Is media freedom being strangled across Commonwealth countries? That is the subject is a debate next week at Portcullis House in Westminster.

The event, organised by the Commonwealth Journalists Association (UK), why journalists are not better protected and media laws being ignored in many countries around the world.
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Amit Rajp is a first-time author. He has a background in academic research and teaching in Birmingham. This is an excerpt from his book: ‘My Name Is Baljit But You Can Call Me Gary: The Alternative Guide To Indian Culture’

What is the fixation that mums, aunties, nans (nannijis), and grans (bibijis) have with plastic containers? It’s like Asian women have an addiction to plastic Tupperware!

The person that sets up the first ‘Tupperware Addiction Clinic’ for Asian women is going to make a lot of money – probably some Asian guy who will acquire a forged certificate from India.
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Internet entrepreneur Lopa Patel, who founded the website Redhotcurry.com, is being awarded an MBE by the Queen, according to the Birthday Honours List 2009. The MBE will be for her services to the creative industries.

She said: “For me it marks that start of a new chapter in giving back to business and the community. Expectations among my family and friends are high – I know that they are looking to see what I can do next in raising the profile of the Asian community in Britain, getting more women-owned businesses off the ground and in helping young Asians feel proud to be British.”

Over the next few weeks & months you can read about a group of young men who decided in the early 1980’s to try and make an impact, and for one night only. You can follow the lives of: The Sultans of Soul.

by Ravi Mangat
Writer

[Earlier chapters: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8]

6a.m. The alarm clock had failed to wake Raj, so Malkit was now calling out to him. Raj opened his eyes and smiled. The night before had been a great revelation and somewhere deep inside of him he felt as if he might finally have some purpose in his life. As he showered and changed, he sang a few of the soul songs that the guys and Bernie had been playing until 2a.m. When he came downstairs he saw Malkit with a big smile on his face. It seemed as if they both had something they were happy about.

“So, how did it go?” asked Malkit expectantly.

“Great, really great”.

“Really?” Malkit was surprised. He had expected a completely different reaction, especially as he had asked Bernie to ruin the equipment. “And the equipment, did it work okay?”
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The prestigious One World Media Awards – regarded as the ‘Oscars’ of factual broadcasting and journalism – will celebrate its 21st anniversary at this year’s ceremony on Monday 22nd June 2009.

Among nominees for the prestigious Broadcast Journalist of the Year award are Nadene Ghouri, which AIM previously profiled here, and the BBC’s Mukul Devichand.

The 12 award categories recognise excellence in coverage of the developing world.
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So the BNP has won a couple of seats and the radio phone-ins are in melt down. I have listened to at least two phone-ins on the BBC, and it was interesting to hear the reactions.

Some seemed surprised at the win and some were angry. Most of the callers were slightly embarrassed and some were offering reasons. And there were those who have voted BNP and were eager to tell us why.
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As part of the GG2 Leadership & Diversity Awards Dinner 2009, the Asian Media and Marketing Group (AMG) are launching a hunt to find the country’s best young journalist from an ethnic minority background. The only criteria other than ability and talent is that they must be under the age of 30.

So if you know of a young talented journalist who deserves to be recognized, please nominate and help inspire the next generation of young journalists. The winner will receive a bursary cheque of £500 from the Daily Mail and will have the chance, if appropriate, of a week’s work experience on the newspaper. Closing date is Friday July 24th 2009.
Email: Minaxi Mistry / More info: GG2 Awards

by Imran Ahmad
Author

I have always felt that Britain has remained remarkably tolerant despite the shock of the July 7th terrorist attacks in London, and the continuing provocation from some elements. But I wasn’t sure the same was the case for the United States.

For example there was a dreadful incident on this year’s New Year’s Day when nine Muslims – including three young children, and all US citizens – were removed from a domestic flight because two of them were overheard discussing where was the safest place to sit on an airplane.

A few weeks later, I was reclining on my sofa, watching President Obama’s inauguration speech in January – in which he mentioned a new era of ‘mutual respect’ between America and the Muslim world. I thought: ‘I can do that!’
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Eastenders is planning to spice up the plotline revolving its only Asian / Muslim family with a gay twist.

The BBC soap’s producers said today that the storyline would be a, “traditional love affair, albeit with a modern multicultural twist”.
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The annual Muslim Writers Award takes place this week in London. Nominations for its presitigious journalism prize include writers Ziauddin Sardar, Faisal al Yafai and Kia Abdullah.

Organisers have announced a partnership with publishers group Penguin Group.
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Over the next few weeks & months you can read about a group of young men who decided in the early 1980’s to try and make an impact, and for one night only. You can follow the lives of: The Sultans of Soul.

by Ravi Mangat
Writer

[Earlier chapters: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7]

When Detective Harris saw the Ford Cortina turn around and head back towards the garage, he decided he wasn’t going to follow any longer. After all, there was a particularly good documentary about the life of a cockroach that he wanted to watch and he had already missed it once.

Ramesh was apologising as the guys pulled up outside the garage. He was sure he must have dropped his keys and as his roommate Jagpal was probably out at the disco, then there was nothing to do but go back and re-trace his steps. As the guys stepped out of the car, Jas instantly told them to keep quiet. “Listen”, he said placing a finger to his lips. For a few seconds there was nothing, but then they all heard it at once. There was the sound of music coming from the garage. “I switched everything off. I’m sure of it”.

They walked slowly down the alley running by the side of the garage. They could see that the door had been forced open. “Maybe we should call the police”, whispered Ramesh.
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The Guardian Newspaper has ended the fortnightly column of its sole regular Muslim columnist. Noorjehan Barmania (pictured) started writing for the paper in August 2007 for a special series called ‘This Muslim Life‘, for its G2 supplement.

