Indian journalism of all genres has gone a long way over the years. We have journalism of all types starting from press journalism to photo-journalism, from sting journalism to stage-managed journalism, from interactive to investigative, from electronic to internet, and radio to video. On them all vests democracy a lot of trust and responsibilities.

These various streams of one of the pillars of democracy, Press, have proved to be doing yeomen’s service to the polity down the years. Still, when it comes to the need for reflecting the real voice of the public in the platforms of these media, they fail, they have failed, and they stay crippled by forces and pressures, interests and interferences.

The free press has become is a pipe dream. The freedom of press has over the years been a farce. No press organization in this mammoth democracy is free, and no journalist here enjoys the so-called free press journalism. Their steaming spirits and their firry letters and resounding voices are made to be vetted by interests and pressures of all hues; from communal to political, from linguistic to local, from corporate to cooperative, to mention a few. They are here to dictate terms, and many media organizations are by-products of these forces. When it is an issue of some public interest, there is hardly any platform worth mentioning but the ones like the fast emerging journalism genre called Citizen Journalism.

On this level playing field, every individual is a journalist and every story is the real echo of the voice of the people. No media stream can claim to be as democratic and transparent as Citizens’ media stream. Here what one wants to make the public read is what one finds in it. It is the best form of democratic journalism, and the emerging popularity of this medium has started forming a little powerful and troubled ripple in the circles of pressures. As a result, there are signs of clandestine moves from vested quarters to host custom-made media portals like Citizen’s so that their commercial interests could claim to have their pound from this platform too.

The real citizens, or the neo-journalists, are not going to stop, and they are bound to find and report things they feel have some relevance to the society, community and nation. This is a cyber-space of individual expression, which is not going to be controlled or pulled up or exhausted. Citizens’ journalism is here to stay and flourish. The coming media age is for this stream of journalism, and the rest of the media will remain as they have always been; the mouthpieces of many a party interest; their likes and lobbies, corporate houses and co-operatives.