9 100

146
State news. In covering news related to Uttar Pradesh on the front

page, Times of India (35.4%)gave highest priority to politics, whereas

Hindustan Times (25.9%) gave highest percentage to law and order

along with Dainik Jagran (29.3%). While Amar Ujala (29.8%) gave

highest space to governance followed by law and order (25.7%) while

Dainik Jagran (22.3%) accorded the second rank to politics followed

by governance (17.4%). However, Hindustan Times accorded second

rank to General Human Interest news (19.3%) followed by politics

(16.1%) and governance (15.6%). Amar Ujala (18.8%) gave third

rank to politics. Times of India gave Law and order (26.9%) the second

rank followed by governance (14.3%). The two other categories –

science & technology and SC/ST, and did not receive any coverage in

all the four papers. Although art and films show no coverage but that

is because entertainment news was principally reported or covered

(Table 15). But, economic activity although important in a state capital

obtained very little coverage in these newspapers in terms of

frequency of news items. Moreover, the allocation of space to these

categories is alike to the percentage of frequency of news items.

147
Table 15
Percentage distribution of frequency of news items and to state news by subject categories on front page
DAILIES
Categories Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagran
fr % space % fr % space % Fr % space % fr % space %
Politics 62 35.4 1915.5 34.3 34 16.1 940.7 16.7 32 18.8 1196.1 23 54 22.3 916.6 19.7
Development 9 5.1 383.8 6.9 17 8 478.4 8.5 12 7 214.4 4.1 24 10 402.7 8.6
Governance and
25 14.3 556.9 10 33 15.6 842.1 15 51 29.8 1560.8 29.9 42 17.4 763 16.4
official work
Law and order, moral 47 26.9 1223.7 22 55 25.9 1307.8 23.4 44 25.7 1498.5 28.7 71 29.3 1680.1 36.1
Accidents and
4 2.3 152.4 2.7 15 7.1 219.8 3.9 10 5.8 204.9 3.9 12 4.9 329.1 7.1
disasters
Science and
0 0 0 0 2 0.9 28.2 0.5 0 0 0 0 1 0.4 14.2 0.3
technology
Arts, films and
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
amusements
Sports 3 1.7 311.6 5.6 5 2.4 161.5 2.9 1 0.6 40.3 0.8 3 1.2 20.4 0.4
General human
18 10.3 828.2 14.9 41 19.3 1144.4 20.4 15 8.8 367.8 7 22 9.1 358.8 7.7
interest
SC/ST 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Women 5 2.9 133.4 2.4 7 3.3 401.9 7.3 4 2.3 89.5 1.7 5 2.1 63.7 1.4
Economic activity 2 1.1 64.7 1.2 3 1.4 72.9 1.4 2 1.2 48.6 0.9 8 3.3 107.1 2.3
Total 175 100 5570.2 100 212 100 5597.7 100 171 100 5220.9 100 242 100 4655.7 100

148
Table 16
Percentage distribution of frequency of news items and space to national news by subject categories on front page
D A I L I E S
Categories Dainik
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala
Jagran
fr % space % fr % space % Fr % space % fr % space %
Politics 163 35.2 4065.8 31.5 111 30.3 2624.5 30.5 30 16 1002.3 20 58 22.3 1344.1 25.5
Development 13 2.8 295.8 2.3 19 5.2 357.6 4.2 8 4.3 105.5 2.1 25 9.6 481.9 9
Governance and
69 14.9 1636 12.7 78 21.3 1899.7 22.1 30 16 969.7 19.4 58 22.3 1277.5 24
official work
Law and order etc. 99 21.3 3578.3 27.8 85 23.2 2021.1 23.5 55 29.4 1361.6 27.3 60 23.1 1059.5 19.9
Accidents and
9 1.9 541.7 4.2 8 2.2 137.4 1.6 9 4.8 274.4 5.5 3 1.2 100.5 1.9
disasters
Science and
3 0.6 46.9 0.4 8 2.2 176.3 2 5 2.7 102.5 2.1 5 1.9 244.9 4.6
technology
Arts, films and
1 0.2 38.5 0.3 1 0.3 5.8 0.1 0 0 0 0 5 1.9 23 0.4
amusements
Sports 11 2.4 353 2.7 4 1.1 58.6 0.7 2 1.1 30.6 0.6 10 3.8 203.1 3.8
General human
36 7.8 872.2 6.8 21 5.7 455.3 5.3 23 12.3 644.4 12.9 14 5.4 258.3 4.8
interest
SC/ST 0 0 0 0 2 0.5 38.7 0.4 1 0.5 13.4 0.3 0 0 0 0
Women 13 2.8 179.7 1.4 3 0.8 66.3 0.8 9 4.8 173.9 3.5 2 0.8 17.9 0.3
Economic activity 47 10.1 1277.4 9.9 26 7.2 765.7 8.8 15 8.1 312.9 6.3 20 7.7 315.1 5.8
Total 464 100 12885.3 100 366 100 8607 100 187 100 4991.2 100 260 100 5325.8 100

