3.1.1 ‘Deaths makes news’ in a competitive media landscape.

Participants described how ‘crime sells’ [Editor #2, Delhi] and ‘deaths make news’ [Senior Reporter #1, Delhi], with deaths and suicide (typically covered by crime reporters) of high interest to the audience. It was articulated that such suicide coverage is often framed as an ‘interesting local issue’ [Bureau Chief #1, Delhi], tapping into the audiences’ curiosity in unexpected deaths, suicides and other alarming events in their city or neighbourhood. As explained by one news editor:

Death, as we have been taught in our journalism, is the first casualty. Whenever there is a death, it is newsworthy. It is more sensationalism, infotainment for our readers. Crime sells they say. Crime actually touches our lives. People think it could happen to me also, or my kid could have committed suicide, so it touches your life. Or if it is close to his house he is more involved with it, “that man two blocks from my house has committed suicide, I didn’t know that”. [Editor #2, Delhi]

The local crime coverage was also seen as an important part of the metro section of newspapers; it was articulated as the section that helps distinguish newspapers from each other, resulting in a high level of competition for the best local content, as this editor describes:

The metro section, the team that covers the city events, the crime, including the suicide, is the cutting edge of the newspaper. That is what makes it stand apart from the competitors… So, the competition to sensationalise more is greater with crime reporting. [Editor #2, Delhi]

Participants described how suicide stories attract a lot of interest from the audience, ‘Suicide does have the element to engage the audience… I think there’s a fascination about suicide’ [Editor #3, Delhi]. Those participants who publish news online described suicide content as getting lots of “clicks”; ‘the number of online clicks you get is not less than what you get for a sex story or an infertility story’ [Editor #4, Chennai]. The sensationalism associated with coverage of suicide events was characterised as ‘a battle for eyeballs… suicide is collateral damage, in that sense… People are attracted to stories on suicides, it’s clickbait’ [Bureau Chief #4, Chennai].

3.1.2 Compelling social narratives and links to a cultural history of suicide as protest.

All participants emphasised that the newsworthiness of a suicide was intimately linked to the social and political issues surrounding it, and the larger message that can be conveyed to society. ‘Every day we get messages about suicide stories. We only cover suicide stories where we can send a message to society at large.’ [Senior Reporter #8, Chennai]. Reporting suicide events was seen as ‘important news because it shows the face of society. Where we are going? How much pressure we can be under? In what condition are we committing suicide?’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi]. This senior crime reporter explained that newsworthiness is heavily based on the reason behind the suicide:

The reason behind the suicide is what makes it newsworthy. On average, around four to five suicides come to my attention every day, so we pick and choose. Last month, an elderly couple committed suicide because they had been abandoned by their children. In these kinds of cases it is something that we would definitely play. We would say, ‘do not abandon your own parents, because they have brought you up’. It’s Indian culture, we are supposed to take care of our ageing parents and the family. [Senior Reporter #11, Chennai]

The majority of participants went further to articulate that reporting suicide incidents became especially newsworthy when it involved highlighting perceived injustices and giving a voice to those who were seen as otherwise voiceless victims of social wrongs. One editor and TV personality explained:

I host a daily crime show on TV, half hour each night. We present a minimum of 3–4 suicides each week. Interesting cases, reportable cases. Anything related to injustice, the public think it’s their story. Suicide with injustice, the public are very close to such stories and they rate highly… There was a classic case. Anita, a Dalit girl and doctor aspirant who committed suicide over an issue with the national medical entrance exams… The government suddenly changed the syllabus and she was disadvantaged… It played like anything. We covered only the Anita story for 4 or 5 days [Editor #5, Chennai].

By contrast, suicides thought to be related to mental health reasons were seen as less newsworthy. ‘Suicides are two types. One is due to mental illness. The second is the social issue. You can’t present just anything uninteresting to the public. If something is a social issue, the public will listen’ [Senior Reporter #7, Chennai].

