Anuraag Baruah

Independent Multimedia Journalist from Northeast India

Mongabay Environmental News •

A bridge of trees reunites gibbons separated by a railway line in India

Jorhat, INDIA – A lone hoolock gibbon jumps from one tree branch to another before taking a big final leap across the railway tracks that fragment its forested home into two unequal compartments.

This is good news, a leap of hope for the western hoolock gibbons (Hoolock hoolock) of Hoollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary in India’s northeastern state of Assam.

Hoolock gibbons, India’s only ape species, are strictly arboreal animals, which means they’re reluctant to spend time on the ground — and which m
Mongabay-India •

Illegal sand mining a threat to the shrinking Chandubi lake

“For the unsuspecting, this would appear to be any other normal grazing land. But the reality is that we are now walking on land that was actually part of the lake until just a few years ago,” says Sarzen, a local guide, referring to the Chandubi lake in the northeastern state of Assam. A herd of cattle and a group of local people doing their washing chores are in a nearby stream. The lake itself seems far away.

The shrinking of the famous Chandubi lake, located in the southern part of Kamrup d
http://asu.thehoot.org/ •

Hitting the wrong note in Assam

The media got the story of the Muslim boy who topped the Class 10 exam wrong. His religion was irrelevant.

ANURAAG BARUAH explains why this ‘news’ was barely news

For the first time perhaps in the history of Assam, high school examination results made it to the headlines of the national media. Sarfaraz Hussain, a student of Sankardev Sishu Niketan, Betkuchi, on the outskirts of Guwahati, topped the Class 10 exam in the state. The regional media reported the results that came out at 11 am on Th
http://asu.thehoot.org/ •

Has the media failed Sharmila?

While the aura around Irom Sharmila has grown since she started her fast 16 years ago before a single camera, it has not let to a deeper media focus on the impact of AFSPA on the ground,

Photo caption: Journalists in Imphal the day Irom Sharmila broke her fast.

On 9th August, 2016 many journalists including me survived a stampede like situation at the Cheirap Court Complex of Imphal East, the capital city of Manipur. The reason being Irom Sharmila was about to break her historic 16 years of hu
http://asu.thehoot.org/ •

The horror of the ‘encounter’

The horror of the ‘encounter’

An army officer’s confession reveals chilling details about ‘live kills’ and how awards for officers are linked to body counts.

Blood on My Hands: Confessions of Staged Encounters

Kishalay Bhattacharjee

Publisher: Harper Collins India, September 2015, New Delhi

ISBN: 9789351772583

Rs. 250.00

Paperback

216 pages

“Clean pick – live human being that will be killed and framed as a militant”

Senior Journalist Kishalay Bhattacharjee’s controversial new book ‘Blo
http://asu.thehoot.org/ •

Assam TV lectures women on how to dress

Assam TV lectures women on how to dress

“Scantily-clad girls are a summer-time nuisance” says an Assam news channel, highlighting the paternalistic approach towards women that has become common.

Recently, Assamese news channel Pratidin Time carried a story called ‘Scantily-clad girls, a summer-time nuisance?’ about young women wearing shorts and undermining Assamese culture with their shameless outfits. The voiceover spoke of how ‘even monkeys in jungles are wearing clothes’ and how, when wome
http://asu.thehoot.org/ •

"Bodos kill 65 in Assam"

This headline in the Assam Tribune was a reflection of the state of English journalism in Assam -- mindless and communal,

For someone outside Assam and for some even inside Assam, the “Bodos kill 65 in Assam” might not ring a bell of alarm. (The paper has changed the headline subsequently in its online edition -- Ed.) Well, let me ring it for you, to make things clear, ‘Bodos’ is not the name of some insurgent/rebel/militant organisation in Assam. Bodos are one of the oldest indigenous communit
Scroll.in •

Ground Zero: Glimpses from a relief camp in flood-ravaged Assam

In every direction you look on the way to the famous pumpkin market of Khowang, in Assam’s Dibrugarh district, there is just water. The national highway appears like an elongated island of brown amidst different shades of blue and green. At Khowang, the sight to greet you is misery. Scores of people have camped on high ground along railway tracks in tents made from bamboo poles and tarpaulin sheets.They moved there about a week ago after a breach in the bund at Kawaimari near Khowang Ghat result
TheQuint •

Delhi Police Falsely Charge NE Girls With Flesh Trade in FB Post

Around 7:15 pm on 4 October 2016, police from the Gurugram Sector 29 police station raided a spa and massage parlour in the locality. The next evening, around the same time, the Delhi police-run Facebook page ‘Delhi Police for Northeast Folks’ was updated with a post headlined “12 NE girls arrested by the police for flesh trade (prostitution) at Gurgaon city”.

The update posted by nodal officer for people from the northeast, IGP Robin Hibu, also claimed that the Gurugram Sector 29 police had bu
TheQuint •

Amendments to Citizenship Act in Assam is BJP’s Political Ploy

… provided that persons belonging to minority communities, namely, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan… shall not be treated as illegal migrants… ‘Secularism’ in India always has been a one of its kind issue. For example, it’s a paradox that the two major political parties of a secular country like India — Congress and BJP — have allegedly always favoured a particular religion over the other for the sake of vote bank politics. In Assam