149
Table 17

Percentage distribution of frequency of news items by subject categories in the inside pages of the sample dailies

D A I L I E S
Categories
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagran
Rank Rank Rank Rank
fr % Fr % fr % fr %
Order Order Order Order
Politics 333 14.3 2 360 10.6 4 605 6.6 6 864 17.3 2
Development 264 11.3 4 810 24 1 553 6.2 7 739 14.8 3
Governance and official
263 11.3 5 346 10.2 5 696 7.8 5 669 13.4 4
work
Law and order, etc. 535 23 1 687 20.4 2 1238 14 4 1471 29.4 1
Accidents and disasters 47 2 8 48 1.4 9 69 0.7 10 153 3.1 8
Science and technology 12 0.5 11 29 0.9 11 30 0.3 11 17 0.3 12
Arts, films and amusements 16 0.7 10 36 1.1 10 377 4.2 8 44 0.9 10
Sports 322 13.8 3 260 7.7 6 1508 17 3 198 3.8 7
General human interest 239 10.3 7 230 6.8 7 1748 20 2 421 8.3 5
SC/ST 3 0.1 12 3 0.1 12 10 0.1 12 26 0.5 11
Women 37 1.6 9 76 2.3 8 198 2.1 9 103 2.1 9

Economic activity 256 11.1 6 489 14.5 3 1894 21 1 304 6.1 6

N= 2327 100 3374 100 8926 100 5009 100

150
National news. In the front page, politics received the highest

percentage of frequency of news items only in English dailies- Times of

India (35.2%) and Hindustan Times (30.3%)whereas across the two

Hindi dailies in relation to the coverage of national news, the highest

percentage was given to law and order by Amar Ujala (29.4% ) and

Dainik Jagran (23.1%). The law and order news (21.3%) reported in

Times of India ranked second whereas 23.2% of frequency of news

was allocated to law and order in Hindustan Times. Amar Ujala with

16% news in politics gave it a second rank followed by 12.3% news

for general human Interest. In Dainik Jagran after law and order

received 22.3% news with more allocation of space to politics. Space

allocation to various categories was nearly balanced in case of

Hindustan Times. Amar Ujala gave a higher frequency of news to law

but allocated lower space to the same category. In the case of Dainik

Jagran, law and order news had higher frequency but space allocation

was less. Further, the Hindustan Times (21.3%), and Dainik Jagran

(22.3%) and The Times of India (14.9%) gave third rank to governance

(Table 16). In case of political news it is evident that a higher

frequency of political news covered in the English dailies whereas in

case of Hindi dailies, frequency is lower but space allocation is more to

political news. Further, general human interest in case of Amar Ujala

occupies a third rank (12.3%) although Dainik Jagran gave governance

the third rank. The governance category received better coverage in

all the four dailies. Overall, Science and technology, SC/ST and women

category did not receive adequate coverage in the front page of the

151
four newspapers, and woman category received 2.8 % news item in

Times of India. Sport was also highlighted in the two English and one

Hindi daily the Dainik Jagran although Amar Ujala accorded negligible

percentage to sport category.

Inside pages

The analysis examined the coverage given to different subject

categories in the inside pages, and Table 17 shows details of coverage

given by four dailies to different categories in the inside pages. Law

and order news dominated as number one rank in the Times of India

(23%) and Dainik Jagran(29.4%). In Hindustan Times development

was given utmost importance (24%) followed by law and order

(20.4%). Both economy and sports are important categories in Times

of India, Hindustan Times and Amar Uajal but these categories were

ranked the lowest in Dainik Jagran. SC/ST and Science and

Technology remained largely the most neglected category in all the

four newspapers.

