Introduction: the illusion of plural expertise
Turn on prime time news or open the opinion pages of major Indian publications on any given day. Whether the topic is China, unemployment, electoral bonds, Kashmir, farm laws, or Middle East geopolitics, a familiar set of names appears again and again. They are introduced as “policy experts”, “strategic affairs analysts”, or “economists”. Their quotes sound authoritative, data-driven, and ideologically neutral.
But scratch the surface and a pattern emerges. A surprisingly small circle of experts dominates political commentary across Indian media. Many of them hold overlapping affiliations with think tanks, consulting firms, corporate boards, government advisory roles, or political foundations. These institutional interests are rarely disclosed to readers.
This article examines why Indian political journalism increasingly relies on the same 10 to 15 expert voices, how their institutional positions shape narratives in subtle but powerful ways, and why the absence of disclosure creates an invisible layer of framing that most audiences never see.
This is not an argument against expertise. It is an argument against unexamined authority.
The rise of the permanent expert class
Indian newsrooms today operate under intense structural pressure. According to the Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2024, Indian media faces declining newsroom staff, shrinking budgets, and relentless demand for 24x7 content across television, web, and social platforms.
Original reporting is expensive. Expert commentary is cheap, fast, and scalable.
A senior editor at a national English daily told Newslaundry in 2023 that one op-ed by a known expert “does the work of three reporters” because it provides explanation, interpretation, and opinion in one package. This logic explains the emergence of a permanent expert class.
These experts share three characteristics:
- High availability. They respond quickly to media requests.
- Media fluency. They speak in soundbites and write clean copy.
- Institutional backing. Their affiliations provide perceived credibility.
Over time, newsrooms build a trusted Rolodex. The same voices get repeated. New or dissenting perspectives struggle to enter.
Mapping the ecosystem: think tanks, consultancies, and corporates
India’s policy ecosystem has expanded dramatically in the last two decades. Think tanks like the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), Vivekananda International Foundation (VIF), Centre for Policy Research (CPR), Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), and Gateway House regularly place fellows on television panels and op-ed pages.
At the same time, global consultancies such as McKinsey, BCG, EY, and KPMG produce policy-facing reports that are quoted as neutral analysis. Corporate-funded foundations and CSR-backed research units have entered the public discourse space.
What is less visible is how tightly interconnected these institutions are.
A 2022 study by the University of Pennsylvania’s Think Tanks and Civil Societies Program notes that many Indian think tanks rely on government contracts, corporate donors, or foreign foundations, often simultaneously.
Yet when experts affiliated with these institutions comment on news, their funding structures and advisory roles are rarely mentioned.
Case study: foreign policy commentary and strategic consensus
Indian foreign policy coverage offers one of the clearest examples.
During periods of heightened India-China tension, such as the Galwan clashes and subsequent disengagement talks, Indian television debates frequently featured the same strategic analysts from a handful of institutions. Many of these experts have close ties to government advisory bodies or defense-linked research organizations.
Their analysis often converged on similar frames:
- India must project strength
- Diplomatic restraint equals weakness
- Economic decoupling is inevitable
Alternative perspectives, such as economic interdependence risks or escalation costs, were underrepresented.
This is not necessarily because dissenting experts do not exist. It is because the media repeatedly turns to institutions that already align with dominant strategic narratives.
As media scholar Srinath Raghavan has written, strategic consensus is often manufactured not through censorship, but through selective amplification.
The economy explained by the same voices
Economic reporting shows a similar pattern.
Coverage of unemployment data, GDP revisions, or fiscal policy frequently relies on economists affiliated with corporate consultancies, investment banks, or industry-linked think tanks.
For example, commentary on India’s post-pandemic recovery in 2022 and 2023 often leaned heavily on optimistic projections from private sector economists, while labor economists and informal sector researchers received limited airtime.
When the Periodic Labour Force Survey data showed persistent employment stress, several mainstream outlets framed it as a “data interpretation issue” rather than a structural problem. The experts cited often worked with organizations that advise corporate clients on investment strategy.
This does not make their analysis invalid. But the absence of affiliation disclosure prevents readers from contextualizing incentives.