This motivation to report on suicide incidents to highlight social issues extended to seeing suicide as an opportunity to influence government policy: ‘it is only when a suicide happens it’s like shock value… so that’s often why suicides are covered. It’s a catalyst for change’ [Reporter #2, Chennai] and ‘traditionally, media houses have looked at such suicides as a kind of tool to pressure the government to take action’ [Senior Reporter #9, Chennai]. To affect change, participants described using sensational and sustained media coverage of a suicide event, as outlined by one senior crime reporter:

We intentionally sensationalise stories to give prominence to the issue, where it is connected to government policy… The suicide is used as a trigger to bring the issue to the forefront. We provide regular updates. We keep tracking the investigation., We ask the political parties for their opinions. [Senior Reporter #13, Chennai]

Others articulated that they can use sensational media coverage ‘so that the government steps in and gives some compensation to the family. We feel good that we have helped in some way’ [Reporter #3, Chennai].

Without prompting, several participants also described beliefs that some instances of suicide in India are a form of protest or martyrdom, a belief they felt had deep socio-cultural roots. The resonance of this perspective appeared to be especially strong among participants from Chennai, with several participants making reference to historical events where suicide decedents have been memorialised as martyrs. As explained by one senior crime reporter:

To add to this complex problem, we have a kind of a culture where we glorify such acts. In Tamil Nadu, there is a big history with the anti-Hindi agitations. Lots of people committed suicide. To this day they are being honoured as martyrs, people who died for the Tamil language. Every year, the anniversaries are observed… So, this type of culture which supports or encourages suicide in one form or another is a big problem for this society. It isn’t just Tamil Nadu. During the Mandal agitation in 1990, protests took place across all of India. The issue was around having reservations or quotas for government jobs to go to people of disadvantaged castes. During the protests, either against or for the policy, I remember so many self-immolation stories from across all of India. [Senior Reporter #9, Chennai]

For some participants, this was accompanied by a view that, in some circumstances, suicide may be a brave act embodying an important societal message. One senior crime reporter explained:

It is about the voice of the oppressed. Suicide is voiceless peoples voice… For a person to commit suicide, he will be more brave than the average person. It is an act of bravery… People want to send a message to the society and the government about their grievances. They use suicide as the message… They are martyrs. [Senior Reporter #7, Chennai]

3.1.3 Suicide notes and apportioning of blame.

Many participants articulated that suicide notes, written by the deceased prior to their death, were critically important pieces of information that could increase the newsworthiness of a suicide: ‘If there is a proper suicide note we go for it’ (Senior Reporter #2). Such notes were seen as crucial in getting an insight into the cause of the suicidal behaviour. ‘…I got hold of the suicide note and I put it up online. It’s the most important part, right? It will explain their thoughts and emotions when they committed suicide’ [Reporter #1, Chennai]. Additional newsworthiness was attained if the suicide note blamed someone or some situation as the cause of the suicidal behaviour, allowing media to generate a level of controversy that would spark reader interest: ‘In some cases, someone blames someone for the suicide, sometimes in a suicide note. Such cases are reported bigly. Media reports those cases of suicide where there is a controversy’ [Bureau Chief #2, Delhi]. Typically, suicide notes were seen as trustworthy sources of information, as articulated by one senior crime reporter:

A business owner committed suicide and wrote a suicide note saying that the demonetisation policy was the reason. So, this made news value… Ninety to ninety-five percent of the time, the suicide notes generally reflect the cause for the suicide. There’s also a belief in Tamil Nadu that when you’re dying, people generally don’t lie… [Senior Crime Reporter #12]

3.1.4 Profile of the deceased.

All participants emphasised that the profile of the suicidal person was critical to the newsworthiness of the story. Typically, there was a view that suicides of lower profile people were of less interest to the audience, who were typically of a middle- or upper-class background and who may feel more connection with the suicide of someone that matches their own profile: ‘A well-placed person committing suicide will get more attention from the media. We believe the readers, who are generally educated, will identify themselves with those victims.’ [Senior Crime Reporter #10]. Celebrity suicides in particular were seen to ‘have commercial value’ [Editor #5, Chennai]: ‘If there is a celebrity involved, then it’s definitely page one. Crime, sex and celebrity is page one’ [Editor #4, Chennai].

