Whenever cornered for their visibly anti-national activities, the best excuse that the main stream media comes up with is, “Look, we are also well-wishers of India as well! Even though our ideas for what’s right for India and what’s not may differ, but ultimately we are also part of the same country, on the same side…”
This time, this surely doesn’t look the case!
The kind of reporting done by the Indian Express and NDTV, under the pretext of investigative coverage of the recent Pampore attacks, sings a very different tune.
Exploiting the faux pas by the Northern Command, of claiming share in credits of gunning down the two militants who attacked 40 CRPF officers in a bus, killing 8 and critically injuring 20 others, the newspaper tried its level best to make an “issue” out of the already-embarrassing situation- presumably to stir rife between the two very integral parts of our defense structure; the Army and CRPF.
Their headline read: “Pampore attack: Army, CRPF fought to take credit for terrorist deaths”.
Just below the headlines, it read, “CRPF sources allege that the Army tried to take credit for killing the terrorists…”
Is this the language one should expect from a ‘senior’, “responsible” newspaper, while reporting what was clearly a, although very much avoidable, misunderstanding and lack of communication between two sets of soldiers of our armed forces- with both the sets’ commitment and loyalty to national interest being beyond doubts, unlike that of Indian Express??
Journalism is of two types:
- a) Dry, strictly fact-based reporting, with no personal analysis or tint being lent to it; leaving it upon the audience to interpret the facts in any way they choose to. Although ideal, but this way is hardly followed by anyone today, due to the obvious lack of economic and readership support to it.
- b) With a message, conveyed often implicitly by the choice words and information prioritization by the journalist, editor etc. This is the kind of journalism that everyone does today, and it is okay, as long as the implicit message doesn’t overshadow the very facts and essence of the news.
What kind of message was Indian Express trying to convey? What ‘impact’ was it trying to make- on its readership, on the involved organizations’ personnel, and on everyone else??
Was it trying to inculcate a sense of mistrust among soldiers of military and paramilitary forces? Was it an effort to further dip the morale of over-worked, underpaid and much, much under-thanked defense personnel?
Or was it trying to make the common man insecure, by seeding the thought that when the two premiere security forces of this country are not even sure about who killed a dead terrorist, how could he- the common man- sleep peacefully at night, vesting its confidence and trust in them?
Or was it trying to defame India on the global level- by showing how Indian security forces bicker among themselves like ten-year old kids, over the dead bodies of ‘poor minority-belonging, misguided youth’?? Was it trying to give Pakistan one more question to raise when India would slam on its face the proofs of Pakistani involvement in this attack as well- both directly and indirectly?
A sensible, pro-India journalist and newspaper would have reported factual inconsistency and intra-contention among the CRPF and Indian Army over the ascertaining of Army’s involvement in the operation.
But then that’s not how Indian Express does it, isn’t it??
This is not the only instance of the MSM, and especially Indian Express trying to sow seeds of animosity between different security agencies of the country!
Remember Ishrat-gate (the very same “daughter of Bihar”, who later turned out to be a ‘certified’ LeT terror-operative)? On the basis of mere hearsay that Intelligence Bureau (IB)’s report of Ishrat’s being a terrorist might have been false/erroneous, Indian Express ran a full-fledged campaign to mount pressure over CBI to arrest Rajendra Kumar, the IB officer who alerted Gujarat police about the plan.
At that time, had it not been for the timely and wise intervention of IB chief Asif Ibrahim, by going to PM directly to prevent the arrest, the whole intelligence-gathering framework would have sustained presumably irreparable damage. Had Indian Express’ campaign would have succeeded, with Rajendra Kumar handcuffed for performing his duty, no officer would have gathered intelligence in the fear of later repercussions of it!
And it’s not only Indian Express who stands guilty of trying to demoralize and otherwise create problems for our defense personnel. Their ‘sister’ concern Nehru Dynasty TV is infamous for its poorly-veiled, repeated efforts of trying to pin the blame for the Kashmir and North-East violence and insurgency on the ‘atrocities’ committed by the Army there- namely, going out of its way by trying to modernize the locales and tribal people, assisting them in the events of natural disasters (even if it means thanklessly losing their own brave-heart comrades in the process) and withholding the use of lethal force even in life-threatening situations!
NDTV’s headline on the article covering the CRPF-Army issue read, “Army’s Tweets Reveal Tug-of-War over Who Killed Terrorist in Pampore”.
Surpassing Indian Express, NDTV not only tried to paint a picture of some sort of cold-Civil-War happening between CRPF and Army, but they didn’t stop even there!
Their headline projects, to reader’s mind, the image of dead terrorist as some ‘poor dead corpse’ which is a ‘trophy’ for the “big, bad boys” called Army and CRPF, fighting over ‘claiming the trophy’!
While there are plenty to argue that under the freedom of speech and expression, any news channel is free to interpret and report the news in any way they want, but they forget one very important thing- this freedom is given, maintained and ensured by the Sovereignty of the State of India, by the Constitution of India; and thus the survival of the two is a must condition for us to exercise this freedom, or any other one. If there’s no India, no constitution, no country, where would this obnoxious misuse of the freedom be practiced??
So, for purely selfish reasons, it’s high time the MSM- and especially these two giants of it- do realize the dangers and peril of the path they are on. Let FoE NOT become the very cause behind an eventual end of FoE, by creating the conditions for the collapse of the very institution which sustains FoE!!!!
Mailed to us by:Mrinaal Prem Swarroop Srivastava