Space. Table 18 presents details of space allocated to different

categories in the inside pages. Like frequency of news items all four

dailies allocated the highest percentage of space in the inside pages to

law and Order category of news. In case of law & order, Times of India,

law and order (17.7%) Hindustan Times (21.8%), Amar Ujala(24.1%)

and by Dainik Jagran (29%) gave first rank to the category. The Times

of India gave development (15.9%) and sport (15.8%) second rank

and third respectively. Dainik Jagran (19.6%) ranked development as

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second followed by governance (13.1%). In case of Amar Ujala

governance (16.5%) followed by development (15.5%) occupied

second and third ranks respectively. The Hindustan Times covered

development (14.7%) followed by economy (13.4%) and sport

(12.4%) in descending order. The Hindi news papers Amar Ujala and

Dainik Jagran allocated mostly the second and fourth rank to

political category respectively whereas the English newspapers – The

Times of India and the Hindustan Times allocated sixth rank and

third rank to political category, and in these two dailies economy

obtained fourth rank. Further analysis shows that all dailies gave less

than 3% to women category news and less than 1% to the SC /ST

category.

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Table 18
Percentage distribution of space by subject categories in the inside pages of the sample dailies
D A I L I E S

Categories Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagran

Space % Rank order Space % Rank order Space % Rank order Space % Rank order

Politics 3213.8 10.5 6 5890.9 13.4 3 8598.2 17 2 6331.9 12.5 4

Development 4875 15.9 2 6478 14.7 2 7847 15.5 4 10022 19.6 2
Governance and
2972 9.7 7 4631 10.5 6 8378 16.5 3 6661.3 13.1 3
official work
Law and order, etc. 5412 17.7 1 9596 21.8 1 12225 24.1 1 14800 29 1
Accidents and
732.4 2.4 8 373.9 0.6 11 659.1 1.3 9 2147 4.2 7
disasters
Science and
123 0.4 11 577 1.4 10 556.5 1.1 10 334.27 0.7 11
technology
Arts, films and
182.1 0.6 10 1120 2.6 8 193.9 0.4 11 398.26 0.8 10
amusements
Sports 4824 15.8 3 5447 12.4 5 4726 9.3 5 2053 4 8
General human
3847 12.6 5 3091 7.1 7 3263 6.4 6 3945.7 7.7 5
interest
SC/ST 100.1 0.3 12 7.4 0.1 12 61.1 0.1 12 152.6 0.4 12
Women 453.7 1.5 9 867 2 9 1142 2.3 8 902.5 1.8 9

Economic activity 3863 12.6 4 5886 13.4 4 3011 6 7 3260.1 6.2 6

N= 30597 100 43965 100 50661 100 51009 100

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State news in inside pages. Table19 explainsthepercentage

distribution of frequency of news items and space to state under

different subject categories in the inside pages. The four newspapers,

Dainik Jagran (18.2%) allocated more percentage of news items to

politics as compared to other newspapers – Times of India (11.1%),

Hindustan Times (8.1%), and Amar Ujala (7.3%). However, in terms of

space, Amar Ujala (13.9%), allocated more space to politics as

compared to other three newspapers – Times of India (8.3%),

Hindustan Times (11.7%), and Dainik Jagran (11.6%). Further,

Hindustan Times allocated the highest percentage of frequency of

news items to development category (41.7%) as compared to other

categories. Also, the same newspaper accorded one-fourth of the total

frequency of news items to law and order. Moreover, other three

newspapers also allocated more space to law and order categories

keeping in view the importance of the issue. Economic activity

category received less than 2% in all the four newspapers in the state

category.

National news in inside pages. Table 20 presents details of distribution

of frequency of news items to national news in the inside pages. It is

evident from the table that, the three newspapers – Times of India,

Hindustan Times and Dainik Jagran have given more coverage to

politics as compared to Amar Ujala in terms of frequency of news

items. But in terms of space, Amar Ujala (22.2%) gave more space to

the politics category as compared to other categories – Times of India

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(12.5%), Hindustan Times (14.5%), and Dainik Jagran (14.3%). In

contrast, for the law and order category Times of India and Amar Ujala

gave more frequency of news items than space. Overall, all the four

newspapers gave more coverage to the economic activity category

both in terms of frequency of news items, and space. Further,

accidents and disaster, science and technology, art and films, SC/ST

and women categories received negligible percentage in the inside

pages in all the four newspapers in terms of frequency of news items

andspace.

