THE recent 100-hours of active hostilities between India and Pakistan was also the occasion for a hysterical media circus which saw all principles and ethics thrown out of the windows, to be replaced by wild and deranged claims, even wilder advice on military tactics, and euphoric celebrations that hardly resonated with most of the befuddled viewers. Presumably, the same must have been happening in Pakistan.

It all started on April 22, when Pakistan backed terrorists killed 26 tourists in Pahalgam shocking the world with its barbarity. The Modi government caught unawares, immediately vowed revenge. In the following two weeks, the media assiduously reported on various high level meetings between the political leadership and the military brass and other security related echelons, indicating that India’s retaliation was in the offing. India put the Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance, cancelled visas to Pakistanis, and closed the Attari border while Pakistan announced corresponding measures.

The media whipped up the expectation and anticipation breathlessly. The tragedies of each family that had suffered a lost loved one in the attack were narrated to hammer home the point. So much so that when a young newly married woman who lost her husband in the attack asked that Muslims and Kashmiris should not be blamed for it, she suffered merciless trolling on social media by the so-called ‘patriotic’ and ‘nationalist’ operatives. The government of course played along with the build-up. Every meeting of top brass was reported by enthusiastic reporters, waiting for some “breaking news”. In the end, as it turned out, the media had no clue to the government’s plans.

Then, on the night of May 6-7, Operation Sindoor was launched in the form of missile attacks on nine locations in Pakistan and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir which were designated as terrorist bases. The next four days saw increasing levels of armed exchanges but shrouded in the usual fog of claims and counter claims. There were, reportedly, missile attacks, dogfights between aircrafts, drone attacks, use of cruise and loitering munitions, conventional shelling across borders and, tragically, more loss of life. It all ended, rather anti-climactically, on the evening of May 10, when a complete ceasefire was announced by both the countries, and also by the US President Donald Trump, indicating their mediation role.

This is the phase in which the mainstream media lost all control and went off the page. Indian viewers are used to drama and hyperbole in the so-called ‘news’ channels. In fact, many viewers treat them more as entertainment and less as sources of serious news. But what was on display was unprecedented. Within a day, the media was declaring that Islamabad had been captured, that Karachi port had been destroyed, that there had been a coup in the Pakistani Army and its chief, General Asim Munir had been arrested, that Quetta had been overrun by armed militants, and so on. All of these specific items were false and it is not known how the media got to them.

Of course, don’t forget that the media landscape in India is highly competitive. If one TV channel announces some event, others have to make up and go further. It is a race to the bottom. There are 912 satellite TV channels available in India as per the latest Annual Report of the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting. Of these 396 are news channels. That’s 43 per cent of all channels. According to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), out of approximately 32 crore households in India, around 18.2 crore have access to television sets. Among the homes with TV access, around 17 crore are connected to either cable or DTH services. What these numbers tell us is that the reach of television is massive. The messages beamed out day and night through these channels directly into crores of homes are shaping and moulding the thoughts and beliefs at an unimaginable scale.

The most notable thing about this was the complete silence of the Modi government on the patently false ‘news’ being dished out by the TV channels. This is the same government which blocked the website of the online news platform The Wire on May 9. The Internet Service Providers were ordered by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (under the IT Act, 2000) to block the site, according to The Wire’s official tweet. Later it transpired that the government had taken objection to an article which suggested that a Rafale aircraft belonging to the Indian Air Force had been shot down by Pakistan during the hostilities. The Wire was subsequently – and belatedly – informed about this. The Wire decided to take the article down from its website after which the site was unblocked. The whole sordid episode showed how the government was micromanaging the narrative in the media to ensure that it remained in its favour. If that is the case, then it is quite possible to believe that the false news spread by various TV channels and newspapers had the approval of the government.

Compared to this legacy media, the omnipresent social media had gone a hundred steps ahead. The dimensions of this landscape need to be recalled: India has the highest number of Facebook users globally, with nearly 38 crore users as of 2024 according to market research estimates. Whatsapp, which is a messaging service, had an estimated 53 crore monthly active users in India in 2023 which was projected to reach a staggering 80 crore by 2025. As per available data, there are over 70 crore smartphone users in India. That means that they can access Facebook, Whatsapp and other internet-based platforms on their own phones anytime, anywhere. The RSS/BJP and all its associated organisations/groups/individuals have a significant presence in this universe, under the patronage of the central and state governments run by the BJP. Not only were the fake news clips from TV channels amplified and propagated by the thousands or lakhs of Sangh Parivar associates but supporters added their own two bits freely and fearlessly. Clips of video games, Gaza, Ukraine and even plane crashes in US were found posted with captions claiming they were from Indian actions in its holy war against Pakistan. Social media accounts actively incited hatred against the minority community within India thus revealing the not-so-hidden link between hyper nationalism and bigotry that RSS/BJP espouses. While the government was trying to impress the international audience and especially Saudi and Gulf States by deputing Col. Sophia Qureshi as one of the spokespersons in daily briefings, the party and its associates were spewing venom against the minority community through thousands of social media posts.

Again, it must be noted that the government must be complicit in some way in this eruption of disinformation and hate on social media. After all, the government’s own fact checkers located in the Press Information Bureau (PIB) had been working overtime catching each Pakistani fake news or posts (yes, they too were posting old images of fires/explosions in Moscow, or in Indonesia, or Kabul, as Pakistani actions in India, among other things). The government asked X to block 8000 accounts including those of well-known Kashmiri journalists, and others. It also blocked some Youtube channels like that of 4PM, a Hindi news channel on Youtube, known for its critical content. The Ministry of Information & Broadcasting had sent official notice on May 8 to all OTT platforms, media streaming platforms and intermediaries, saying that under IT Rules 2021, they were prohibited from “carrying content having its origin in Pakistan” and further, that they had to make “reasonable efforts” to not “host, display, upload, modify, publish, transmit, store, update or share” any information that “threatens the unity, integrity, defence, security or sovereignty of India, friendly relations with foreign States, or public order”. All of this would apply to the incendiary posts and fake news propagated with impunity by TV channels and various social media platforms. But no inflammatory or untrue material directed against Pakistan or the minority community was ever picked up or acted against by any government agency, at the central level or in the states. In fact, in BJP ruled states like Tripura, the law was used to target the Left and the minority community only.

The ceasefire announcement – first by US President Trump, then by India and Pakistan – left the corporate media and the legion of RSS/BJP social media foot soldiers bewildered and adrift. The hysteria and the fantasies of seizing back Pakistan Occupied Kashmir or flattening Rawalpindi and Karachi suddenly evaporated. One day was occupied in reporting on Pakistani violations of ceasefire but the Modi government had committed to the course so everybody finally, reluctantly fell in line. The troll army of RSS/BJP couldn’t criticise the top leaders so it turned on Vikram Misri, the spokesperson of Ministry of External Affairs who had been anchoring the daily news briefings. However, the misgivings about allowing a third party (the US) to reportedly mediate and force a ceasefire, and the obvious reality of an end to the intoxication of war have left many full of resentment. Both these were sought to be assuaged by the PM’s address to the nation which was full of rhetoric and triumphalism. However, the seeds of hatred sowed by the RSS/BJP and its associates will continue to be fostered – unless countered by a strong secular response that builds unity of the people.