AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
Fighting between India and Pakistan has stopped. That's a welcome development. But when clashes between the two nuclear states broke out, much of India's televised coverage wasn't just exaggerated. It was made up. So we asked NPR's Omkar Khandekar to find out how the coverage affected the people watching and the people driving the violence.
OMKAR KHANDEKAR, BYLINE: When India struck Pakistan in the early hours of 7 May, its government claimed its airstrikes killed more than 100 terrorists in Pakistan. It offered no evidence, but some Indian TV channels ran with it.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #1: (Non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: The channel Zee News identified one of the killed terrorists as Qari Mohammad Iqbal.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #2: Most wanted (non-English language spoken), Qari Mohammad Iqbal, airstrike (non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: A defense expert on the News18 channel described Iqbal like this.
UNIDENTIFIED DEFENSE EXPERT: He was not technically a terrorist operation operator (ph). He was the...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Motivator.
UNIDENTIFIED DEFENSE EXPERT: ...Motivator. He was the radicalizer.
KHANDEKAR: Iqbal was, in fact, a teacher in a Muslim seminary in Poonch, a town in Indian-administered Kashmir. His colleague Izhaar Ahmed says Iqbal died while trying to evacuate students from the ongoing shelling.
IZHAAR AHMED: (Non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: Ahmed says media's portrayal of Iqbal hurt him and the local community. But it wasn't the only thing TV newsrooms got wrong. During the four-day fight, channels like Republic TV claimed that the Indian Navy destroyed Pakistan's busiest port, Karachi.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #3: We're reporting a major attack by the Indian Navy on Karachi.
KHANDEKAR: Times Now Navbharat channel claimed that the Indian army was marching into Pakistan.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Non-English language spoken).
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: ABP News and Zee News channels reported that the Pakistan's army chief Asif Munir has been detained. These things did not happen. Such falsehoods are telling of the relationship between Indian media and the government. This is according to eight analysts NPR spoke to. Praveen Donthi is an analyst with the think tank International Crisis Group. He says...
PRAVEEN DONTHI: The magnitude has sort of gone through the roof of this kind of relationship between the government and the media and journalists. There is also an extra factor of fear and intimidation.
KHANDEKAR: Fear and intimidation - during the conflict, social media company X reported that the Indian government had ordered them to block more than 8,000 accounts within India. This included critical Indian journalists and news websites. Meanwhile, Aaj Tak and Zee news channels aired clips from the Israel strikes on Gaza but claimed it was Indian military strikes on Pakistani cities.
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KHANDEKAR: The Indian government did not publicly call on these channels to stop airing falsehoods. Kapil Komireddi is a political analyst. He says the coverage of some Indian news channels...
KAPIL KOMIREDDI: Was a theater being performed in a gutter.
KHANDEKAR: Komireddi has written several pieces critical of India's treatment of minorities, including Muslims. This time, he says Indian media loyal to the government used the conflict to spread misinformation against Muslims, like the teacher Qari Mohammad Iqbal.
KOMIREDDI: What that demonstrates is what they can get away with and whom they can vilify and villainize in India. Had they done this about, say, a Hindu abbot in Karnataka, they'd be outraged.
KHANDEKAR: NPR reached out to the TV channels as well as the Indian government. They did not respond to our requests for comment. But after the fighting ended, the ruling BJP party shared a video of prominent anchor Sushant Sinha defending misinformation.
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SUSHANT SINHA: (Non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: He says it doesn't matter much even if a couple of news reports were wrong, just like not every missile hits its target. Mitali Mukherjee is the director of Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University. She says the influence of government and pro-government business houses over the media has accompanied a deterioration of press freedom in India.
MITALI MUKHERJEE: It's also an advertising model that is so heavily dependent on government for revenues that it makes some of these news organizations quite beholden through the government.
KHANDEKAR: Back in Poonch, Iqbal's friends and family are still trying to come to terms with his death. Teacher Abdul Hamid says the portrayal of this kind, quiet scholar as a militant still stings.
ABDUL HAMID: (Non-English language spoken).
KHANDEKAR: He says, "we blame Pakistan for trying to divide us, but the bigger forces trying to turn people against each other are within." Omkar Khandekar, NPR News, Poonch.
(SOUNDBITE OF MF DOOM'S "LICORICE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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