The Dual Role of Media in Indo-Pak Peace Process From “Aman ki Asha” to “Propaganda Warfare”

Fizza Batool

Submitted to Sir Moonis Ahmer

October 4, 2013

Department of International Relation

University of Karachi

Ross Howard called media “the double-edged sword” as it can be a dreadful tool of

violence and a very worthwhile instrument of peace, depending on how it processes the

information and how it delivers it to the audience.1 History, however, seems to show just one

blade of this sword – the negative manipulation of public sentiments by proselytizing messages

of fanaticism, racism, and chauvinism and by propagating misinformation by print and electronic

media. It was media that propagated anti-semetism among German population before holocaust.2

It was also media that led to ethno-religious massacre of Muslims in Bosnia3 and ethnic slaughter

of Tutsi in Rwanda.4 Even today, media is being criticized for spreading hatred against refugees,

immigrants, and minorities.5 However, the stories of responsible role of media in propagating

peace and stability are hard to find and it appears that this role was under neglect by both

practitioners and researchers.

The purpose of this writing is to highlight this neglected role of media in the context of

Pakistan and India and to see how this shifting of role from peace lover to war monger by the

Pakistani and Indian media has affected the peace process of the region. My main argument in

this paper is that the media in both countries has not yet accepted their peace promoting

responsibility despite some initiative on paper. Media is playing a dual role as, on one hand, it is

making alliances and getting foreign funds for establishing peace through preparing friendly

environment for formal peace talks and, on the other hand, it is busy in its sensational reporting

to promote hatred against the neighboring country.

Much has been said in the literature about the role of media in promoting conflict and

wars where it was identified that media is being controlled by any of the party of conflicts to gain

public support for their objective.6 However, quite recently, peace scholars realized the

importance of the role of media in fostering peace in any conflict zone and a lot of debate has

been launched in this regard.

Media can influence the peace process in four different ways, as pointed out by

Wolfsfeld. These are:

1. Defining the political atmosphere

2. Devising the nature of debate about the peace process

3. Changing the antagonists’ strategy and behavior

1 Ross Howard, An Operational Framework for Media and Peacebuilding (Vancouver: Institute for Media, Policy

and Civil Society, 2002), 1. 2 William I. Brustein, Roots of Hate: Anti-Semitism in Europe before the Holocaust (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 2003), 12-32. 3 Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and Genocide in Bosnia (London: University of California,

1996), 103. 159. 4 Mark Thompson, Forging war: the media in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Hercegovina (Bedfordshire: University

of Luton, 1999) 209-308. 5 Amir Saeed, "Media, racism and Islamophobia: the representation of Islam and Muslims in the media." Sociology

Compass, Vol. 1, no. 2 (2007): 443-462; Raymond Narin, Frank Pega, Tim McCreanor, Jenny Rankine, and Angela Barnes. "Media, racism and public health psychology." Journal of Health Psychology Vol. 11, no. 2 (2006): 183-

196; Christoph Butterwegge, "Mass media, immigrants and racism in Germany. A contribution to an ongoing

debate." Communications Vol. 21, no. 2 (1996): 203-220. 6 W.A. Hachten, The world news prism: Changing media of international communication (Ames: University of

Iowa Press, 1999).

4. Raising and lowering the public standing and legitimacy of antagonists7

In the case of Pakistan and India, media active in promoting peace has remained focused

only on the first influence. However, not much has been made to change the antagonist’s

behavior or lowing public standing or legitimacy of antagonists. One very good evidence of this

neglect of changing antagonistic behavior and to delegitimize the antagonism is evident in the

objective of “Aman ki Asha,” a peace alliance between daily Jung group of Pakistan and Times

of India group of India, that says “to create an enabling environment to facilitate dialogue

between the governments, encourage people-to-people contacts and thus contribute to bringing

about peace between India and Pakistan.”8 As can be noted, the objective is entirely focused on

environment creation and there is no mentioning of other important roles media can play in this

regard. It seriously devalues the importance of media in peace process.

Another point of concern is the abrupt shift in the role of media at times of clashes. Most

of the activities performed under Aman ki Asha platform are being conducted at times when

there is no serious clash between the two countries. However, at times of crisis, when role of

media ought to be highly positive one, in order to suppress the negative feelings and to counter

the hawkish arguments, media on both sides try to get gains from the situation. People at times of

crisis are emotional and media uses that emotion to gain audience and make business. As put by

Imtiaz Gul, “Media on both sides of the border … live and thrive off a contentious style of

reporting and analysis, at the cost of established journalistic norms that are fast fading in the face

of the quest for breaking news and ratings.”9

For instance, during the recent border clashes between Pakistan and India, the media,

particularly the Indian news media, played a very negative role by exaggerating the situation and

promoting negative sentiments across the borders.10

Even media was found to misinform the

public by making news out of speculation about mutilation of Indian soldiers’ bodies by Pakistan

army, which ultimately resulted in creating hype against the opposite party to the conflict and

public pressure to derail the dialogue process.11

The most ironic is the way news is being

reported by the two news groups directly involved in “Aman ki Asha.”