How undisclosed interests shape framing
The most powerful influence of expert outsourcing is not overt propaganda. It is framing.
Framing works by defining:
- What counts as a problem
- Which solutions are thinkable
- What trade-offs are emphasized
An expert affiliated with a defense think tank is more likely to frame geopolitical tensions as security challenges than economic risks. An expert from a corporate consultancy may frame regulatory reform as efficiency rather than accountability.
These frames become normalized through repetition.
As communication theorist Robert Entman explains, framing becomes invisible when it aligns with elite consensus. Readers rarely notice what is missing.
The disclosure gap in Indian journalism
Internationally, many publications require disclosure of conflicts of interest. The New York Times and The Guardian routinely mention if an op-ed author consults for industry or holds advisory roles.
In India, such disclosures are inconsistent at best.
A review of opinion articles across five major Indian outlets conducted by The Wire in 2021 found that fewer than 15 percent of op-eds by policy experts included full institutional disclosures.
Television debates fare even worse. Panelists are introduced by designation, not funding sources.
This gap is partly cultural. Indian journalism historically placed trust in elite institutions. But as the policy ecosystem has commercialized, the old norms no longer suffice.
Why newsrooms accept the risk
Editors are not unaware of these issues. So why does the practice continue?
Several structural reasons dominate:
- Time pressure. Disclosure requires research and verification.
- Legal caution. Outlets fear defamation claims.
- Access dependency. Challenging expert neutrality can jeopardize relationships.
- Audience assumptions. Editors assume readers do not care.
In an era of shrinking margins, convenience often wins over rigor.
The democratic cost: narrowing the Overton window
The cumulative effect is a narrowing of the Overton window.
Certain policy positions appear reasonable and inevitable. Others seem radical or fringe, not because of evidence, but because they lack expert amplification.
This has democratic consequences.
When public debate is mediated by a small, interconnected expert class, citizens are deprived of genuine pluralism. Media becomes a relay system rather than a contest of ideas.
This is especially dangerous in a country as diverse and unequal as India, where policy outcomes affect vastly different lived realities.
What readers can do: practical literacy tools
Media literacy cannot rely solely on newsroom reform. Readers must develop their own filters.
Here are concrete practices:
- Track expert repetition. Notice how often the same names appear across outlets.
- Look up affiliations. A two-minute LinkedIn or institutional bio search often reveals funding links.
- Compare coverage. See how different outlets frame the same story.
- Ask what is missing. Which voices are absent and why.
Platforms that analyze narrative patterns across sources, such as tools like The Balanced News, can help surface these invisible consistencies by comparing how different outlets use the same experts and frames. Used critically, such tools augment rather than replace judgment.
The responsibility of think tanks themselves
Think tanks are not passive actors. They actively court media visibility.
Many institutions now include “media outreach” as a performance metric. Scholars are incentivized to produce commentary aligned with institutional priorities.
Greater transparency would benefit them as well. Clear disclosure builds trust and protects intellectual credibility.
Some Indian think tanks have begun publishing donor lists, but this practice remains uneven and often buried deep in annual reports.
Toward a healthier expert ecosystem
Fixing this problem does not require banning experts or demonizing institutions.
It requires three reforms:
- Mandatory disclosure norms across media formats
- Expert diversity audits within newsrooms
- Audience-facing context tools that make affiliations visible
International examples show this is possible. ProPublica’s approach to sourcing and disclosure offers one model.
In India, independent media literacy initiatives and research platforms are beginning to experiment with bias detection, source mapping, and narrative comparison. Again, tools like The Balanced News are one example of how technology can surface patterns that are otherwise hard to see, without telling readers what to think.
Conclusion: expertise without opacity
Expertise is essential in a complex world. But expertise without transparency is power without accountability.
When Indian political news is filtered through a small, undisclosed network of institutional interests, democracy suffers quietly. Not through censorship, but through consensus masquerading as neutrality.
The task ahead is not to reject experts, but to demand context. Only then can readers see the full picture and make informed judgments.
The future of Indian media literacy depends not on louder debates, but on clearer sight.
Originally published on The Balanced News
Originally published on The Balanced News
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