DNA Edit | Not rebels, terrorists...but western media plays a wily game

On the first of July, all prominent national US dailies, along with major news agencies, ran a story on how Syed Salahuddin, a Kashmiri “rebel”, had been designated a global terrorist by the US. Indian news platforms also put out stories on the new sobriquet of the Hizbul Mujahideen chief. What distinguished the Indian news reports from the American ones was the latter’s striking preference for the phrase “Kashmiri rebel” when they referred to Salahuddin. A simple phrase it may be, but it is laced with an acute insensitivity for the losses India has suffered in its seemingly interminable duel with Pak-sponsored terrorism on Indian soil. To term Salahuddin as a “rebel” is to grant to the terrorist a legitimacy of which he is even legally undeserving, and is akin to treating him as a hero fighting for the cause of Kashmir — which is miles away from the truth.

Hizbul Mujahiddeen, an organisation headed by him, is responsible for a number of attacks in the state that has snuffed out the lives of not only armed forces personnel, but also countless innocent civilians in the state. Many a US news platform are labouring under the belief that J&K is under a pall of human rights abuses and coercion engendered by the Indian military, while the home and Pak-bred terrorists are braveheart rebels who are oh-so-courageously warding off the depredations of the armed forces. The sooner they disabuse themselves of such nonsense, the better. Contrasted with what is so often projected by a select few media outlets, there is no natural outpouring of collective anger against India in Kashmir. Barring a small, radicalised minority fuelled and egged on by money from Pakistani coffers, the people of the state consider themselves as inalienable citizens of India.

However, that opinion isn’t one that will grab eyeballs, and so journalistic misadventures abound. Another egregious instance of loose reporting is evident from BBC’s coverage of the Amarnath tragedy, as has been pointed out by Rajya Sabha MP and Essel Group chairman Dr Subhash Chandra. BBC has gone on to label the perpetrators of the tragedy as “militants”, and not as terrorists. An organisation with the repute and integrity like that of BBC is keenly attuned to the semantics underlying these labels, and in its wisdom has chosen to slyly ignore Indian concerns. What’s hypocritical is that perpetrators of the attacks in the First World get sanctimoniously labelled as terrorists. Be it 9/11, Manchester, London, Nice or Stockholm, individuals involved in these incidents have been unconditionally referred to as terrorists.