Literary & Journalistic Style

Headlines drop articles and often use the present

French news headlines conventionally use the présent even for events that already happened, for a sense of immediacy — a 'headline present' that gives the story more urgency than the grammatically accurate passé composé would. Full articles then typically switch to the passé composé or the conditionnel (for unconfirmed reports) once they move past the headline. Malayalam newspaper headlines use the same trick: a headline reads രാഷ്ട്രപതി പരിഷ്കാരം പ്രഖ്യാപിക്കുന്നു ('President announces reform', present tense) even though the announcement already happened, while the body of the article switches to the completed past tense പ്രഖ്യാപിച്ചു ('announced') to narrate it properly.