Collusion of Hindutva with Indian Media Exposed

By Sajjad Shaukat

Since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and leader of the extremist party-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power, he has been implementing anti-Muslim and anti-Pakistan agenda with the support of fanatic coalition organisations, as he had got a land sliding triumph in the Indian elections 2014 on the basis of anti-Muslim and anti-Pakistan slogans.

Besides, various developments like unprecedented rise of Hindu extremism, persecution of Muslims, assaults on Muslims, including their places of worships and property by the fanatic Hindu mobs, inclusion of Hindu religious books in curriculum and ban on beef and cow slaughter clearly show that encouraged by the Hindu fundamentalist parties such as BJP, RSS VHP, Bajrang Dal and Shiv Sena, including other similar outfits have been promoting religious and ethnic chauvinism in India by propagating the ideology of Hindutva (Hindu nationalism) which is the genesis of Hindu terrorism.

Besides, by Continuing false flag operations, on Setember18, 2016, New Delhi staged the drama of the terror attack in the Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) at a military base in Uri, close to the Line of Control (LoC) with Pakistan. After the episode, without any investigation, India’s top civil and military officials, including their media started propaganda against Pakistan by accusing that the militants who targeted the Uri base came from Pakistan’s side of Azad Kashmir. By manipulating that false flag terror attack, the BJP-led Indian Prime Minister Modi has also accelerated war-hysteria against Pakistan and instructed Indian forces to continue shelling across the LoC and Working Boundary, which have killed many innocent civilians inside Pakistani side of Kashmir and other nearby villages.

However, BJP-led coalition government of Modi, which is in collaboration with the preachers of Hindutva and those of ‘Bhagwa Atankwad’ (safron terror) is relentlessly promoting their ideologies. In every state election campaign, Bhagwa philosophy based on communalism was used as a driving tool to maximize the Hindutva vote, while affecting the opposition and regional disparities. Even, Indian P.M Modi has also recently claimed that BJP has enhanced influence and made government in twenty states. To further enhance the BJP’s pursued philosophy, a supportive atmosphere is being prepared, where every stakeholder of the Indian society is expressing readiness to shore up wittingly or unwittingly for promotion of Hindutva.

In this regard, on May-June, this year, revelations of the Indian website Cobrapost.Com exposed the dark colours of Hindutva which is in connivance with Indian media.

Cobrapost.Com disclosed that BJP and RSS are exploiting government funds for media management to win elections all over India and are promoting Hindutva ideology. While indicating other instances of Hindutva, it pointed out the recent exposition of ‘Operation 136’ which exposed the real face of Indian media.

In this respect, regarding the ‘Operation 136’, Cobrapost.Com revealed on March 26, 2018:    “Cobrapost investigation exposes many Indian media houses willing to peddle Hindutva, which could lead to communal polarization for electoral gains, and to defame political rivals as part of a malicious media campaign, all for money…covert or overt attempt to misuse Social Media including Facebook to influence India’s electoral process through undesirable means…Well, this is exactly what Operation 136 establishes, for the first time in the history of Independent India.”

Earlier, Cobrapost had come into contact with Indian TV which belongs to Rajat Sharma-an editor known to be close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India’s largest Hindi newspaper Dainik Jagran,  local Uttar Pradesh channel Hindi Khabar, the entertainment and news television company SAB Group, the English newspaper Daily News and Analysis DNA- owned by Zee and Dainik Bhaskar etc., including the news agency UNI, the entertainment channel 9X Tashan, the UP news channel Samachar Plus, the Uttarakhand channel HNN 24×7, the Hindi newspapers “Punjab Kesari” and “Swatantra Bharat”, web portals ScoopWhoop and Rediff.com, IndiaWatch, Hindi newspaper Aaj and the influential Lucknow-based news channel, Sadhna Prime News.

It claimed that none of the business representatives of the media houses seemed to consider it problematic that a client wanted to use their platform to influence the upcoming election to polarise voters and tarnish the reputation of opposition leaders mainly on communal grounds.

The portal said that the media groups agreed to play these because “sangathan” has set aside a budget of Rs. 742 crores for the Karnataka elections alone. It was also revealed that about Rs. 8,000 crores were spent for media management in the last general elections; and that the budget for the 2019 polls will be even more.

In this connection, in order to win the general elections 2019, Modi and the BJP-led coalition of the extremist parties are, again, propagating the ideology of Hindutva by targeting Muslims and Pakistan as part of the, pre-election strategy of the BJP.

As regards the propaganda campaign of the Indian media in support of Modi, it is notable that under the caption “Narendra Modi favourite for 2019 Lok Sabha elections, say US experts”, Indian leading newspaper Hindustan Times wrote on March 14, 2017: “Prime Minister Narendra Modi has emerged as a clear favourite for the 2019 general elections after the BJP’s landslide victory in assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, top US experts on India have said. It was a big win for the BJP. Its candidates won with much larger margin of victory than compared to the two previous winners–BSP and Samajwadi Party.”

Likewise, under the title “Why Narendra Modi Should Be Elected Again the PM of India in 2019”, Mohammed Asif opined in the website Lindinden.Com on October 30, 2016, “In 2014, a history was created when Narendra Modi was elected as the prime minister of India. Since he was elected by the great mass support, he is considered among the most popular leaders ever born in India…Despite of so many critics–from Arvind Kejriwal to Rahul Gandhi…There is much roar…Narendra Modi could win the election in 2019.”

Moreover, following a well throughout plan; BJP is playing anti-Muslim/anti-Pakistan card to gain votes of a majority of Hindus. Earlier BJP intended to create fissures in Muslim voters by blowing up “Triple Talaq” (irrevocable divorce), issue aiming to get votes of Muslim women.

Undoubtedly, we can conclude that the revelations of the Indian website Cobrapost.Com have exposed the dark colours of Hindutva which is in connivance with Indian media at the cost of Muslims, other minority groups and opposition parties such as Congress.