Daily Times

Cyril Almeida has become the tempting bone over which ravenous Indian media studios have fallen over like hungry wolves of the arctic. Each one is trying to get as much of the prize as possible. Even those who were until not long ago sober, less inclined to sensation and melodrama, had less appetite for such items, are competing with the rest in order to be not left behind in the claims on patriotism. At times when patriotism means money, it is silly to be an uptight professional. The bone is dangling in front of them to grab and raise their status as patriotic Indians, who can go to any length in order to cut the enemy to size. Even if that comes to suckling up to hollow stories, which, if anything, expose the absence of holding up their own journalism to a standard that they are subjecting the enemies to.

It does not seem to occur to anyone of them whether they are capable of, or have the courage to do a similar scoop in India. Imagine an Indian journalist picking things from a meeting of Narendra Modi and his key ministers in the presence of the top command of the army, and then releasing to a widely read national newspaper. Except for sharing file photos and carefully leaked information, a typical Indian journalist’s brief does not cross the limits either imposed by what Foucault term the rigid boundaries of governmentality or lines sketched by censorship arising from within. It is anybody’s guess what might happen to a journalist who brings out news from a defence committee in India to the effect that the surgical strike is manufactured as a poll gimmick and one designed to help the premier to live up to his rhetoric that pushed him to the highest chair of country. And then, worse, stand by it.

No doubt, the move to put the writer on the Exit Control List (ECL) and create unnecessary fear among other journalists is ill-advised but the holier-than-thou attitude demonstrated in the Indian journalese is nothing short of ridiculous. First, the flagging of Cyril Almeida as some kind of an intelligence mole who has put national security on risk is amusing, and reflects insecurity that only nations lacking self-confidence show in times of crisis. The decision against a staff reporter of Dawn ill-harmonises with the values of the founder of that newspaper and the nation. At best, the story should have been taken in one’s stride as do all nations that believe that national institutions and security are not so weak and porous as to be penetrated by a news item, no matter how high profile or serious. The report was as good as over when the PM’s office had denied the report and the reporter had stood by the same.

By denying the report on one hand and putting the person on ECL, only the faultlines between civil and military institutions have been magnified. Besides, the alarming decision forged a bone and passed that to warrior-journalists in India to beat Pakistan with at home, abroad and in TV studios. And American spokesmen grilled by Russian and other journalists about ISIS and Al-Nusra find this bone useful to get a breather from the hell-hole of the Middle-East. With global scales being inclined towards India, even a bone-let comes handy to put Pakistan in its place.

Meanwhile, circus masters in Indian studios are busy digging details about Almeida, filling the eyes of audience with information about the ancestors of the reporter. Probably advising him to go to the ancestral ground of Goa if it gets too hot across the border. The news item has been played up as part of the package of ‘Surgical Strikes’. (Internally knowing well that the latter is nom de guerre of the ‘Save Modi’ campaign). Each move made in panic in Pakistan is patriotically interpreted as a fallout of the historic surgical strikes. The hysteria matches well with the thrilling news of ECL. It is conveniently forgotten that an entire media blackout prevails in Kashmir over the past three months since the native rebel Burhan Wani was killed in what the Indian forces claim to be an encounter.

No text messages, no news channels from Pakistan, no local channels, no internet, and withholding advertisements from newspapers that are barely associated with the rebels. Except post-paid calling services and landline broadband, most of the communication lines are dead, all of which is done to stop assemblies in Kashmir and the inflow and outflow of news from and toward Kashmir. All of that in the backdrop of an ongoing year that the New York Times correspondent Ellen Barry has described as the “year of the dead eyes.” Eyes of young boys as old as 12 have been pierced out by ball-bearing shaped, high velocity pellets. To debate Almeida and score media freedom points against a backdrop of enforced silence on readers and reading material in Kashmir is to befool the international community, and enclose oneself away from a haunting reality. A few years ago, in the time of somewhat calmer Congress, a prominent editor from Kashmir upon asking about the ban on advertisements in his newspaper, was directed that he should solicit advertisements from Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad, a clear message that he has to either fall in line or shut his newspaper. Not many days ago, the unofficial but very popular newspaper Kashmir Reader was banned for “inciting trouble.” The newspaper carried news items that were ignored by other newspapers.

The contrast between the urge to play up Almeida and cover up the strangulation of media at home is reflective of over-patriotic journalism, one bordering on jingoism. While almost the whole of journalistic community, and even political parties, came to the aid of Dawn staff reporter, there is almost no one in India who can speak for media empowerment at home or in Kashmir. The sermons are meant for others, while silence is routine at home. Any person daring to speak for freedom of media is immediately subjected to the test of patriotism, and the sword of sedition is hung over his head. Cyril Almeida is another bone on which patriotism of Indians is tested. Say that he proves Pakistan curbs media freedom and you are a good Indian, call him the symbol of media freedom you will wake up to lampoon, and possibly, if stars are ill-aligned, sedition. Instead of making Cyril Alemida a weapon to demonise the Other, he has to be made an instrument to stop journalism, in both countries, from becoming a subset of the Ministry of Truth in Orwell’s dystopic 1984.

The writer is a columnist, author, and lecturer at the University of Kashmir, Srinagar. He can be reached at javjnu@gmail.com