Journalist B N Uniyal was the first to train the spotlight on caste in Indian media, through his piece 'In Search of a Dalit Journalist', which was published in The Pioneer on November 16, 1996. A foreign reporter had asked Uniyal for an introduction to a Dalit journalist. Uniyal realised he did not know one. He analysed 454 caste surnames of 686 journalists accredited by the Press Information Bureau. There was not a single Dalit among them. He called up 47 of the remaining 232 accredited journalists—and still drew a blank. To celebrate the dawn of the new millennium, The Pioneer invited Uniyal to write for its eight-page Dalit supplement. He sent them the 1996 piece with the following addition: “The article…was totally ignored by our journalistic establishment… None felt aghast or alarmed at the situation described in the article.”
Ajaz Ashraf, ‘Bitter pill: Caste in the newsroom’, Mid-Day