It was positioned as a light hearted take on a woman “searching for her place in British society”.
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Susheel Kumar is part of an award-winning comedy series that could become the next Goodness Gracious Me. He is also acting in a new theatre production with a decidedly twisted storyline. He talks to AIM magazine about his journey through the industry.

You were recently in the BBC Radio show Fags, Mags and Bags – tell us a bit more

It’s a comedy that was written for Radio 4 and is set in a town just outside Glasgow in a cornershop. It focuses around Ramesh played by Sanjeev Kholi his sidekick Dave and his two sons Alok and Sanjay (Sanjay being the stroppy teenager and Alok, as Ramesh describes him ‘the self appointed Richard Branstons’). It’s not your typical Asian comedy, the humor really transfers well across the board. The show scooped the prize for Best Radio Comedy at the 2008 Writers’ Guild of Great Britain Awards which was a great achievement.

It features some familiar faces and voices in Scottish comedy as well as a guest spot from Nina Wadia. We’ve got a 3rd series on the way later in the year, so expect more mayhem!
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A BBC scheme to develop a diverse talent pool of journalists ends next week.

The BBC Journalism Talent Pool is designed to speed the recruitment of journalists by finding and assessing talented people from a range of backgrounds in advance of vacancies.
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The critically acclaimed band Asian Dub Foundation have announced their first UK tour in year – with a particular focus on attacking the BNP. (dates & video below)
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The BBC has been criticised for ignoring British Sikhs by an organisation monitoring its output.

The Network of Sikh Organisations says the corporation needed to take “urgent steps” to rectify the problem and ensure it covered all religious communities in Britain fairly.

The group cited two recent instances when Sikhs were excluded from BBC programmes.
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The 2009 Satyajit Ray Short Film Competition was won by Nikesh Shukla (Yam Boy) and Laura Taflinger for their film The Great Identity Swindle, it was announced last week.

“It fuses perfectly the mediums of poetry, cinema, comic books and music resulting in a hilarious study of Asian culture in contemporary Britain. I feel I learnt more about this protagonist’s life in sixty seconds than I do at the end of most Hollywood blockbusters,” said one of the judges.

The one-minute short is part of moti roti’s 60 x 60 project, where established and emerging artists from the South Asian Diaspora – twenty each from Britain, India and Pakistan – present their personal perspective on what ‘home and boundaries’ mean to them.

Writer and producer Farrukh Dhondy (far right) spoke at the launch for the new publishing company Revenge Ink last week in central London. The company is publishing two debut books by its founder, The Armageddon Mandala by Gopal Mukerjee, and Ugly Duckling by Amita Mukerjee.

“Revenge Ink is a small, idealistic publishing house for the post-modern age, when more people are writing than reading (about their lives on the Internet), when they are more eager to turn themselves into characters through their blogs and Facebook pages rather than turn to fiction for just such a specialised art,” said Ms Amita Mukerjee.
www.revengeink.com

Over the next few weeks/months, you can read about a group of young men who decided in the early 1980’s to try and make an impact…and for one night only…you can follow the lives of: The Sultans of Soul.

by Ravi Mangat
Writer

[Earlier chapters: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6]

Ashok had been true to his word and had found an unused lock-up garage that his friend was allowing him to use. It was quite a fair size and although the lighting was quite dim, it was enough for the guys to get by. Raj had just finished setting up the equipment when Ramesh walked in hurriedly and almost tripped over some cabling.

“Hey, what’s the rush?” asked Ashok.

“It was hard to find this place. It’s not exactly what I would call convenient”, Ramesh was almost out of breath.

“It’s free…so it’s convenient”, retorted Ashok. “Have you been running or something?”

“I’ve never been here before and there’s a lot of dodgy looking people out there”.

“And that’s just the women”, Ashok said with a smile. “Relax man…you’re with me now, so it’s cool”.
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The Council of Europe has launched a new campaign to challenge ethnic and race-based discrimination across its member states.

The Strasbourg, France, based organisation is comprised of 47 member countries across Europe and has already launched ad campaigns across various countries.

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After his career was shattered by a massive head injury and memory loss, Irshad Ashraf began a recovery that is coming to fruition this month.
Nominated for next month’s Penguin muslim writers awards for his story The Drowners, his photography exhibition No Pork features abstract depictions of New York.

The Exhibition opens on May 18 in London. A film he made for The South Bank Show, with Melvyn Bragg, transmits in May.
To attend, email: vulvana.williams@irshad.tv.
www.irshad.tv

The BBC’s Tamil service, BBC Tamilosai, has launched a special 10-day morning news programme to cover the increasing interest and flow of news out of the situation in Sri Lanka. It will also concentrate on the Indian General Election.
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BBC Radio has launched a new service combining all its Asian programming across the country as one weekly podcast.

Desi Download is a new weekly service, presented by actor Kulvinder Ghir, which takes snippets from Asian programmes across local BBC Radio stations. It is being billed as a half-hour ‘pick of the week’ featuring community Asian programming.
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The BBC made its widely expected announcement yesterday that Channel 4 commissioner Aaqil Ahmed had been appointed its new head of religion.

He will become the corporation’s first Muslim to occupy the post, and the second appointee ever from a non-Christian background.

The decision is also likely to trigger a crisis at Channel 4, where he was recently appointed head of multicultural programming. There he had a ringfenced budget of £2 million to commission prime-time programming aimed at a diverse audience.
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With India’s 15th General Election currently underway, political anthropologist Dr Mukulika Banerjee of University College London sets out to discover how the country manages to defy apparently insuperable odds to deliver an efficient and effective democratic process that is admired across the world.
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