Despite the military's technological prowess and tactical victories, India's international standing collapsed under the weight of reckless media sensationalism, diplomatic overreach, and the unchecked proliferation of communal hate speech that alienated potential allies. https://thewire.in/media/how-indian-media-sabotaged-its-own-war-efforts
Why did no country stand with us in those four crucial days, like China, Turkey and Azerbaijan did for Pakistan? Why was the International Monetary Fund able to sanction another one billion dollars for Pakistan in the midst of its nuclear sabre-rattling? Why was Trump again able to hyphenate India and Pakistan and throw in the mediation spanner in the works, knowing fully well our historical opposition to it? Why did the international reporting of those four days favour the Pakistani version of events rather than ours?
The answer, perhaps, lies in what Arun Shourie told Karan Thapar in an interview on May 13, that “the Indian media has destroyed our credibility.” With, may I add, not a little help from the government and its right wing cohorts. This ensured that we lost the global perception war.
Media (particularly television) reporting since the Pahalgam incident has been (again in the words of Shourie) no less than “a crime against the country”.
The misreporting of the conflict crossed all limits of fakery, dishonesty and war mongering, studios were converted to mendacious war-rooms where all manner of fiction was concocted: the destruction of Karachi port, the occupation of Islamabad, the imminent fall of Rawalpindi, even the bombing of Kirana Hills and Pakistan’s nuclear installations and the release of radiation (denied by the Indian Air Force and the International Atomic Energy Agency, respectively). Every single hour these channels contradicted the official briefings in Delhi, causing confusion, panic and loss of our credibility internationally.
by Avay Shukla
19/05/2025