Kasganj Clashes: Shocking Coverage by Media

On one hand, PM Modi welcomed the ASEAN leaders for India’s 68th Republic Day parade, a parade so grand which would make every Indian proud. On the other hand, the events that took place in Kasganj, Uttar Pradesh on the same day would fill every Indian’s heart with anger.

As the nation woke up on Friday one could see miniature flags being waved everywhere, people wearing a pin of the Indian flag on their clothes, films and songs that salute the valour of our army were being played throughout the day on television and the radio. A normal Republic Day right? Some youths in Uttar Pradesh with a tinge of patriotism ventured on their bikes waving the tricolour and shouting ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’. All was okay until they entered an area dominated by a particular community who took the sloganeering rather un-appreciatingly and hence stones were pelted, and bullets were fired from both the sides. A man identified as Naushad was hit by a bullet in his leg and is currently undergoing treatment in Aligarh. Chandan Gupta, 23, who was a part of the bike rally was shot dead.

The town of Kasganj has been simmering ever since the killing of Chandan and violence erupted after his last rites were conducted. Section 144 has been imposed and a total of 49 arrests has been made till now.

If a youth gets killed for feeling patriotic on the occasion of Republic Day (because this is what all the media reports suggest) – Does it not make your blood boil? However, there are a few people whose blood didn’t boil. They weren’t even angry. Forget boiling of blood and anger, they even went to the extent of rationalizing and justifying the Kasganj carnage and murder. The shameful stance taken by the so-called liberals and the left-leaning media will make you wonder how low their nexus can go just because certain incidents don’t appeal to their crooked moral standards.

This incident (un)surprisingly got very little media coverage. The media coverage was limited to reportage. This thing happened, that one got killed, this one got injured. There were no discussions, debates, tailored trends, emotionally charged reporters darkening TV Screens. Just plain news reporting.

Chandan Gupta was not fortunate enough and Kasganj carnage was not important enough to get the kind of Media coverage that Pehlu Khan got or Akhlaq got or Junaid Khan got.

Media resorted to the same old trick of masking the M-word with “a-particular-community” tag. Since we are an internet media house and depend on Mainstream Media reports for our analyses we have to follow the same wretched trend of not naming the one who cannot be named.

Hindustan Times ran a report like this:-

Look how Chandan suddenly became ‘a man killed’ which was so not in the case of Pehlu Khan. Notice how it’s byline read “when members of a “right-wing organization” had an altercation with members of “another community” while taking out a ‘Tiranga Yatra’ on the occasion of Republic Day.” This is nothing but a desperate attempt to twist the facts and blame it on the right wing. After reading this headline a naïve reader would take Chandan Gupta as a member of one of the many Right-Wing organizations like ABVP or VHP or Bajrang Dal. A naïve reader would consider Chandan Gupta as a sloganeer who may have said certain unpleasant things about a Certain Community.

But guess what, Contrary to the reports, Chandan Gupta was affiliated to none of the organisations that Hindustan Times tried to link him to. And he all sloganeered really was Jai Hind and Vande Mataram. As a matter of fact, Chandan’s parents claimed that their son was forced to shout ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ by some miscreants, which he refused to, upon which he was shot dead.

And it’s not just the media. Opposition leaders who came out in droves for Pehlu Khan were found in their nests when it came to Chandan’s murder. Just because the community he belongs to doesn’t fit their votebank politics. They choose to remain silent. Arvind Kejriwal, Rahul Gandhi, Mamata Banerjee and Sitaram Yechury normally the first ones to shout from rooftops remained deafeningly silent! Secularism is a two-way street, but these leaders seem to have blocked the traffic from one side.

Hartosh Bal, a known Modi baiter and a staunch liberal, even tried to defend the killing of Chandan by alleging that “a rally by ABVP types raised provocative slogans in Muslim majority areas triggering violence.” The attempt to justify Chandan’s murder shows the liberals have no intention to preach secularism but just to absolve one political ideology or a community from all the crimes.

The decision of the Karnataka government to revoke all the cases pertaining to communal violence against the minority community stands as a testament to that. The silence of the media, whenever an RSS worker is killed in Kerala is another example. This just shows to the extent the liberals can fall to defend and twist the narrative.

Reporting of the cold-blooded murder by media outlets like The Hindu is equally shocking. When a Muslim techie was beaten to death allegedly by Hindutva activists over a morphed Facebook post, The Hindu ran a headline “Muslim Techie dies after attack by Hindutva group”. However the same publication quickly turned ‘secular’ and reported the Kasganj violence as “One killed in Kasganj communal clash.” Both the cases should have got the same treatment as both are equally heinous and perpetrators of both the cases must be punished.

Or take a look at the Indian Express

What does it say about their ethics, their journalistic standards?

The Liberal Media that would scream at the top of their lungs about Right to Freedom of Expression, and Intolerance and Secularism and Plurality and what not suddenly go mum when the news piece is against their cabal’s commonly agreed upon norms.

Media and Secular Politicians have made Hindus expendable citizens. People whose agendas can be questioned, their affiliations challenged, and their deaths belittled. Chandan Gupta is the latest victim of Media’s double standards. It’s disgusting, but it is the truth!