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Table 19
Percentage distribution of frequency of news items to state news by subject categories in inside pages
Categories D A I L I E S
Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagran
fr % Space % fr % Space % fr % Space % fr % Space %
Politics 116 11.1 1192 8.3 138 8.1 2071.6 11.7 325 7.3 4454.8 13.9 658 18.2 4053.1 11.6
Development 189 18.1 3749.1 26 714 41.7 5176.7 29 407 9.2 6124 19 657 19 9115.8 26
Governance and official
116 11.1 1358.9 9.4 121 7.1 1549.6 8.7 492 11 5970 19 456 13 3974.2 11
work
Law and order, etc. 262 25 2795.9 19 381 22.3 3409.4 19 836 19 8247 26 1146 32 11795 34
Accidents and disasters 26 2.5 414.5 2.9 24 1.4 193.9 1.1 57 1.3 520.3 1.6 101 2.9 1247.7 3.6
Science and technology 4 0.4 38.1 0.3 8 0.5 84.7 0.5 11 0.2 333.2 1 5 0.1 51.2 0.1
Arts,films and
10 1 100.8 0.7 11 0.6 232.9 1.3 213 4.8 97.54 0.3 8 0.2 66.9 0.2
amusements
Sports 110 10.5 1569.1 11 79 4.6 1855.6 10 808 18 2639 8.3 64 1.8 705.5 2
General human interest 172 16.4 2614.6 18 157 9.2 2340.6 13 1057 24 2115 6.6 312 8.8 2963.2 8.5
SC/ST 2 0.2 100.1 0.7 1 0.1 2 0 8 0.2 44.07 0.1 14 0.4 81.7 0.2
Women 25 2.4 301.4 2.1 54 3.2 599.1 3.4 181 4.1 953.9 3 80 2.3 698.5 2
Economic activity 15 1.4 197.9 1.4 23 1.3 238.5 1.3 39 0.9 420.6 1.3 37 1 242.3 0.7
N= 1047 100 14432.4 100 1711 100 17754.6 100 4434 100 31918 100 3538 100 34996 100

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Table 20
Percentage distribution of frequency of news items to National news by subject categories in inside pages

D A I L I E S

Categories Times of India Hindustan Times Amar Ujala Dainik Jagran

fr % Space % fr % Space % fr % Space % fr % Space %

Politics 217 17 2022 12.5 222 13.4 3819.6 14.5 280 6.3 4143.5 22.2 206 14.5 2278.5 14.3
Development 75 5.9 1126 7 96 5.8 1301.7 5 146 3.3 1723 9.2 82 5.6 906 5.7
Governance and
147 11.5 1613 10 225 14 3081.4 11.8 204 4.5 2408 13 213 15 2687 16.8
official work
Law and order,
273 21.3 2616 16 306 18 6186.3 23.6 402 8.9 3979 21 325 22 3005 18.8
etc.
Accidents and
21 1.6 318 2 24 1.4 179.9 0.7 12 0.3 138.8 0.7 52 3.5 899.3 5.6
disasters
Science and
8 0.6 84.9 0.5 21 1.3 492.4 1.9 19 0.4 223.2 1.2 12 0.8 283.1 1.7
technology
Arts, films and
7 0.6 81.3 0.5 25 1.5 886.7 3.4 164 3.7 96.4 0.5 36 2.5 331.4 2.1
amusements
Sports 212 16.6 3255 20 181 11 3591.4 13.7 700 16 2087 11 134 9.1 1348 8.4
General human
66 5.2 1232 7.6 73 4.4 749.9 2.9 691 15 1148 6.1 109 7.4 982.4 6.1
interest
SC/ST 1 0.1 0 0 2 0.1 5.4 0 2 0 17.04 0.1 12 0.8 70.9 0.4
Women 12 0.9 152 0.9 22 1.3 267.9 1 17 0.4 188.3 1 23 1.6 204 1.3
Economic
241 18.8 3665 23 466 28 5647.6 21.5 1855 41 2591 14 267 18 3018 18.8
activity
N= 1280 100 16165.2 100 1663 100 26210.2 100 4492 100 18743 100 1471 100 16014 100

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