Meanwhile, a commonly expressed view was that the suicide of someone from a poor background was less newsworthy as it was seen as a less important priority for the country, as articulated below by one news editor:

the profile of the victim matters to the treatment that the suicide gets. All suicides are not newsworthy… I would not spend resources trying to stop suicides in a slum. I would rather try to save those precious education men who can serve the country more. Because the contribution to the economy from that person from the slum is not as much. So I would rather not spend more on saving his life. It’s not a priority for a poor country. [Editor #2, Delhi]

Participants consistently expressed the view that suicides among younger people and females were generally more newsworthy, as they were presumed to generate greater reader empathy and curiosity. Younger people were seen as more newsworthy because ‘he is the future of the country… [and] reader psychology is such that they will be more interested in why a young person has committed suicide with their future ahead of them’ [Bureau Chief #1, Delhi]. Most participants struggled to explain why female suicides were considered more newsworthy. A variety of suggestions were made. One senior crime reporter suggested: ‘maybe because of sympathy. If there is a women’s photo, how she was before, then that is more newsworthy. Female is close to their children. If she had two or three children, who will look after them’ [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi]. Others suggested that ‘readers want to read a woman suicide story, it has more masala, more spice’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi], and that ‘when a lady does it, it is more dramatic and more painful for society to look into’ [Editor #2, Delhi].

Certain occupational categories were also viewed as carrying a higher degree of newsworthiness. For example, the suicides of farmers and students were frequently identified as particularly newsworthy, with a perception that farmer suicides are highly politicised and attract a lot of attention while student suicides cause great concern to many readers who themselves have children or grandchildren at school.

3.1.5 Simplified reasons for suicide.

In contrast to the narrative that suicides are reported to raise awareness of important social issues, several participants also described how a suicide can become highly newsworthy if it can be framed as having a cause perceived as silly or petty: ‘suppose that a 10-year old child is committing suicide just because he couldn’t get a good mark. We do some special suicide stories on how many persons have committed suicide just because of petty reasons’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi]. One senior reporter recalled that suggesting a suicide was the result of a simplistic reason can capture the attention of the audience:

One woman suicided because her husband would not take her to the movies. They were married and only living together for three months. We reported this to say this is a silly reason kill yourself… We are at fault for reporting in such a simplistic manner. If you give a silly reason for a suicide, the audience automatically tend to watch, they will also take-it-up online and it can go viral. [Senior Reporter #8, Chennai]

3.2.1 Routine crime coverage of suicide.

Participants described how suicide events are typically covered by reporters on the crime beat, and that this practice is deeply embedded: ‘Traditionally it is considered a crime-based story. If a suicide happens, the crime reporter will find out the details from the police, suicide has always been reported like that’ [Senior Reporter #1, Delhi] and ‘reporting of suicide will never change from this’ [Bureau Chief #1, Delhi].

All participants described the crime report approach to suicide reporting as ‘very routine’ [Bureau Chief #1, Delhi] incident reporting. Typically, the reporting approach was described as brief and depersonalised: ‘For us it is just impersonal information, very dry and unhuman coverage. If you go in-depth, there are a lot of complex issues at play. [But] the suicide reports are impersonal and brief’ [Bureau Chief #2, Delhi]. Participants consistently articulated that the reporting approach tended to follow a basic copy: ‘The profile of the person. The apparent reason. Whether there was a suicide note… and the method of course… so yeah, we are supposed to file a 2 or 3 paragraph story with these basic talking points’ [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi].

3.2.2 Police as informants and their relationship with crime reporters.

All participants identified that police were almost always the first source of information on a suicide incident: ‘It’s the local police person who gives the most information… We cultivate this in local police and in [police control room]. Not every police person has ‘news sense’, it is a built-in quality’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi]. The criminality of suicide attempt under the Indian Penal Code means that ‘every suicide is a [police] case. Everything they have we will ask for, and they will have to tell the information’ [Editor #2, Delhi]. The information would come informally at first, through a police source, followed by a formal request for the official first incident report (FIR). One senior crime reporter explained:

There are Whatsapp groups in every police district. So, they usually inform that, you know, so and so incident was reported at this station. The crime reporters, the persons covering the respective beats, are members of these groups. They furnish us with the basic details and photos, often of the bodies or a headshot from when they were alive. The information is reliable, and you can publish that, but of course you call the police station and ask to confirm the details officially. [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi]

Most participants articulated the relationships between reporters on the crime beat and police as being somewhat symbiotic and interdependent, working together on a daily basis. The examples given ranged from helping police gather information on a case to clear quid pro quo arrangements: ‘sometimes we give some money or some alcohol… sometimes we do favour and we put their name in an article’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi] and ‘in many cases, the police get a lot of information from what we find out’ [Reporter #2, Chennai]. In other instances, participants described occasions of police contacting them to encourage them to write a media report about a particular case: ‘they sometimes call me up and say this is a really sad case… so why don’t you write about it?’. [Editor #7, Chennai]. One Bureau Chief reflected that crime reporters often identify strongly with the police, which impacts the way they approach their work:

The first information for the crime reporter on suicides comes from the police version. They take it and reproduce it as it is. And sometimes it’s in your face ridiculous… We need our crime reporters to ask more critical questions but it’s like a Stockholm syndrome. They spend most of their lives in the police station and the commissioner’s office, and so they identify with the police. [Bureau Chief #4, Chennai]

3.2.3 Time and space limitations.

All participants commented on the very tight space limitations that reporters are working with when covering a suicide incident: ‘There’s a word limit, 300 or 350 words. Just to describe that event and at least one quote from the police or a neighbour will consume the 350 words’ [Senior Reporter #1, Delhi]. Participants also described the time pressures to report on a suicide quickly: ‘Because of competition to break news we need to verify facts quickly. If we get to know the incident now we have to verify it within 15–20 minutes. There is little scope for error and there is little time’ [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi]. Often this reporting was well before official investigations were complete: ‘It takes at least 24–48 hours for the autopsy. Media reports usually happen before the autopsy is completed. Sometimes we will give a follow-up story after the autopsy is complete’ [Senior Reporter #9, Chennai]. A higher value appeared to be placed on breaking news quickly rather than getting the details of the suicide story right the first time. This occasionally resulted in problems when the post-mortem findings later contradicted the initial media report, resulting in media outlets needing to ‘rectify the story when we get a clearer picture’ [Senior Reporter #10].

3.2.4 Contact with bereaved family.

There was a drive to capture personal impact narratives and information about the incident from bereaved families to engage the audience. Contact details for family members were often being provided to reporters by the police and all participants identified that engagement with bereaved families shortly after the incident was a fraught and unpleasant part of the process of reporting on suicides. Examples were also provided of interviews undertaken with children shortly after the suicides of parents:

In one case, two parents took their life. Who is going to look after the children? I met the children and talked to them. We had some conversation about what happened last night… They were 7 or 8 years old. Total family has been destroyed. They were a high-class family, they had everything.’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi]

Participants identified that many families are scared of the ‘public shaming’ [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi] and social stigma associated with suicide. Participants described how most families request the media not to cover the case and they sometimes try to conceal the facts. A perceived element of concern for families is how they might be portrayed, with the knowledge that the media may ‘report against the family, and other times in favour of the grieving family… the reporting may blame a member of the family for the suicide’ [Senior Reporter # 8, Chennai]. Even though families would request that a suicide is not covered, professionalism and competition was used to justify pursuing the story: ‘As a professional, I can’t stop any story on the request of a family member. If I do not cover my boss will question me and ask why this other newspaper has covered it and not us’ [Senior Reporter #2, Delhi].

By contrast, in some instances, families wanted the suicide to gain media coverage where they were seeking some form of compensation, where they were desperate for answers as to why their loved one killed themselves, or where they wanted to expose some perceived wrongdoing implicated in the suicide: ‘For example, a student committing suicide and the parents want to expose what has happened in the college… then they will want to talk about it so that it doesn’t happen to other students in the same institution’ [Reporter #2, Chennai].

3.2.5 Personal impact of covering suicide.

Participants working on the crime beat discussed having become emotionally disengaged and indifferent to some of the sad suicide incidents that they were covering. It was articulated that such stories were a routine part of their day-to-day professional job, and that they had become emotionally disengaged and indifferent:

Have we become insensitive? This is something that we [crime journalists] happen to discuss over drinks sometimes… So now if I get a message at 9pm, at the end of a long day, that a guy has suicided by jumping off a building my first reaction is now ‘why the fuck did he have to do this at 8pm in the evening? he could have done it in the morning’. I’m not meaning to be insensitive; I’m just being frank. Each day we have to write 6 or 7 reports for different crimes… No one taught us to emotionally disengage to the stories, but it is probably a normal human response. The thing is, I used to be a naïve person, a very sensitive person. I don’t know how I ended up being a crime reporter and becoming so indifferent. [Reporter #4, Chennai]

However, in contrast to this notion of having become emotionally numb to such incidents, most participants did report that ‘sometimes it is very emotional’ [Editor #5, Chennai] and that they occasionally experienced distress and emotional involvement in the suicide report. Participants described feeling disturbed, guilty, angry, shaken, and scared: ‘Sometimes the incidents are very bone chilling and they affect you mentally and psychologically… There was one time I couldn’t sleep for two or three days because I was scared of sleeping alone after covering a suicide’ [Senior Reporter #4, Delhi].

