Daily Times

Reports about firebrand Indian anchor Arnab Goswani being in possession of secret knowledge about the Modi government’s plans about the Balakot strike ahead of time has opened a can of worms, but it has also confirmed what was already pretty much known in Pakistan. For India has long been in the habit of putting the spotlight on Pakistan whenever the going is not so good at home. And at the time, when BJP was heading into a general election with a broken economy and unprecedented social divisions and unrest, was just such a time. Everybody, at least in this country, expected it to drag Pakistan into the national debate and then let its savage media take over the proceedings.

And the fact that Arnab was caught with his hand in the cookie jar, so to speak, vindicates Pakistan’s suspicions about the matter. India did exactly what it always does. It planned to conduct an illegal violation of Pakistani airspace and fed the information to its more aggressive journalists and anchors to whip up exactly the kind of frenzy that BJP needed to stage a strong show at the polls. And, like every time, it worked like a charm.

Now that this information has come out hopefully the international community will pay more heed to Pakistan’s concerns about Indian designs in the region. It’s a good thing that the Mumbai police found this evidence and then made it public. For Arnab was not only doing his government’s dirty work, he was also cleverly trying to manipulate his own channel’s ratings in order to appear stronger and make more money. This has been his aim all along, and the same can be said of a number of other leading Indian journalists, and it has worked for him for far too long simply because he is always able to stimulate anti-Pakistan sentiment in India and then shamelessly ride that way to yet more fame and riches every time. Yet as the show now comes to a rather shameful end for Arnab, a question that begs an answer is what is going to be done about the trend of which this particular journalist was just one part? It would obviously be asking too much to expect the Indian government to do the right thing, so the best one can do is pin hopes on India’s vibrant civil society. How they take this surgical strike on media integrity will become clear soon enough. *