A very preliminary analysis of the some news clippings reported in Times of India and

The News during border clashes revealed several negative words and phrases that go against the

objective of creating environment for promoting dialogue. For instance, while reporting the

border clash, Times of India held that Pakistani forces “attacked” an Indian posts, “intruded” into

India territory and “ambushed” the posts12

– all terms directly associated with war. Similarly,

7 Gadi Wolfsfeld, Media and the Path to Peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 11. 8 “What is Aman ki Asha, who initiated it, and why?” Aman ki Asha. Last accessed October 3, 2013,

http://amankiasha.com/faqs.asp 9 Imtiaz Gul, “Analysis: Indo-Pak relations and the curse of 24/7 TV” The Express Tribute, May 23, 2013, p. 7. 10 Ali Ahmed, “Dear Indian media, please stop spreading hate” The Express Tribute, January 10, 2013. Last accessed October 3, 2013. http://blogs.tribune.com.pk/story/15573/dear-indian-media-please-stop-spreading-hate/; 11 Beena Sarwar, “LoC tensions: need facts, not hype” Press for Peace, January 20, 2013. Last accessed October 3,

2013, http://pressforpeace.blogspot.com/2013/01/loc-tensions-need-facts-not-hype.html 12 “Pakistan army violates ceasefire, kills five Indian soldiers at LoC” Selection from Regional Press, Vol. 22 No. 15

(2013), 1.

The News while reporting that Pakistan was not involved in these killings adopted a very pro-

Pakistan tone with claims that this attack is based on only “Indian media allegations.” 13

The best approach both should have adopted is to report the facts and to explain what

both parties to the conflict are claiming instead of telling the story from one perspective without

taking into account the claims of the other side. Pakistani report has, to some extent, mentioned

the Indian claim yet the report by Indian paper totally lacks this important element. However,

one cannot reach any conclusion through this preliminary analysis and cannot conclude that

Pakistani media has played a less negative role as compared to Indian media. The point of

consideration is that, whether less or more, media on both sides have failed in playing their role

for promoting peace.

One major obstacle to peace process in India and Pakistan is the negative sentiments of

public against each other. Peace initiatives like “Aman ki Asha,” with its limited approach and

uncommitted behavior, cannot bring an end to this antagonistic attitude toward each other. They

will have to make real changes in their reporting system, should devise a code of conduct, and

should have a monitoring system to ensure that members of media peace groups are complying

with the codes. They ought to understand that they are the ones having power of discourse and

without the right use of this power, peace is impossible in this region. As aptly remarked by

Shamshad Ahmed, “In the absence of ‘Aman ki Bhasha’, the much touted ‘Aman ki Asha’ is

doomed to remain ‘Aman ki Nirasha’.” 14

13 Mariana Baabar, “Pakistan rejects claims of India media on LoC incursions” The News, August 7, 2013, p. 1 14 Shamshad Ahmed, “Aman ki Nirasha” The Nation, August 27, 2013, p. 7

Bibliography

Books

Brustein, William I. Roots of Hate: Anti-Semitism in Europe before the Holocaust.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Howard, Ross. An Operational Framework for Media and Peacebuilding. Vancouver:

Institute for Media, Policy and Civil Society, 2002.

Sells, Michael A. The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and Genocide in Bosnia. London:

University of California, 1996.

Thompson, Mark. Forging war: the media in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Hercegovina.

Bedfordshire: University of Luton, 1999.

Hachten, W.A. The world news prism: Changing media of international communication

(Ames: University of Iowa Press, 1999).

Wolfsfeld, Gadi. Media and the Path to Peace. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

2004.

Articles in Scholarly Journals

Butterwegge, Christoph. "Mass media, immigrants and racism in Germany. A

contribution to an ongoing debate." Communications Vol. 21, no. 2 (1996): 203-220.

Narin, Raymond, Frank Pega, Tim McCreanor, Jenny Rankine, and Angela Barnes.

"Media, racism and public health psychology." Journal of Health Psychology Vol. 11,

no. 2 (2006): 183-196.

Saeed, Amir. "Media, racism and Islamophobia: the representation of Islam and Muslims

in the media." Sociology Compass, Vol. 1, no. 2 (2007): 443-462

Periodicals

“Pakistan army violates ceasefire, kills five Indian soldiers at LoC” Selection from

Regional Press, Vol. 22 No. 15 (2013), p. 1.

Ahmed, Ali. “Dear Indian media, please stop spreading hate” The Express Tribune,

January 10, 2013. Last accessed October 3, 2013.

http://blogs.tribune.com.pk/story/15573/dear-indian-media-please-stop-spreading-hate/

Ahmed, Shamshad. “Aman ki Nirasha” The Nation, August 27, 2013, p. 7

Baabar, Mariana. “Pakistan rejects claims of India media on LoC incursions” The News,

August 7, 2013, p. 1

Gul, Imtiaz. “Analysis: Indo-Pak relations and the curse of 24/7 TV” The Express

Tribune, May 23, 2013, p. 7

Electronic Sources

“What is Aman ki Asha, who initiated it, and why?” Aman ki Asha. Last accessed

October 3, 2013, http://amankiasha.com/faqs.asp

Sarwar, Beena. “LoC tensions: need facts, not hype” Press for Peace, January 20, 2013.

Last accessed October 3, 2013, http://pressforpeace.blogspot.com/2013/01/loc-tensions-

need-facts-not-hype.htm