3.3.1 Emergence of health reporting on suicide.

In strong contrast to the routine incident-report approach of crime reporters, many health reporters and editorial-level media professionals talked about the recent shift to introducing some coverage on suicide as a public health issue. The health reporter angle involved looking at trends and broader social and psychological causes, including bringing in discussion around depression, tension, mental health policies and programs and the prevention of suicide:

The health reporter’s perspective is fairly recent in India. Traditionally it is considered a crime-based story… In the last five years, we have also started reporting on suicide from a public health perspective. More people are trying to analyse it and find out the trends and the causes, this is mostly only happening in the English-language media, not the vernacular media. Crime journalists will still report the individual cases. [Senior Reporter #1, Delhi]

Some health reporters lamented the sensationalism of the dominant crime reporter approach to the coverage of suicide news:

I’m not reporting on the fire, I’m reporting on what caused the fire. That’s what I wish more journalists would do. We’re all seeking the sensation that telling you about a suicide will get. I find that very disappointing. The way I understand my profession as a health reporter, it is to seek the broader reasons why these things are happening. [Editor #3, Delhi]

3.3.2 Complexities around a mental health framing of suicide.

Many participants talked about how most suicide reporting in India does not draw links with mental illness as a contributing factor to suicide. Depression and its link to suicide was identified as ‘something that has been missing from our coverage; I don’t think it’s something we really understand, it is a new conversation’ [Editor #3, Delhi]. Almost all reporters identified that they themselves had limited mental health literacy and that there is a high stigma attached to mental illness that restricts help-seeking and prevents more open reporting on the topic. As articulated by one editor:

In India, depression is a silent killer, it is not treated as a disease. People [with depression] have been branded as mentally sick or weak, so they don’t report and are not treated. To be treated for mental sickness is a big taboo in India. As a health reporter, I have written features, you know, there are psychiatrists who have packages of care. But the individual, because of social stigma, people don’t access help. [Editor #2]

Stigmatising attitudes towards suicide was also perceived to be a barrier to writing stories around people who are recovering from suicidal thoughts and behaviour. Similarly, the lack of supply of high-quality mental health professionals was also identified as a barrier to any positive gains that might otherwise emerge from stimulating awareness of mental health services:

suicidal thoughts are actually quite common, and we need more personal stories on this in the media, but for the person sharing their story it puts them under a lot of pressure to say this in public… A lot of people don’t trust counselling. People think they are a waste of time. I think they can help, if you are willing to trust them and they are good. I think the worst possible thing is when you finally go to get help and you get a terrible counsellor or you can’t access a service. We need more and better counsellors. [Reporter #1, Chennai]

Some participants also raised issues around the sociocultural and economic complexity of suicide in India, articulating that structural drivers of suicide are prominent with people facing real and multifaceted challenges that impact on suicide rates. Concerns were raised that shifting to a narrow focus on mental health as a key driver of suicide in India would not do justice to the range of complex societal issues at play:

Suicide raises so many issues. The way depression has been ignored, we’ve also ignored a lot of the social and economic issues surrounding suicide… Like say, the disempowerment of women or a homeless man dying. We should be equally responsible for those deaths to… These are human beings who are facing complex problems. Depression is only talked about when it is a well-to-do person. I happened to cover one report of a young women who had attempted suicide… I’m sure depression was an issue, but so was hunger and poverty. [Editor #3, Delhi]

Finally, it was also articulated that it was hard to generate demand for more writing around suicide prevention, in part because the country’s economic challenges and the enormous population size have meant that preventing suicide hasn’t been a major priority:

Suicide in India is not shaking the social concerns as much as it does in the West. We are overpopulated. One more death doesn’t really shake up people, unless it’s a high-profile thing. In India, we haven’t reached the point of focusing so much on preventing suicide… To us, it is just one more death, it is in the hands of the Gods. [Editor #2, Delhi]